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Lights on!
On the bright side of Rhema Christmas
James Shelby and Jesse Cabrera (foreground) stand under the lights over the bridge at the park on the Rhema Bible College campus in Broken Arrow. MICHAEL WYKE / Tulsa World
By MATT GLEASON World Scene Writer
Published: 11/23/2009 2:25 AM
Last Modified: 11/23/2009 4:43 AM
In a battered old Chevy truck hauling a trailer, Rhema Christmas display supervisor Jesse Cabrera steered his way out of the Rhema campus to a nearby warehouse filled with sad, unfulfilled lights.
It was only a week before "the big deadline," as Cabrera called it, and about 300,000 of roughly 2 million lights waited for their place in the show.
But Wednesday at Rhema's 6 p.m. "flip-the-switch" ceremony, so many of those sad lights will flicker and dance to everything from a techno club mix of "Amazing Grace" to Bob Seger's "Little Drummer Boy."
In 1982, Rhema's light display offered a mere 60,000 lights. This year, the Rhema park bridge alone will glow with 72,000.
Beyond that bridge are six scenes in the display, ranging from the Nativity to Noah's ark. They're all heavy with ornaments, especially the Nativity, because, as Cabrera said, "there's just a lot of sheep."
To pull off the Rhema light spectacle, Cabrera heads a team of 20 student workers, who toil from the last week in August right up to the opening ceremony.
Once the light display, which requires daily maintenance, ends on Jan. 1, those same workers spend three months tearing it all down.
"I'm Christmas lights all day — that's all I see," said the 24-year-old Cabrera, who is a Rhema graduate and has worked on the light display since 2006. This year is his first as supervisor.
When Cabrera goes home at night to his wife and 7-month-old son, Joshua, his only Christmas decorations are found indoors.
"We put a tree up, hang lights around it, put a wreath on the door and we're good to go," said the man who also works a side job hanging Christmas lights on homes, banks, etc., to earn a little more income for the holidays.
While Cabrera oversees the light display, Rhema's electrical supervisor — 51-year-old James Shelby — gives it power and synchronizes all those twinkling lights to music.
Shelby, who's worked on the display for four years, has worked on this year's display since January, including a 10-month job to choreograph the lights to music.
The brain center of the entire light display is kept entirely within Shelby's laptop.
At Wednesday's "flip-the-switch" ceremony, Cabrera will show his wife and baby boy how months of work can turn darkness into bright, colorful light. As for Shelby, he'll watch the ceremony with his wife. He'll also keep an eye on all the children enjoying the show.
"You see little 4-, 5- and 6-year-olds dancing with their brothers and sisters, running up and down the sidewalk giggling and laughing," he said. "And they're trying to chase the lights up and down the bridge."
Until then, though, the Rhema lights will wait in darkness for their most wonderful jolt of electricity.
Matt Gleason 581-8473
matt.gleason@tulsaworld.com
By MATT GLEASON World Scene Writer
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