Al Andrews and Janice Gaines: The Power of Connection

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About the Episode

Al Andrews and Janice Gaines, champions of Christ through their professions, share how vulnerability has fostered connection to others and God throughout their career journeys, and how hope prompted them to take action toward the greater good.

Intentionally Connecting. Sharing Suffering. Choosing Hope.

Founder and Executive Director of Porter’s Call Al Andrews and prominent gospel artist Janice Gaines sat down with Dr. Greg Jones at Belmont’s Hope Summit in October to illustrate how God’s presence led them to their true callings and demonstrate the power of connection through meaningful conversations.

“I would describe hope as a choice. The circumstances of life will present themselves. As younger people say, ‘life be lifin’,” Janice shared. “But in that, I choose to believe that there's good ahead for me and those that I love.”

“The man who pets bees is the man who believes it's worth the risk of a sting for the potential of a connection,” Al added. “My father would move toward his enemies and find a way to connect, because when you have an enemy, most times if you're face to face and you have a desire to move forward, you can.”

This episode covers…

• How cultivating connections with a diverse range of people nurtures empathy and erases preconceptions and biases toward people different from you. 
  
  
• The peace that comes from trusting in God despite the circumstances, and how trusting in God enables artists and visionaries to grow stronger through uncertainty. 
  
  
• The importance of vulnerability and authenticity about hardships, demonstrating to others that they are not alone.

Conversations with Friends

Discussing how connections have played a role in Porter’s Call, Al reflected on how his awareness of the world’s need for connections, particularly in the hard-to-crack music industry, inspired the creation of his company.

“The name comes from my wife. Found it in the Rules of St. Benedict, a document written in about 500 AD, and its rules on how to live in the monastery,” Al explained. “A Porter's job was hospitality. And so if an artist walks in our door today, we help them find the way to what they need.”

Continuing his point, Al dissected his philosophy around connection, and how true connection will always have the power to create change.

“When I think of the word connection, it's such an essential word, because if you don't connect with someone, you live in a fantasy world,” he said. “As soon as there's a face, things change. And I think that's true with artists as we've connected them, they find safety in that connection and walls fall down.”

Building on how connection breaks barriers, Janice shared her perspective on how connection can build love even in the face of discrimination and offered hope to those who may be experiencing what she went through as a black woman in the industry.

“I have experienced things that could make me pause to make connections in different spaces, and those pauses are very real in every society,” she revealed. “And so I want to encourage the listener who's in pain to move toward connection instead of making generalizations that only serve to isolate us and rob us of hope and connection.”

An Everlasting Peace

As both guests were inspired by their faith to begin and continue their callings, Al emphasized how the stories in the Bible result in human beings’ love for stories, and how stories and perspectives open space for empathy and inner peace.

“Most of the Bible is contending and then moving toward resolve,” Al offered. “Story connects us all. Empathy comes from knowing what our stories are like, and we can have hope that there can be change in healing and move toward resolve and revelation.”

Expanding on her own story, Janice credited her faith for her ability to hear God’s words and trust His knowledge over her own in all areas of her life.

“I think a lot of times we approach faith as, ‘If I have this faith, then it means I have all the answers and I don't need to ask the questions,’” Janice explained. “But I think faith comes by hearing, and hearing comes by the word of God, and how can I hear if I don't ask him what I need to hear?”

Janice continued on the relationship between her faith and her calling, illustrating how music brought her closer to God and fueled her drive toward loving others through music.

“There's something that gets down to the soul when it comes to music,” Janice expressed. “It seeps into our souls. I found that even when I would be porting at Porter's Call, sometimes I would sit there and I would know the next thing to do was sing a song.”

The Pathway to Change

As the guests built on the role connection has played in each of their lives, Janice broke down the importance of sharing vulnerability to receive it, and how it is the most effective means of coping with grief and hardship.

“I have found that vulnerability begets vulnerability,” Janice maintained. “Any suffering that I've experienced has been in the moment when you're smack dab in some kind of grief. The only relief is that there is someone else who presents themselves to you and is ahead of you and says, ‘actually, there is hope down the road.’ And it doesn't negate what you're feeling, but it can get better.”

Concluding the conversation, the guests shared their perspectives about how hope leads to meaningful action, and promotes good within the world. Janice explained how intentionality is heavily involved in hope.

“Hope in action starts at thoughts for me,” Janice said. “I think it comes down to choices from my thoughts to my words, to my actions, every day moving in the direction of hope instead of another direction.”

Al added to that, explaining how hope not only inspires an individual who prioritizes hope, but also inspires the people around them. 

“Hope in action is implanting something that gives someone a forward feeling,” Al concluded. “Hope is people moving towards something they never dreamed could happen. I just think it's people that are doing good in this world.”