Vicki Winans celebrates Resurrection Sunday with Greater Cleveland Avenue
Photo by Timothy Ramsey
Nationally renowned gospel singer Vicki Winans performs during the Resurrection service at Greater Cleveland Avenue Christian Church.
BY TIMOTHY RAMSEY
FOR THE CHRONICLE
Easter Sunday is celebrated by churches across the country in a myriad of ways. The congregation of Greater Cleveland Avenue Christian Church at 5095 Lansing Drive featured gospel singer Vicki Winans for their Resurrection Sunday Service.
Winans has been connected with Greater Cleveland since she met lead pastor Bishop Sheldon McCarter 20 years ago at the Great Family Gathering the church held at the Benton Convention Center and they have been the best of friends since then.
“Our friendship has been tremendous and what makes Vicki different and unique is the fact that she is so touch-able and friendly to everyone,” said McCarter.
The idea to bring Winans to Greater Cleveland on Easter Sunday was that of Bishop McCarter’s eldest daughter Alana, who said she thought Winans would be excellent to headline the Easter service based on the close ties she has had with the family for all these years.
“I love him; I love his ministry; what he does, and his beautiful wife and daughters,” said Winans. “They always have been cream of the crop and I have met millions of people, but it’s very few you can just pick up right where you left off, but he is one of those people.”
Bishop McCarter reiterated the point by saying, “I’ve seen her outside of the church at a conference or something and she sees me and I see her, and it doesn’t matter who either one of us are with, we will just hang out. ”The Greater Cleveland Avenue choir kicked things off with exceptional singing that brought everyone to their feet and even bringing some out of their
pews and into the aisle. The children of the church then performed an interpretative mime dance routine, followed by a tandem routine performed by church members Stephanie Burrison and Courtney Smith.
Winans took the stage and had everyone in stitches as she prefaced her performance with a little comedy and spoke about her longtime friend-ship with the McCarter family. Winans sang beautifully even though she was supposed to be resting her voice, but said she definitely was not going to miss this event. She went on to say that the songs that she sang were all requested by friends from Greater Cleveland and even sang an encore song requested by the Bishop himself.
Bishop McCarter’s sermon centered around the phrase “The struggle is real, but the benefits are better,” touching on the fact everyone goes through a struggle at some point in time in their lives, but you have to persevere because the reward that comes after the struggle will be well worth it.
Winans also spoke about her jewelry line that will be released later this year and told everyone there is no limit to what you can make in life. She wants to use this as a springboard to teach other young women that this is easy to do and the revenue can be used for such things as college tuition.
