TECHNOLOGY

What is our purpose here at the Gaylord E-Free Church?  It is to meet as many people as possible right where they are and help move them to where God wants them to be!  What is our vision as a church?  It is to saturate our county with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and let it bleed over into all of northern Michigan.  As a result, at the beginning of this year we embarked upon a 3-year vision plan that we believe God led us in putting together.  In my blog posting yesterday, I updated you on the aspects of our purpose and vision that dealt with radio ministry.  Today, let me update you on what God is doing in regard to other areas of technology.

As we entered 2013 we did so with a technology upgrade plan that was part of our vision plan.  Through the Ingathering offering last November and through other major donations that have come in since then, we are currently being able to accomplish this upgrade that should be done and operational by November 1.  This upgrade involves three main areas:

First, it deal with environmental projection being put into the Gospel Center and the Chapel.  Environmental Projection will allow us to visually change the entire front of our auditoriums into any scene or design we would like to help us enhance our worship and our ability to visually connect to the message.  If you want to see a very small example of what this can look like, simply click on the pictures below.

Second, it deals with a new lighting system.  This will allow us to make the stage much brighter and to use far more by way of colors to set the mood of our worship elements.  This will also allow us to broadcast with much more excellence in appearance.

Third, it deals with high definition cameras for both broadcasting and recording.

This technology upgrade will open up a whole new world of opportunities for us to be able to "meet and move" as we seek to saturate our county with the Gospel and let it bleed over into all of northern, Michigan.  Here are some added ways that we will be able to move forward in our purpose and vision due to this upgrade.

We will be able to start broadcasting the message in a quality video feed each Sunday down to the chapel so that those who attend our Classic Service will no longer have to walk down to the Gospel Center to hear the message (of course, they can still walk down if the prefer).  This will give more time for worship in our Classic Service as well.

We will be able to video all of the messages so that we have a video archive of the messages on line.  Currently we only have an audio archive of the messages available.

We will be able to live stream our services on the internet.

We will be able to produce and edit a quality copy of each message to use in starting satellite campuses as God leads.  In fact, through a connection in our church we are pretty certain that beginning this December we will be doing just that at one of the ski resorts in northern Michigan.  By the end of year we hope to have two services each Sunday at this large resort using a tape of the message from the previous week.  The first service at the resort would be an early service for those who work there and the second service would be for the guests.  We even have permission to promote these services at the resort.

Think of it this way, by the end of 2013 it is quite possible that each and every week the following opportunities will all be available to us as a church to do some serious "Meeting & Moving":

Three live services each Sunday morning here on campus including both of our Contemporary Services in the Gospel Center and our Classic Service in the Chapel with a quality video feed of the message being broadcast to the Chapel.

A live radio broadcast of our 9am Contemporary Service on The Eagle (101.5 FM)

My weekly live radio show each Wednesday morning on The Eagle (101.5 FM)

A weekly "Folks, Listen" radio broadcast of my messages on The Promise FM (90.5)

A weekly internet stream of one of our Contemporary Services each Sunday morning through our church webpage

Two satellite services at a local ski resort using a video of the previous Sunday's message 

Video archives of our preaching ministry here at E-Free available 24-hours a day through our church webpage.

This will go a long ways in allowing us to meet as many people as possible right where they are and help move them to where God wants them to be.  This will go a long ways in allowing us to saturate our county with the Gospel and let it bleed over into all of northern Michigan.  As you can imagine, this is a huge undertaking which is why our vision plan also includes the hiring of a Technical Director that oversee all of the audio, video, lighting and broadcasting areas.  It is our hope to include monies for is position to start on a part-time basis in 2014.