I can’t claim to be a Hebrew scholar but one thing I do know is that the Lord will provide. The name Jehovah-Jireh was coined by Abraham in Genesis chapter 22 and is one of many names for God in the Old Testament.

Setting out on the Homegrown Worship journey I knew that it wouldn’t be easy financially. Recording new songs and sharing them every week takes up a lot of time and eats up a lot of money. I look forward to the day when our songs are receiving millions of weekly streams, but to begin with all we look set to do is to lose money each week. However, when you obediently follow God’s instructions, it’s amazing to see how things actually pan out.

I learned to trust God’s provision for my ministry early on.

When I was sixteen I was in an evangelistic pop band in Sheffield called Elevation. Thankfully you won’t find evidence of my breakdancing on YouTube however we did travel around the country doing gigs and even performed in front on thousands of people at the Sheffield arena. Having been travelling for over a year doing concerts, we desperately wanted to make an album that we could share with people at events. This was the nineties and it wasn’t quite as easy for unsigned bands to release their own music, but we wanted to give it a go.

We priced up either making an album with a producer or buying the gear we needed to do it ourselves. My sister who was also in the band encouraged the band to invest into my skills as a producer so we thought we’d like to build up our studio equipment to try and make radio-ready productions. We were all students and didn’t have the £1500 we needed -  it was a lot of money back then :). Our plan was simple - we prayed.

Instead of our weekly band practise in my parents cellar, we spent time praying for God’s provision.

The next day we received a double payment from a gig.

The day after that, a gig that said they couldn’t pay us sent us some money.

We then had a surprise gift from one of the band member’s parents.

One week after our prayer meeting, we were performing at a church in Sheffield called The Kings Centre, a wonderful place where some of the band attended at the time. We played a couple of songs during the morning service and had no idea what God was organising as we shared our songs. At the end of the service, a lady approached my sister to say that she’d felt God speak to her during our song ‘Don’t Stop’. She has a prophetic vision about how our music would reach audiences and people overseas and that we wouldn't even see firsthand the fruits of our ministry. She also felt the Lord ask her to write us a cheque for £1,000 which she did and we banked.

We had all the money we needed for our album within one week.

God thank You that you are my provider. You have shown me time and time again that I can trust You.

Andy Baker, Chief Enthusiast, Homegrown Worship