Grace Mills River Church Puts on Concert to Benefit Black Mountain Home

Austin Sebek (Left) posing with Hearthsong for a picture on stage

Grace Mills River Church in Mills River, Nort Carolina put on a benefit concert on November 21st that attracted a variety of Christian artists from Asheville to Nashville. The concert was in benefit of Black Mountain Home, a children's home Northeast of Mills River. The nonprofit is home for many children who have been orphaned by a variety of circumstances. Their home was left devastated by the recent hurricane.    

Hurricane Helene was one of the costliest storms in history, causing an estimated $200 billion in damage and a death toll that has surpassed 130 people across six states, according to numbers from Science News and Britannica. There was so much damage done, and it leaves the question, how can nonprofits like Black Mountain Home rebuild after suffering over $5 million in damage. Black Mountain Home president, Jimmy Harmon, said, “God is so faithful, we will rebuild and I believe that he will restore us, not back to where we were, but he will take us further.”

Behind the Concert for Black Mountain Home

Harmon said that they are very blessed to be chosen by Grace Mills River Church as the recipient for their benefit concert. Andrew Kerhoulas is the associate pastor at the church and had the idea of a benefit concert for Black Mountain Home, after listening to a sermon that tugged at his heart. His band, Hearthsong, consists of Chris Godley, Brother K, and Christian Singleton. Singleton invited Jess Ray, Taylor Leonhardt, and Austin Sebek. Singleton said that “Everyone was just really willing to do it.”

Singleton is a local music artist and the drummer for Hearthsong. She started playing music at her local church when she was around 7 years old and met fellow Hearthsong member, Chris Godley in middle school. They started a band and played through college until they split up, leaving Singleton to produce music on her own. She currently sits at nearly half-a-million monthly listeners on Spotify, thanks in part to a collaboration with Hillsong Recording. However, she still hasn’t been able to pursue her music full time and currently works at a homeless shelter as her nine to five. Her goal within the next few years is to become a full-time musician like Ray and Leonhardt have been able to do.

Leonhardt is from Nashville, Tennessee and Ray is from Raleigh, North Carolina. They are singer-songwriters who have been in the music industry for nearly a decade now. Although they both loved music growing up, they didn’t decide to pursue music full time until their mid-20s.  Leonhardt said that she had a journey similar to most 20-year-olds, asking the question, “What am I supposed to do with my life?” She tried a lot of different jobs and planned to be a teacher after grad school. She’d still been writing songs as a hobby until she had an experience that changed her life. “I got to play my songs for a room full of people and just kind of felt like, I think this is it. I don't need to go looking anywhere else. This is what I want to do.”

She met Ray a couple years after that, and they’ve been close friends ever since. They’ve traveled and performed together for years. Even when money was tight at the beginning, they made do. Leonhardt said there were “Lots of early tours together where we shared a hotel room and a Chipotle bowl, just really trying to cut the cost.” Ray added jokingly that, “We get our own Chipotle bowls now and we feel like we've made it.” The two concert headliners have a deep connection to the state of North Carolina. Ray has always lived there and Leonhardt was born and raised in the state, and then lived there for 10 years. Ray said she’s “Just heartbroken over what happened a few months ago with the hurricane and the flood…everybody's, trying to figure out a way to help, and this is a tiny way, but we are ready. We're ready to help.”

Jess Ray, Austin Sebek, and members of Hearthsong with their crew and loved ones in the green room before the concert.

Ray and the other performers helped 170 children and many more staff members at Black Mountain Home through donations from this concert. The children there have been orphaned by circumstance or the family court system. Many of them have been abused, neglected, or abandoned. This nonprofit gives these children a place to call home, and a family environment with a mom and a dad in each house.

                Black Mountain Home also has a building for medically fragile children who were addicted to drugs or had fetal alcohol syndrome. They also have an independent living program for children over the age of 18 that want to learn a trade or go to school. “Our continuum of care starts at birth and goes through college and beyond.” Harmon said.

A Black Mountain Home employee poses in front of a donations table.

                Harmon told multiple stories about overcoming challenges that the hurricane had caused. They’d tapped into an old well that had been on campus for 100 years and were able to have fresh water. People from all over the country were bringing food, but one night, they planned to serve nachos and only had about eight pounds of meat for everybody. Harmon said that God will provide. He was the last one to get food and there were still two cups of meat left.

Harmon described walking outside afterwards and seeing a double rainbow. 

“And then underneath that double rainbow flew a helicopter…The helicopter lands there in front of the kids. They throw out five cases of water on one side and two Starlinks on the other. They wave at the kids, and they take off.” Harmon said that “in the midst of an hour, God showed his provision. He showed his promise, and he showed his protection.”

Black Mountain Home president Jimmy Harmon showing pictures while speaking at the concert

Harmon said that he won’t put a cap on God, and he believes that Black Mountain Home will end up better off than it was before the hurricane. 

“We will see the blessings of God in ways that we cannot imagine,” he said. The children’s home is already on their way to reaching their goals thanks to the $33,000 that was raised by the concert. If you feel called to give to Black Mountain Home, you can do that here.