New Pulpit and Monitor Stand Fever, part 2 of 3

This week our church is hosting the Biblical Counseling Training Conference. We typically try to get things looking nice before our guests arrive but sometimes we do things a bit late in the game. Years ago we would do major upgrades to the auditorium sound and video system the weekend before the conference started. In those days the BCTC started on Saturday evening and often we would work from Friday evening straight through trying to get things ready. The older I get the less I like working at 3am when I started at 6pm the previous day.

Having learned a few hard lessons we haven’t done anything major like that at the last minute in several years. We try to plan ahead and schedule our upgrades with enough time for a little Beta testing before the next major event.

Back in November I posted about a fire we had in our pulpit on a Sunday morning. You can read about that here. This is part 2 of a 3 part story. In early January our worship pastor started shopping for a new pulpit. We landed on one but it was going to be close to get it installed before the BCTC. I had to get mic specs to the manufacturer so that part could be completed as well and the unit still ship in time.

Once we realized the pulpit would be here we also had to create a new stand for the LCD monitor our speakers use to see their video feeds. Before the monitor stat on a pedestal that matched the pulpit. We wanted to upgrade that so now we have a larger screen attached to a steel pole that comes up from the stage. This was custom designed by myself and a few others and built by the company of a church member that has a full scale metal shop. You should really come see it.

In a true reminder of the good ole days version 1.0 of the pulpit stand was tested on the Thursday before the conference. It had a few issues so we decided to get another version made on Thursday afternoon. Version 2.5 went into production on Thursday and we got to test it on Friday night. The pulpit also arrived on Friday night and thanks to the grace of God was all installed and working as planned by Saturday afternoon.

The next step in the process is to get the lift working again. Now that the pulpit has been updated we would still like it to lower down into the floor. Upgrading the lift will be part 3 of this story. We are hoping to make several improvements and are doing some engineering work now. Stay tuned.