Let Your Light Shine

"If we want to shine with the stunning beauty of our heroic Lord, we must allow Him to shape every dimension of how we live into His glorious likeness." -Leslie Ludy

Josh Turner- I Am Second

Josh Turner. The name brings a smile to my face and a joy to my heart! He is with out a doubt my favorite singer EVER! I love love love his deep voice and what he stands for. This interview can be found on the I Am Second website! You can also watch his video interview on the website.

Josh Turner

I had a vision of this long, black shiny train…..

Singing country music, that’s what I’ve always dreamt of doing as a young boy. Growing up in South Carolina, it was out the ordinary to dream such a dream.

I haven’t always been the guy that walks into a room and automatically the attention is on me. I’m normally the guy that stands off in the corner. Singing allowed me to express myself in ways that I wouldn’t be able to do otherwise. I don’t feel like God called me to be a gospel singer. He didn’t call me to be a Christian singer, he called me to be a country singer, and I just happen to be a Christian.

The one thing that I had to overcome was negativity. The idea that dreams can’t really come true, I never wanted to believe in that.

I grew up in a little place called Hannah, South Carolina, a little farming community a long way from any kind of big city. The first real album I owned was Randy Travis’ Storms of Life, and that was the album that really made me start dreaming of the possibility of doing this for a living. I moved to Nashville in 1998 to get a record deal and try to get my foot in the door, and I didn’t really know what I was doing.

God inspired me to write “Long Black Train.” I wrote this song, by myself, in my apartment, and it came to me in a vision. It’s a vision of this long, black, beautiful, shiny train, and people are standing out to the sides of the track, watching this train go by, just craving to get on it. At the same time, they know that this train leads to destruction, it leads to emptiness, it leads to nowhere, but yet they still want to get on it. This train was a physical metaphor for temptation.

I wrote three verses and a chorus that night in my apartment, woke up the next morning, I wrote the fourth verse. And at that moment in time when I laid the pen down, I said nobody’s ever gonna want to hear this. It’s too old-fashioned, it’s too old-timey, it’s a gospel song. So this is probably not going to end up on one of my records in the future.

And a friend of mine walked in and she said, can I hear it? And I was like well, sure. I played it for her, and she said you need to play this for such and such, and so it just snowballed from there. I ended up playing it for recitals, and all kinds of stuff, did demos of it. A girl in my class heard it on that demo, played it for MCA, they heard it. This was the song I played first time on the Grand Ole Opry, and got two standing ovations and an encore– I was completely unknown to the audience that night. It became the title track of my first record, it became my first hit, it helped me sell a million copies of the first record. So there were a lot of people hearing this song, a lot of people being touched by this song.

That was the moment that I realized it’s not about the money, or the fame, or the glory. It’s about changing people, it’s about touching people and influencing people in a positive way, and so from that point on, that’s what I’ve tried to do.

(There’s a long, black train coming down the line, feeding off the souls that are lost and crying. Rails of sin, only evil remains, watch out brother for that long, black train. )

There’s no song that I can write, there’s no record that I can make that’s going to save me. I do need a savior.

(Look to the heavens, you can look to the skies, you can find redemption staring back into your eyes. There is protection, and there’s peace the same, burning your ticket for that long, black train.)

I’m thankful to have Jesus as my savior. My relationship with God has always been one to where I’m talking to him all day, every day, about anything and everything. It’s just a continuous ongoing conversation that I have with the Lord, and I feel like that’s brought me closer to Him. It helps me think through things clearly, I feel like it’s given me wisdom about other people, about myself, about the life that I live. Ultimately, I get my joy from Him, and always put Him first.

My name is Josh Turner, and I am second.

19 Candles, Class, and Fish

Today is my 19th birthday. (*jumps up and down.) Honestly I can't believe I'm 19. Why? Because I always thought people who where this age were old. And look here I am... "old". I look back at my 18th year of life and I can see how God has changed me. A lot has happened this past year. My relationship with God has grown the most. Last spring I was going through a tough time and God held me all the way through. I overcame a addiction a lot of girls go through for various reasons. I was a cutter. My parents never knew (latter they I told them) but my best friend's mom knew. She recommended to me a lady I knew from scrapbooking, Toni. I started seeing her for counseling. Soon we got to the root of the problem and through God's help I overcame it. Toni runs a nursing home with her husband, Jack, who is a RN. They hired me to work for them and it is the most enjoyable job I've had. Now I know what your thinking, "Taking care of old people is fun? What planet did you fall off of?" But seriously it is so great to walk in and see the old people's face light up when they see you! My bosses have been so great letting me work when I'm home on break from school. It really is a great job! Even when Betty is stubborn about taking her pills and Fran is putting you through the "wringer".

College has not exactly been a walk in the park either. There have been moments I have been to the point where I have texted my dad begging him to come get me and take me home. I have lived in the same town, gone to the same church, and been around the same people all my life. So being in a new place, in a new church, and around people I don't know at all has scared me. I saw a quote one time that said "I'm one of those people who is really quite and then you get to know me and BAM I'm a different person." Yep that's me. I have started getting use to living here, my new church, and the people. Many people have said they can tell I've changed a lot since I first came here. I am still not crazy about being here but I am trying to make the most of it. God has a plan for all of this and no matter how hard it is I need to just let Him be in control.


I celebrated with my family before I came back to school. We went to Cheddar's. It was really good I had Tilapia (it is a type of fish) with mango salsa, rice, salad, and a virgin pina colada daiquiri. My family got me a climbing harness package that consist of the harness, chalk bag, chalk, carabiner, and belay device. They also got me a Mountain Hardware rain jacket. It was really fun to hang out with my family before school.

Now today my actual birthday. It has been a great so far! I woke up at 8:30 to a bunch of text messages from people who wished me "happy birthday " on Facebook. I only had one class today (*whoot whoot) Church Music Philosophy. Exciting, right? We shall see how that class goes. Tonight for supper my roommate invited my friends to a party for me tonight in the guys dorm lounge. No one is ever in there so it is perfect! One of my guy friends is from Alaska and he caught a bunch of salmon to bring back to school. So guess what we are having? Salmon, rice, salad, and bread. Sound familiar? What can I say I like fish!

Now for a great laugh because you know you need it. And laughter is good for the soul. I love this guy! He's super funny and I love how puts this! P.S. Number 1 is my favorite ;)