Dallas Jenkins is the director of “The Chosen,” the first-ever multi-season TV show about the life of Jesus. It has more than 200 million unique viewers. Photo by Gabriel Dillard

About 2,600 attendees were on hand Tuesday for the 77^th annual Fresno-Clovis Prayer Breakfast in Downtown Fresno.

Elected officials including Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer, Clovis Mayor Vong Mouanoutoua and Fresno County Supervisor Nathan Magsig joined local Christian leaders in a program that included prayer, music and stories of inspiration.

The event had its traditional opening with the sounding of a shofar by the Rabbi Amnon Shor of the Bet Shalom Messianic Congregation in Fresno. The shofar is a ram’s horn used for Jewish ritual purposes.

The Pledge of Allegiance is led by Bernice Resendez, a 93-year-old Army veteran of the Korean War and resident of The Veterans Home of California-Fresno.

 

Dallas Jenkins, director of “The Chosen,” the first-ever multi-season TV show about the life of Jesus, delivered the keynote address.

And Hobby Lobby President Steve Green was announced as the keynote speaker for next year’s conference on Feb. 17, 2026. Green has been president of Hobby Lobby since 2004, helping to grow the family business to more than 1,000 stores in 48 states with more than 46,000 employees.

He is also chairman of the board for the 430,000 square-foot Museum of the Bible in Washington, DC. The museum, which opened in 2017, is dedicated to a “scholarly and engaging presentation of the Bible’s impact, history, and narrative,” according to Green’s bio on the Hobby Lobby website.

Jenkins, this year’s keynote, began his filmmaking career in 2000 with the movie “Hometown Legend,” which was based on a novel written by his father, Jerry B. Jenkins. The elder Jenkins is also an author of the “Left Behind” series of novels, which were adapted into a series of Christian movies starring Kirk Cameron.

Jenkins, who is based in Texas, teased the audience about the turnout. The Fresno-Clovis Prayer Breakfast is one of the largest prayer events of its kind in the country.

“We Texans didn’t think there were 2,600 Christians in California,” he said.

 

Jenkins turned to crowdfunding in 2017 to make the pilot for “The Chosen,” which tells the life of Jesus of Nazareth through the eyes of those who knew him. From the $11 million first season, the series has continued for four seasons, with a fifth-season local premiere scheduled at the Wilson Theatre in Fresno on Sunday, Feb. 23 at 6 p.m. The actors who play the Apostle Phillip (Rezo Diako) and Apostle John (George Xanthis) are scheduled to appear.

The series has more than 200 million unique viewers, laying claim as one of the most-watched shows in the world. It is free to watch via The Chosen app, and can be downloaded or streamed on multiple platforms.

The series has reportedly raised $100 million from viewers and donors, and episodes playing in movie theaters nationwide have grossed tens of millions of dollars at the box office.

A Fresno connection to “The Chosen” comes by way of Stan Jantz, the son of Dan Jantz, who for nearly 50 years built the Fresno Bible House into one of the largest Christian bookstores in the nation.

Jantz was introduced to the audience by Stephanie Smith, the new CEO of Fresno-based, faith-centered travel agency Inspiration Travel. 

Stan Jantz now works as a global ambassador for the Come and See Foundation, which was set up to manage donor funding for a planned seven seasons of “The Chosen. He introduced Jenkins to the audience.