April 28, 2003
Illusionist's message stunted and growing
___By Leann Callaway
___Special to the Standard
___Whether Brock Gill is escaping from a water coffin, doing a blind motorcycle ride or simply using his quick-wit and improvisational skills, the message remains the same.
___Gill, a popular Texas youth evangelist, uses stunts to drive home his point that supernatural power may be found only in Jesus Christ.
___"I use illusions, escapes and stunts to draw large crowds," he explained. "When we get people's attention, we spread the gospel. Primarily, I'm using creative ways to get the message out. I'm a creative evangelist."
___Gill, the son of a Baptist pastor, grew up in Texas and graduated from East Texas Baptist University in 1999 with a religion degree. His desire to pursue a vocational career was based on a calling from God.
___"I started doing illusions when I was 22 years old, just fiddling around with it, and I felt God calling me to do it," he said. "I quit my job and started doing the show."
Brock Gill
___Despite successfully navigating stunts, he is no stranger to tribulations.
___In the summer of 1999, he and his wife, Andrea, hit rock-bottom when their trailer containing $20,000 worth of sound, lighting and illusion equipment was stolen. The only thing they had left was to rely on was their faith.
___"I had been married for about three months and graduated college only three months earlier, when I came home to find that my trailer had been stolen," he explained. "That was everything that we had--brand-new career, brand-new life, brand-new everything. I lost all the equipment to do this ministry. It took me by surprise and was devastating."
___At the time, the hardships seemed like they never would end.
___"We had a lot of things go wrong," he continued. "A week after our trailer was stolen, our house was broken into. A week later, I was pick-pocketed. A couple of weeks later, our new house was flooded. Several other things happened, and something major was going on just week after week."
___Then, just when things were starting to roll again, a new truck he was traveling in caught fire in the middle of the night. "This time, we didn't lose everything again. We still had some stuff, but it was still devastating. It was a slap in the face again."
___A month later, his rental truck was vandalized, and he lost another $4,000 worth of equipment.
___Looking back, he believes God was faithful by providing and answering each prayer--despite the trials.
___"I just had to pray that God would get us through those hard times," he said. "We had no other choice. My wife and I just started praying specifically for God to meet each specific need. I wanted to keep the ministry going, and we felt that's what God wanted us to do. We had a difficult time there for about 18 months. Lots of stuff going on, but God met every bit of our needs. When we lost something, he built it back up, even better than it was before."
___At the same time, word of Gill's illusions and crusades spread across the country. Today, he books 200 events annually, including church outreaches, city-wide crusades and larger conferences like the Hot Hearts Student Conference.
___Gill presents several unique illusion shows, depending on the size of the event.
___For city-wide outreach events, he performs large-scale illusions as part of a community outreach at a neutral location. "I do things like making a girl disappear, making it snow and stuff like you've probably seen on television but geared to us a little more with our personality," Gill said.
___He also has a smaller show he performs once or twice a month, called the Lost Luggage Show, where Gill literally arrives with only the clothes on his back. "It basically has no props, I just show up and I use things from the audience to make a show out of it, which is really incredible. It's more believable because I'm taking stuff from the audience."
___On a larger scale, the Freedom Experience, a two- or three-night crusade, involves illusions, stunts on BMX bikes and Gill escaping from a water coffin. The latter, he explained, is an escape, not a trick or illusion.
___His shows not only draw crowds; sometimes they draw unusual crowds. A recent performance in Delaware was attended by a group of witches, he said. "Three out of seven got saved."
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