Leola Resident Plays Messianic Music

Mark Pearl's childhood home in the greater northeast region of Philadelphia is not so many miles from Leola, but it is a different world culturally.

Pearl's life now is spiritually distant from his upbringing as well. Pearl's penchant for playing Messianic music represents his journey from an 11-year-old who did not want to attend Hebrew school and lobbied for a Christmas tree rather than a menorah.

By the time Pearl was 17, one of his mother's sisters, who had married a Christian, had convinced his parents to attend a Baptist church. Pearl was not any more enamored of church than he had been with Hebrew school. "I'm looking at Big Ben on the wall (because) I can't wait for 12 o'clock so I can fly out of there," recalled Pearl.

"But God's Word never goes void," stated Pearl. "I would say I was born again in 1975." From 1977 to 1979, Pearl did a stint in the Air Force. By the mid-1980s, Pearl was living with Christian friends in Norristown who introduced him to the music of artist Keith Green. "(Green's music) just blew me out of the chair," said Pearl, who wanted to meet the singer until his friends informed him Green had been killed in a plane crash in 1982.

When Pearl's parents moved to Lancaster County, he joined them. In 2015, he began attending the Seed of Abraham - a Messianic congregation of Jewish and Gentile believers, then meeting in Lititz. Pearl became familiar with the music of Paul Wilbur, known for his Messianic worship songs, and Lamb, a Messianic group comprising Joel Chernoff and the late Rick Coghill. Pearl began covering their tunes in his presentations. "I consider myself a Messianic Jew," said Pearl, who wears a yarmulke and prayer shawl during his musical performances. "A lot of people in this area don't know the Jewish side of the Gospel, and that's what I present to them," he said. "When you hear Messianic music, you feel you're in Israel."

In addition to his solo presentations, Pearl has performed with the recently disbanded Lancaster Christian band known as Saved Renegade.

Readers who would like to learn more about Pearl's music may contact him at 717-645-3628 or email mmpearl@comcast.net.