Our Guest Joshua Mills
JOSHUA: I couldn’t. I could not. I was absolutely overcome by the Spirit of God. I was overwhelmed by God and it’s a really good thing because I came out of that encounter the next day with more of a hunger for God than I had ever had in my entire life. And I had more of a desire to be with God, spend time in His presence. And one of the overflows from that encounter was this overwhelming desire to praise and worship the Lord with everything that I had. To give my life to God in every single way. And I began sitting down at an old piano that we
SID: Now, but let me take you back.
JOSHUA: Sure.
SID: When you were really young you did what I did. You had piano lessons but
JOSHUA: I did. I did. (laughing)
SID: And they said about you what they should have said about me I just didn’t know and maybe they said it about me. What did they say about you? Huh!
JOSHUA: (laughing) My piano teacher actually told my mother she said you need to stop bringing Joshua to these lessons. You need to save your money. He will never, ever learn how to play the piano. That’s what she said.
SID: Okay. So you have this insatiable desire all of a sudden with this encounter you had with God
JOSHUA: Right.
SID: to worship God. So you sit at the piano knowing you can’t play it and what’s happening?
JOSHUA: And the Holy Spirit literally begins to teach me and instruct me. Just like the Bible says “He will teach you in all things.” And He literally began to teach me and instruct me in praise and worship and teach me how to play the piano. Teach me how to sing songs to Him. And I begin writing hundreds of songs, of praise and worship songs over the next year. Just these songs would just come.
SID: Had you written, had you ever written a song before?
JOSHUA: Oh gosh, probably as a little child I probably wrote something silly but I had never written praise and worship songs. I had never written anything that was significant like what was coming out of me at this time. Absolutely amazing.
SID: Speaking of significant, we have a bonus CD, one of Joshua Mill’s best. And what kind of feedback are you getting on people that listen to your music? And this is a soaking CD which means it’s pure music. And what kind of feedback are you getting?
JOSHUA: You know we had a teacher contact us from Auckland New Zealand who had been dealing with children in her school that were troubled and causing a lot of problems and she said she played the soaking CD in the classroom and she said it actually brought an atmosphere of peace and just, just totally changed the atmosphere completely when she began to play that CD. And the children’s behavior began to change. They became much more compatible, much more behaved, would listen a whole lot more. And she sent us an email just testifying about it and so excited and thanking us that we had created this resource that she could use to change the atmosphere in her workplace.
SID: Well it was supernatural that you played the piano. How long did it take from the time you were fiddling with the piano and realizing hey, I can play this thing! My teacher was wrong!
JOSHUA: (laughs) It was only a matter of months, I think about two or three months and I began to lead praise and worship as part of a youth band at our church and then from there you know it just accelerated and got more invitations to travel around and do that. And you know I’m still travelling today because of what God did in my life supernaturally when I was 16 years old.