Related Link Purchase John Tesh: Worship at Red Rocks

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A Conversation with John Tesh

By Mark Weber
Guest reviewer

CBN.com – When former Entertainment Tonight co-host John Tesh isn't hosting his popular "John Tesh Radio Show: Music and Intelligence For Your Life," currently heard on about 160 stations in the U.S. and Canada, or leading worship at a Messianic evangelical church he and his wife, actress Connie Selleca, attend, he keeps busy making Christian music. Tesh's latest project, a double CD and DVD, "Live Worship At Red Rocks," releases ten years to the day since his original "Red Rocks" release.

"Red Rocks, I believe," says Tesh, "was my first true intimate experience with the Holy Spirit. It's one of those things where it never should have happened and it never should have worked. It rained really hard during it, we never should have been able to get it taped, and it never should have become a PBS special -- one of their most successful specials ever -- but it did all those things. When God has his hand on something, it just jumps through hoops and that's what happened with 'Red Rocks.' That's why I wanted to go back and be even more honest by doing worship music there."

Growing up Methodist, it wasn't until Tesh met Selleca, who invited him to her church, where he got to know Jesus in a close and intimate way. Now Jesus is his driving force.

"I feel like my role is to tell people, 'Hey, listen, you know I've tried all this stuff--I've tried driving a Mercedes or being the most popular kid on the block or having people recognize you and getting a good table at a restaurant -- it's not where it's at," he says. "It's about having an afterlife and it's only going to happen with your faith in Jesus."

Tesh and his wife often spend time together at a place you wouldn't expect: "When I want wisdom, I go to a 90-year-old and I hang out," he says. "My wife and I hang out at this retirement home. We have lunch over there all the time. We talk to Mo, Bob, Ann and Mariana, and we ask them, 'What mistakes did you guys make? What's the one thing you missed? What would you want to do over?' and mostly its about going deeper in their faith and spending more time with their families."

Family is important to Tesh, and he wants his work on the radio and on CDs and DVDs to be family riendly -- but not safe or bland.

"I'm big into the family-friendly stuff, but it drives me crazy sometimes when radio stations, every ten seconds, say 'we're safe for the whole family.' We can all figure that out," he says. "One of the reasons I left TV was because it was so horrible. I think it takes a lot of effort to be intelligent, funny and family-friendly. It's so much easier to have porno on or violence. A lot of people equate family friendliness with bland so we're big into making it exciting and fun -- like a 'Shrek' experience -- and something that's also intelligent."

With "Live Worship At Red Rocks," Tesh wants to encourage people to have faith and live a worshipful life all the time, not just on Sunday at church. He hopes that people will be encouraged by his music to live their life in a way that reaches lots of people who may or may not know Jesus in a personal way.

"I think that Christians have to be careful not to get trapped in their churches. What's happening is that we're hiding in these megachurches and people from the outside world are seeing Christians meeting together and closing everybody out," he says. "Remember, church is a training ground for you to go out into the world and that's what I would encourage Christians to do -- take what you learn in that church, go out and be wisdom, salt and light in the areas where you're needed."

For more info, visit www.teshmedia.com