I like the name. I'm a born-again Christian too. I play regular praise and worship services in a very lively charismatic church. Just thought I'd mention that.
Anyhow, regarding your question, I don't notice any phase/delay when going direct to the mains. One of the strong points of the vg8 is how good it sounds through a PA system. Hence the use of a keyboard amp for monitor. The VG8 signal is best served with the high fidelity reproduction of a full frequency range amp as opposed to a guitar amp which is intended to add it's own color to the sound. And fx loops don't apply here. The vg8 box does it all. You pick the virtual guitar, amp, speaker configuration etc, add whatever fx you want, and out comes the signal. Kind of like a keyboard, no fancy amps needed. Just faithful reproduction of the signal that's already been created. It's compact and versatile. It serves me well in a praise & worship setting that involves many styles of music. You probably know what I'm talking about.
Interesting point you raise re: phasing/delay when going direct. We'll do some experiments to see if we can detect it.
