Welcome to the Larnie Marshall website!

Biography

Music

My love for music came very early in life.  At the age of 5, I started playing piano.  My sister, who is 9 years older than me, was playing Thompson 5th grade level by that time and after she would finish practicing for her piano lessons, I would go in and play her songs by ear.  So my parents decided that I should start piano lessons at that time.  I started playing guitar at age 8 and at age 12 I started organ lessons at the church.  I also started playing in the school band with some of the brass instruments such as Trombone, French Horn and Trumpet.  From there I started concentrating on voice as well which lead to some wonderful experiences in theatrical productions and eventually a fine arts scholarship to college for voice and piano.

Testimony

I don’t have one of those testimonies about being on the wrong side of the tracks and then finding God.  I have been in church my entire life and accepted Jesus Christ as my personal Savior early in life.  My parents are very devout Presbyterians and took me to church every Sunday.  So I grew up in the Presbyterian church.  At age 16, I started playing the organ for the Lutheran church and transferred my membership there.  While growing up in our small town in Virginia, and coming from a music background, I also toured many churches in many denominations to sing on certain Sunday’s.  During college, I was invited to become the Minister of Music for a Baptist church and so my long line of positions in the church started at that time.  During college I also had the wonderful experience of traveling to Germany (East Germany at that time) to study Martin Luther.  In 1992 I became a member of the Baptist church where I was the Minister of Music and was baptized again through immersion, of course I was infant baptized in the Presbyterian church.  In 1994, I started working for WCFC-TV38, the largest independent Christian TV station in the country at that time.  The majority of the employees there were Assembly of God, and I had never been exposed to a Pentecostal or charismatic type services, nor contemporary worship.  All my life it had always been just hymns.  So I set off to find a church near home that had Praise and Worship as part of the service.  At Living Water, thanks to Ken and Chrystal Hansen, I had found my new calling in music.  For the first time in my life, I was actually able to worship and understand what worship is all about.  Even simple songs like “I love You Lord. And I lift my voice. To worship You. Oh my soul rejoice. Take joy my King. In what You hear. Let it be a sweet, sweet song, in Your ears,” gave worship to me a whole new meaning.  Hymns do have their place in the church, but because that’s all I knew, I was just singing words on a page and wasn’t relating them to me or my heart. Giving people words and melodies that can mean something to them and allow them to truly worship God is one of the most awesome and inspiring things that has ever happened in my life.  I had always considered myself a Christian, but I had never “connected” with God prior to that.  To just “go to church” and go through the motions, doesn’t bring you closer to God.  It becomes just a thing your are expected to do as a Christian on Sundays.  Growing up, I was always taught that the reason you go to church was to hear the message.  Therefore, it would seem that you go to church for what you will get out of it.  In truth, you a attending a “worship service” which means you are going to church to “serve God through worship.”  So attending church shouldn’t be to go and see what you will get out of it that day.  You attend to serve God through worship not expecting anything in return.  To “connect” to God.  Through Praise and Worship, I was finally able to truly “connect” with God and allow the Holy Spirit to start working in my life.  My calling is to do the same for others by leading with Praise and Worship.