Our History
The Rev Dr Sir Allan Walker
Wesley Mission has been involved in television from the very beginning. The Rev. Dr Sir Alan Walker, the then Superintendent, represented the Christian Churches during the 1954 Royal Commission into television. During the commission Alan Walker established the importance of the Commercial Networks supporting religious programming with facilities and broadcast opportunities.
Out of this Royal Commission came section 103 of the broadcasting Act.
As television started to establish itself, Alan Walker put together and hosted a program called “I Challenge the Minister”, 1959. “I Challenge the Minister” was broadcast on Channel 9 occasionally ‘live’ but generally ‘live to tape’ somewhere in the city and suburbs of Sydney.
The Christian Television Association of Victoria were so impressed by the program that they purchased the show for $500 to be broadcast on Channel 9 in Melbourne.
“I Challenge the Minister” was broadcast fortnightly from 1959 to 1965. And during its day it captured 19% of the Sydney and Melbourne television audience.
Alan Walker also started Wesley Mission’s annual Easter Sunrise Service. Originally the service began in 1961 in the ‘Sky line’ North Ryde Drive In. The congregation would drive their cars into the parking lot and watch, listen and participate in the service in their cars. In subsequent years as the service was being televised it was moved to the Sydney Opera House, where today it is televised annually ‘live’ on Channel 7.
Rev Dr Gordon Moyes on the set of Turn Round Australia
The next superintendent was Rev. Dr. Gordon Moyes he started in 1979. His television work began under the banner of the Christian Television Association of NSW. His first program was on Channel 10 called Turn ‘Round Australia (TRA). Originally it was a one hour program that ran for 12 weeks. When the program manager of CTA told Gordon Moyes that the program had to stop and some other denomination had to have a go, Gordon bought commercial time on Channel 10 while at the same time negotiated a ‘statutory facilities and time’ deal on Channel 9. He successfully organised a broadcast timeslot in 1981 on Channel 9 at 9am pushing an American evangelist Rex Humbard back to an earlier timeslot. In the ensuing years TRA was pushed further and further back in the Sunday morning timeslot, until it settled at 5:30am.
During Gordon Moyes’ 27 years as Superintended there were several other seasonal documentary series, specials, television series and radio programs produced such as: The Discovering Series, The Christmas Pageant, the music video show Swordfish and Sunday Night Live.
Rev Dr Keith Garner
After Gordon Moyes, the Rev. Dr. Keith Garner arrived as Superintendent of Wesley Mission at the beginning of 2006. A new weekly television program was created to replace Turn ‘Round Australia it is called Rise & Shine. Rise & Shine is filmed regularly at FOXTEL and broadcast on Channel 9, The Australian Christian Channel and around the world on other cable platforms.
In the first few years under the guidance of Keith Garner Wesley Mission Media has already produced a wide selection of programs such as: The continuation of The Easter Sunrise Service filmed ‘live’ from the Opera House; The historical Flying documentary series - Flying through the Gospels and Flying through the Seven Churches of Revelation; the social documentary Santa’s Forgotten People – which looks at homelessness at Christmas time; as well as his weekly televised service Praise, Prayer and Preaching.
Aside from normal television production, Rev Dr Garner has taken the department into the new broadcast medium of the internet. Using the modern technology and the resources of YouTube.com, the media department has been able to create and broadcast over twenty stories that feature the work of Wesley Mission with the vulnerable, poor and disadvantaged. These stories are designed to create awareness in the community and help raise much needed funds. Many of these stories can be seen on YouTube.com, or you can email us to request a free DVD copy.
As the internet grows and starts to become a bigger broadcast platform than television, Wesley Mission Media is faced with the challenge and opportunity to create compelling programming across multiple platforms that reaches our audience informing them about God’s love and the work of Wesley Mission.
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