Ronell's Story.

 From Left to Right: Ronell Ragbir, Bruce Carroll, Ginny Owens

 

Here is some more of Ronell Ragbir's touching story for those of you who've watched the "Ministry" video:

In 2006, one of Hope's members was volunteering down at St. Jude’s Target House, where he often played acoustic guitar for the patients and their families.  It was there that he met a 20-year-old young woman named Ronell Ragbir from the country of Trinidad.  Ronell was diagnosed with bone and soft tissue cancer on March 11, 2004—2 weeks before her 18th birthday.  Ronell and her mom came to Memphis a month later to start treatment at St. Jude.  But despite her treatment, including multiple surgeries, her condition worsened.  And eventually, her left leg and part of one of her lung’s had to be amputated.  Unfortunately, her cancer was terminal.

But it turns out that Ronell was an aspiring songwriter and that she had a sort of a “Make A Wish” type dream to record some of her songs.  So the Hope member called Bruce Carroll and we made arrangements for Ronell to come into the studio, which was no small task given her condition.  She had to have a nurse and she traveled with literally a backpack full of medications.  She was undergoing Chemo and would frequently be nauseous.  

Bruce helped Ronell with the music and the arrangements for four songs, and Kerry Kernan, one of our recording engineers, recorded the songs and later had additional musicians come in to finish up the songs—all at no charge to Ronell and her family.  And if this were the end of the story, it would be a great example of the mercy of our Lord, and a testimony to Hope Church and to Bruce’s vision to build The Grove Recording Studios.  But our God was way ahead of us on this one, and it turns out that this was just the beginning of what He was up to.

You see, a few months later, we received an email that had been forwarded to us from Bruce Koblish of the Worship Network in Nashville (Hope folks might know Bruce as the guy who conducts our string section for our Christmas and Easter services).  The email was from the President of Rocketown Records in Nashville, which is the label started by Michael W. Smith.  It was sent out to a who’s-who of the Christian music industry—big time agents and label executives and managers. 

The email briefly told Ronell’s story and said that they were looking to help Ronell put on a concert, and that Dove-award-winning artist, Ginny Owens, had agreed to help out.  Ginny was an artist on Rocketown, and she had lost her sight to a congenital eye disease at the age of two, and Ronell’s story had really touched her.  So the email explained that Ginny was going to come to Memphis, and it seemed like a good idea to get Ronell and Ginny together in a studio, and someone was pretty sure that Bruce Carroll was at a church in Memphis that had a studio, and it asked if anyone knew for sure. 

Bruce and I just scratched our heads in amazement of our great God and what He was up to!  They, of course, did not know that we had already been working with Ronell for months and, of course, were more than happy to use the studio again to bless Ronell—this time with Ginny Owens.  So Ginny, Ronell, Bruce, and Kerry came into the studio on Feb 28th and March 1st, 2007.  Ginny and Ronell co-wrote and recorded a song entitled “Say Amen” that became the title track of what, along with the four songs we had previously recorded with her, became a 5-song CD. 

Without cost to her, we helped design her CD package and pressed up 1,000 CDs for her to have at her upcoming concert.  A few weeks later, Ronell did indeed perform her songs live (something she had never done before), with Ginny Owens as the opening act and Bruce Carroll, Donna Hauth, and some of the musicians from Hope as her backing band.  Afterwards, she spent more than an hour signing autographs to long lines of people that were inspired and edified by her heart-wrenching but uplifting story of faith and courage as she "walked in the valley of the shadow of death." 

Just a week or so later, Ronell celebrated her 21st birthday on March 28th, 2007.

She passed away on June 7th, 2007.

While Ronell is deeply missed, we look forward to that bright and glorious day when we will again be with our dear Sister and join in that innumerable choir as together we all "Say Amen!" 

--Matthew Temple


Listen to Ronell and Ginny with their version of Say Amen:

Also, be sure to check out Ginny's entire album entitled Say Amen at the following locations:

GinnyOwens.com
iTunes