"Not only possible, but it's really easy to do," said guitarist Juan DeVevo. "He really just wants you to talk to Him. He wants to show you the truth. The people who already do have a relationship with God, we want that relationship to grow and get closer. There's a lot of people vying for your attention these days. We just want you to know that God wants a part of that--if not the whole thing."

Casting Crowns, which is on tour to support its latest album "The Altar and the Door," is taking a unique approach to capture fans' attention during its shows. The Georgia-based group has brought on tour painter/YouTube phenom Marc Eckel and his ministry "Splat Experience."

"He just takes paint from a bucket, slaps it on a canvas but when he's done, you see exactly what he's painting. He paints during two of our songs. It's really incredible. One's called 'The Word is Alive;' it talks about Scripture and how it can speak to people. And 'Voice of Truth' which talks about how God can speak to you through His work. It's really cool how it works out. It really helps getting the message across."

Casting Crowns and its singer, Mark Hall, have been nominated for six GMA Dove Awards. The awards ceremony will take place April 23 at Nashville's Grand Ole Opry House.

DeVevo--who is joined in the band by drummer Andy Williams, violinist Melodee DeVevo, guitarist Hector Cervantes, keyboardist Megan Garrett and bassist Chris Huffman--talked to LiveDaily about debuting high on The Billboard 200 album chart, their opening bands and how God lends a hand with the songwriting process.

LiveDaily: Your latest album, "The Altar and the Door," debuted at No. 2 on The Billboard 200 album chart, behind "High School Musical 2." Did you expect it would do so well?

Juan DeVevo: No. We just did another CD. We had some things to say. We had people calling us saying, "You guys are on Billboard right after 'High School Musical 2'." People were asking us if we were disappointed because we weren't No. 1. I thought, "If I have to come in second, if it's behind 'High School Musical 2,' that's OK." You realize what a big music thing that is. Everybody's buying that CD. All our middle schoolers [at their respective churches] know about "High School Musical." I haven't even seen it yet. But that was incredible. I don't even know how to express it right now. You don't usually see things show up like that. It's usually the normal people that you see on that chart. God just blessed us and we actually stayed on the chart for a couple weeks. If that gets the word out, and we get to do a couple interviews with people we weren't able to get to before, that gives us a chance to get the message out there.

Why did you decide to name your album "The Altar and The Door"?

For a lot of people who go to church, when they're at church and they're hearing the pastor speak or the music playing, they start to realize that God, through that, starts to speak to them. They start to realize really what it is they can do. It's so clear and it's obvious what it is they can do for them. It's different for different people. When they start to walk through the door, they start to get more out of focus and they start to ask questions like, "Maybe I was just too emotional right then. That was kind of ridiculous what I was thinking right there. Maybe I should calm it down a little bit. Maybe that was kind of radical. Maybe I need to just chill. I need to be just 'normal.' It was just a phase I was going through." By the time they get from the altar to the door, they've gone through a whole change. They're just back where they were. That's why a lot of people think the church doesn't work. By the time they've left that church for that day, they're back where they were. There wasn't any kind of change. We don't allow God to change us. We just think, "Maybe it was all just a dream." We're just trying to take the things that we know to be true when we're in that moment, the quiet and stillness, and take it and instill it into our lives. Make it part of our daily lives so He can change us. We sing these songs from, "Hey this is what I'm struggling with. Is anybody else dealing with this?"

Do you and the rest of the band still work as staff members at your respective churches?

Mark is the only real staff guy. The rest of us are actively involved in ministry. Megan, her husband is a youth pastor. So technically she's on staff. That's a full-time position, too, when you're the wife of a minister. We are all involved in youth ministry. We're either leading worship or small groups of teenagers, or leading student praise bands. We don't all get paid, but we're all really involved.

How do you balance Casting Crowns with the work you do for your church?

Me, personally, and my wife, who plays violin in the band, too, and I can speak for Mark, we have a lot of really good adult volunteer leaders that kind of keep it going while we're gone. That's really the point of ministry, anyway. If it doesn't run while you're gone, you've kind of dropped the ball a little bit. The point is to get other people involved, to introduce yourself and give a space for other people to be able to use their gifts to help out and do things for the church. God's blessed us with that. We have a bunch of adult leaders that really are just able to take over while we're gone and keep things going.

Have you always been active in your church?

Me, I wasn't. [Laughs] I grew up, being in the South, it's pretty much part of the culture to go to church. Both of my parents are really very strong Christians. I went to church all the way up until I went to high school. For about a semester or two in college, I didn't go, I slept in. The cool thing is, just out of habit, I was like, "Man, I really just need to go to church." I just started going out of sheer habit. I started finding out that I could actually do stuff in the church to help people. That was when it became an addiction, I guess you could say. I can actually do things. Before, I was just sitting in a chair, listening to people talking. Now, I'm actually part of helping change lives and everything. That's when it becomes ingrained in you.

What is the songwriting process like for Casting Crowns?

As far as lyrics and everything, Mark is the seasoned veteran on the lyrics. He goes off for maybe two or three days at a time. We really get together as a band and pray for him. He just basically casts praise over what it is that people need to hear and God will show him those things. Through ministry, just dealing with the problems that people have every day, that's one question we get a lot: "How do you know what people are dealing with?" That's why we stay involved in ministry. You get to see just what real people deal with and the fact that everybody deals with the same stuff, it's just that nobody's talking about it. That's why we get it out there. For me and Hector and the rest of the guys, we come up with ideas and give them to Mark. Usually, they just gel with what Mark's writing lyrically. The music is just an excuse to get the message out there, to get people to talk.

I thought it was interesting that the album is based on an experience Mark had with MySpace and seeing what participants in his ministry were writing on their pages.

Somebody said, "Hey, you need to check out MySpace." They went on and they started checking out the different students' MySpace pages and they realized they were living a totally different world than what they were seeing in church. The funny thing is, MySpace isn't the problem; it was a screen to look through to be able to see what the actual problem was. People aren't carrying their lives in church out into the world. They were being something completely different. One of them is going to fall short. I mean, you can't live a double life for too long. That was just something that was a wake-up call. We started realizing that there's something more to it. We just needed to invest in and need God a little bit more. Or just call them out on it. What's this double life people are talking about? What's the deal? We got up in their business a little bit. You got to live it all the way through from Monday to Sunday. A lot of people are using that as an excuse for not coming to church. They point to that all the time. "I don't want to go to church there's too many hypocrites there." I'm trying to fix that from the inside.

I've seen some pretty iffy MySpace pages as well.

I think it kind of gives you a good glimpse at maybe stuff that we forgot that we were doing when we were teenagers. [Laughs] I'd cuss for no reason and I did stupid things trying to get people to accept me. That's what they're trying to do. They're trying to find out what activity or what action or what behavior gets me the most friends, gets me the most love.

Who are the opening bands on your tour?

John Waller, who's a new guy on our record label, and Leeland, [which] is a band that just came out on [the] Provident [label] about a year and a half ago. When we look for opening bands, it's just people that agree with our ministry and everything. We don't really look at musical style that much. We actually meet with the band and kind of hang out with them for a little bit and find out what they're all about. John Waller's a worship leader at his church. Leeland, the guys in the band, they're actively involved in ministry. Those are guys we wanted with us. We look for people who are as real on the stage as they are off the stage. They're pretty much the same. All those guys are like that.