“I can probably count on one hand the number of times that I’ve watched anything that has that kind of reaction out of me,” said British YouTuber Charlie Smith as he discussed his experience hearing The Tabernacle Choir for the first time with The Stick of Joseph YouTube Channel. “I don’t think I’ve ever been shaking by the end of anything that I’ve watched.”

And indeed, Charlie Smith, who is not a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has a whole channel devoted to discovering music. He films his reactions to videos that are submitted to him every day, so for a reaction to be this level of a standout means something. He had a fan submit The Tabernacle Choir’s versions of both “Wayfaring Stranger” and “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing” and he was visibly moved by the experience. (See the video below):

 This video and his channel were quickly flooded by loving comments from members of the Church and it wasn’t long before someone offered to fly him to Utah for the quickly approaching general conference to see the choir in person. With an expired passport, he initially brushed off the offer, but when the offers kept coming, he decided to see what it would take to make his passport valid in time.

And so it was that Charlie Smith got to sit in the conference center among an audience full of visitors from around the world to hear the choir in person. “It was incredible,” he says of the experience, “I knew it would be.” He loved the music and the choir, which was the main reason that he came, but he discussed with the hosts of The Stick of Joseph how much the messages resonated with him as well.

He liked the “messages for the future and how to step into it” and appreciated that there were teachings for people of all ages. Smith himself grew up in the Church of England and though he regularly attended church as a young child, he began to step away as an adolescent. He sought comfort from his problems in other arenas that weren’t always the healthiest ways to cope. At one point, facing broken relationships and failing finances, he says, “I got to a point where I was suicidal. I just felt I couldn’t take it anymore…I was just broken every day…at some point, I think I just looked to the sky and said, ‘If you’re there, just help me out, man. I really need some help right now.”

And help came. Though Smith says he’s no scripture scholar and he hasn’t found a church to attend regularly, the divine help he saw in his life has brought him a personal relationship with God again. He and the hosts of The Stick of Joseph channel had a wonderful interfaith discussion about that journey. The video of their full conversation is below.

As for Charlie Smith’s visit to general conference? He was able to come and meet the choir after the session. When his host said, “would you like to talk to them?” he thought she meant casually interact with them one by one, but it was only once he entered the theater where they were having lunch in the audience seats that he understood she meant talk to them, like speak to them as a whole. With three seconds notice, he was supposed to say something to this audience of 300.

“Usually, I’d be very nervous with something like that. I’m not very good at public speaking…but it felt like I was speaking to family.” He says they showed him so much love as he was walking down the steps and it felt like both parties were just so happy to see other. “It really was one of the most amazing experiences of my life.”

“I’ve really seen the hand of God in this whole thing,” says Smith, “I feel I was meant to come, for sure.”

See the full interview with Charlie Smith on The Stick of Joseph in the video below: