If you somehow managed to miss the swing dance flash mobs, the colorful chalk advertisements all over Grounds and the group of students in AFTERDARK T-shirts tossing out flyers on the Lawn, you really must have had a lot of midterms. For everyone who got the memo, you had the chance to experience AFTERDARK, an event “where music and message meet” that featured heartthrobs Ben Rector and Tyrone Wells.
Despite the event’s billing, music wasn’t the main purpose of the event. Joe White, highly acclaimed speaker and former Texas A&M assistant football coach, presented the performance’s true colors, speaking on the the topic, “Is Jesus Relevant Today?” Music was, however, central to the event. Special guest and opener on Ben Rector’s tour, Tyrone Wells, sang a quick set with just a microphone and a guitar before the night got underway. In such an intimate setting, he immediately developed a personal relationship with the crowd, cracking jokes and telling stories.
After Tyrone left the stage, speaker Joe White promptly took over, building on the mood that Tyrone set by reciting a poem relating directly to the University community. He went on a rhyming tangent reciting stanza after stanza of descriptions like “Greeks and freaks.” Just when we all thought he was about to run out of breath, he took in a quick gasp and kept going.
His poem eventually did come to an end, leaving him breathless and the crowd amazed, but the jokes never did seem to cease. Then, suddenly, the lights dimmed and a video began to play on the topic of what it meant to be significant in this world. Everyone forgot where White was until he reappeared among the crowd when the lights turned back on, carrying a big wooden log. He brought the log to the stage and chopped at it with an axe. As wooden bits flew everywhere, he assumed the role of a Roman cross builder, calling himself the “scum of the ghetto,” but revealing that the prophet Jesus gave him hope.
When reassuming his authentic role as Joe White, he explained, “That’s the love of a dad.” Joe related Jesus to fathers, explaining his enduring, unconditional love and emphasizing the sacrifice of himself to allow forgiveness of all his “children.” He told lengthy stories packed with emotion — stories of NFL linebackers crying their eyes out at hearing this message, his testing struggle with cancer and the story of Team Hoyt, a father-son tandem where the father pushed his disabled son in a wheelchair through triathlons and marathons. All of these stories related to his main premise that Christ’s love of his people mirrors the love of a father.
Joe ended his testament by setting up the cross that he built on the stage, and allowing students to come up and nail a piece of paper on which they had written their sins. This somber mood lasted for 10 minutes or so, until Ben Rector took the stage, lightening the mood and getting everyone up on their feet.
Constantly attempting to get the crowd to yell, Ben’s enthusiasm was catching. Clad in an untied bowtie, a grey blazer and some high-water dress pants, he stole hearts while crooning “There’s nothing like you and I, baby” in his opening number “No Ordinary Love.” Following that with summer anthem, “Thank God For The Summertime,” he tapped into his country roots, recounting his summers full of wiffle ball and Carrie Underwood’s rendition of the National Anthem.
The crowd only got louder when he announced he was doing a cover for his final song, and began belting out Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance With Somebody.” As hundreds of students piled out of the arena, many continued singing Houston’s hit song at the top of their lungs, without fear of judgment. It seemed that the answer to the question the talk proposed, ‘Is Jesus Relevant Today?” was yes, according to the couple hundred U.Va. students that attended AFTERDARK.
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