Gospel veteran CeCe Winans targets the church crowd with her first album in three years, and is enjoying a chorus of support. “Thy Kingdom Come” recently hit No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Gospel Albums chart, No. 2 on Top Christian Albums and No. 12 on Top R&B Albums.

During the last two decades, the nine-time Grammy Award winner has been successful in the gospel, R&B and contemporary Christian arenas. Her previous release, “Purified,” has sold 286,000 copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

Winans feels “Thy Kingdom Come” could have broad appeal, but says she focused her music on communicating to churchgoers.

“Everybody can be blessed by it,” she says, “but it’s a record that’s really for the church and encouraging the church to stand up and be the church, reminding them of the authority we have in Jesus Christ.”

The first single, “Waging War,” is about the power of prayer, rather than a call to arms linked to current events.

“It’s definitely not there to encourage that war (in Iraq) at all, but something I pray for daily is our soldiers and our leaders . . . I didn’t mean for this to be connected to that war except as a reminder to us to pray.”

Promotion plans for the album include visits to churches, where Winans sings three or four songs.

“We’re targeting some really nice churches that we believe are heavy into praise and worship and are also trying to target places we have never been before to try to spread her reach,” says Demetrus Stewart, president of Winan’s own PureSprings Gospel label.

The EMI-backed label also partnered with Verizon to offer the track “Forever” as a full-length song, ringtone and ringback. The set is also garnering exposure through key media appearances, including an April 15 Trinity Broadcast Network special that Winans is hosting.

In recording “Thy Kingdom Come,” Winans worked for the first time with her son, Alvin Love III, as a producer. “He wrote some on ‘Purified,’ but this time he wrote a song and also co-produced. That was kind of funny having to do what my son told me to do. It was kind of weird, but we made it,” Winans says with a laugh.

Reuters/Billboard