Six Birmingham choirs to join for M-POWER event

Six Birmingham-area church choirs will join in a concert for Birmingham’s M-­POWER Ministries March 11. 
  
The event, Sing & Shout, will be held at 5 p.m. in the Alys Stephens Center’s Jemison Concert Hall on the University of Alabama at Birmingham campus.
  
The choirs — including one from Brookwood Baptist Church, Mountain Brook, in Birmingham Baptist Association — will sing separately and then join to form a mass choir with more than 300 voices.
  
M-POWER is a faith-based, social services ministry that operates a variety of seasonal programs and has five major ongoing ministries. 
  
The ongoing ministries consist of the only free acute care medical clinic in Jefferson County, a dental clinic, the largest adult literacy program in Alabama, free after-school tutoring and summer programs and Birmingham’s only Christian Women’s Job Corps program.
  
Several groups support M-POWER, including Birmingham Association, several of its member churches and the North American Mission Board.
  
“We have a long-standing relationship with M-POWER,” said Robert Barandon, worship pastor at Brookwood Baptist. “It will be a blessing to worship with other Christians in the city to encourage M-POWER and what their ministry is about.” 
  
More than 900 attended the first Sing & Shout last year and organizers are expecting that many for this year, said Ryan Hankins, M-POWER executive director.
  
“It’s a chance to share … about what we do in the community,” he said.
  
In addition to Brookwood Baptist, choirs from Trinity Baptist Church, Covenant Presbyterian Church, Guiding Light Church, More Than Conquerors Faith Church and Trinity United Methodist Church will be singing.
  
For more information and tickets, visit www.singandshout.org or call M-POWER at 205-595-5959 or the Alys Stephens Center box office at 205-975-2787. (TAB)