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Worship Without Walls: Celebration Church, Fresno and Clovis, Calif.
Multi-site church utilizes a portable studio package that knows no limits
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Mass Transit: If the system is set up in the main Fresno location, it only takes two hours to strike everything and be fully set up and operational in Clovis, and that includes a 30-minute drive time.
Instead of a fully equipped production truck, a studio-on-wheels concept was developed...but at a fraction of the price and with more versatility.
Televangelism is a curiously American phenomenon, born-and-bred in a largely deregulated media environment where access to the airwaves is open to virtually anyone with the licensing and technology required to broadcast. From pioneers like Billy Graham, Rex Humbard, and Oral Roberts to the televised ministry of Joel Osteen, the medium's message has yet to fail in attracting large audiences.
While traditional televangelism as we know it has this power to reach millions, substantial investment is required to produce programs, purchase airtime on cable and satellite networks, or engage in terrestrial broadcasting operations. Today, however, with the growing capabilities of streaming video, the process of reaching out to large groups of people in locations separated by a few or even thousands of miles has become infinitely more affordable, giving rise to new growth management strategies for many congregations.
"My grandfather was an evangelist and a pastor," says Kent Murphy, media production director of Celebration Church, an apostolic ministry currently based around main campus locations in Fresno and Clovis, Calif., an established satellite facility, and a landmark building also in Fresno under preparation to open as a fourth site. "In his day, he traveled all over this country, bringing his ministry to other places. Brick-and-mortar were his tools. Everywhere he went he built a new church from the ground up, filled it with people, then handed it over to a local pastor before moving on to the next town to do the same thing all over again. We're essentially on the same path here at Celebration in the 21st century, but the need to physically travel so much is no longer part of the plan."
Celebration's plans for wide-ranging outreach found their origins within a necessity to meet the needs of unbridled, runaway growth. With six services on his schedule each weekend spread across three locations, the church's pastor quickly discovered that it was physically impossible to be in all places at the right times. Cloning their spiritual leader once or twice not being an option, the church cast about for realistic answers to the problem, eventually turning to Broken Arrow, Okla.-based Media Concepts, a dealer of new and used video equipment.
"They felt a broadcast solution could well be their salvation," Media Concepts' Gary Dennis says, recalling his first meeting with church members. "One of their first thoughts was that if they owned a turnkey mobile production truck, they could broadcast the main live portions of their services to their other facilities in a regular rotation from different central locales each week, and thereby eliminate much of the pastor's travel. That's a logical enough idea, but the cost could be staggering, and the gear would always be confined to the truck, effectively leaving your production capabilities always on the outside of each venue looking in."
Instead of a fully equipped production truck, Dennis began developing a plan that would retain the studio-on-wheels concept, but at a fraction of the price and with more versatility. Placing a call to BigFoot Mobile Systems/VTR Specialists, Inc. in Vacaville, Calif., Dennis enlisted the help of company founder Doug Solis, creator of BigFoot MobileCarts, a brawny line of rolling equipment enclosures originally designed for use by the NFL.
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