(We’re coming up on an anniversary of this concert from back in early November 2002, which I always list as my favorite show ever, just slightly ahead of dc talk in Hersheypark Arena in April 1999. What I remember about this 2002 show was the wonderful humility of all of the performers who ministered to us. And there is no better song than Third Day doing “Agnus Dei” … at this concert, Michael W. started his song off as a ballad and Third Day turned on the power, ending it with a powerful flourish. Truly great, and I remember it like yesterday, seven years later … dave o’c)

HERSHEY — Mac Powell saw the guy in the front row almost as soon as he and the other Third Day musicians moved to the very front edge of the stage.

There was William, covered in tattoos, among the 10,500 people inside a jam-packed Giant Center, and Powell chuckled.

“That’s the kind of fan Third Day has,” the band’s singer said, compared with the perhaps slightly more sedate fans of Michael W. Smith, the main performer at Friday night’s “Come Together and Worship” event here.

With that, Third Day’s bass player Tai Anderson, himself a strapping dude in a cowboy hat, went over and gave William the Fan his best football-ish, fist-five salute.

As shown by William, not to mention the mix of music offered by Smith and Third Day, there certainly was diversity among the faithful who gathered by the river actually, inside the new arena.

And the combination of music and the motivational preaching of author and speaker Max Lucado all made Friday’s event one of the better Christian music concerts of recent years.

But the term “concert” isn’t really accurate. By design, it was more praise and worship than performance and entertainment.

Smith, among the most popular Christian music performers, didn’t do his best-known songs, like “Friends.” Nearly everyone has probably heard the tune and its “A friend’s a friend forever…” refrain at a graduation somewhere.

Instead, he was Michael W. Smith, worship leader, and the sparkling new arena was a giant church — one with hockey banners, no less.

The combination met just about every interest. There was Third Day’s thundering (but sometimes light and melodic) guitar-fueled rock, led by Powell’s powerful vocals, along with headliner Smith’s extremely catchy keyboard-based pop.

Third Day’s set had several songs found on its best-selling, harder-edged worship album, “Offerings.”

They ranged from “These Thousand Hills” to the slower “King of Glory” and “Your Love Oh Lord,” with the whole arena clapping to the whap-whap-whap-whap drum-and-organ intro.

Despite the band’s Allman Brothers-ish, Black Crowes-ish sound — like them, Third Day’s also from Georgia — the group’s best song Friday may have been the slow and beautiful “Love Song,” also from “Offerings.” It featured Powell and guitarist Mark Lee, playing an acoustic.

Smith’s set would have been familiar to anyone who owns his platinum-selling “Worship” album from a year ago.

That project, along with his newest album “Worship Again,” recently made him the only artist, Christian or mainstream, with two albums in Billboard’s top 100.

Backed by an extremely professional band, Smith’s trademark voice led the crowded house on “Here I Am to Worship,” “Open the Eyes of My Heart,” “Above All” and Rich Mullins’ “Awesome God.”

Lucado, a popular Christian speaker and the author of such best-selling books as “He Chose the Nails,” popped up intermittently with messages of several minutes each.

At one point, the Texan challenged the crowd to give up an area of their lives they’re hanging onto — money, children, their jobs — and asked “What’s your Isaac?” Lucado’s reference was to Abraham in the book of Genesis, who, being tested by God, was asked to give up his only son.

The concert ended as it should have, with Smith’s moving “Agnus Dei.” He played softly on piano while he sang the gentle “Ha-a-al-le-lu-ja,” and then Third Day joined him for its harder-rock version.

The 16-date “Come Together and Worship” tour is getting perhaps as much mainstream press attention as any Christian music tour in recent memory, and the concerts are being held in, and often selling out, some of the country’s larger arenas.

There also have been pieces about the tour in USA Today and on the “Today” show.

At Friday’s show in the new Giant Center, several fans said the sound system was excellent across the bright, airy arena, and the staff was cheerful in helping crowd members find their way around.

On the down side, traffic outside was… well, a challenge, and the church vans and cars trying to get in and out of the parking lot probably had plenty of people praying for patience.