I’ll keep this one short (sorta to fit the title, here, ya know?):

Do you NEED tech so much that you get fidgety without it?

If you answered YES to that question, then turn it off for 24 hours. Seriously.

I’m a tech geek and I know that I love the productivity, networking opportunities, relational updates and sheer enjoyment from leveraging technology. None of that is bad! But when I NEED tech & am putting it as a higher priority than it should be, well, it’s past time to turn it off.

Be proactive. Turn tech off regularly and have the ability and discipline to walk away and keep yourself fresh.

Be careful that you’re not making tech an idol.

Time for me to end this blog post and turn off my Mac.

Today is the proud launching of my E-Book, “The Reason Your Church Must Twitter”!

I’m very excited to hear what YOU have to say about it on the new website launched today with the E-Book at TwitterForChurches.com. The site is in version 1.0, with great features including a blog to interact with me and some of my ministry peers about leveraging technology for churches, a blog roll with links to Twitter resources and reviews of the E-Book.

We’ve got even more planned for version 1.1 (next month) with additions that will make it one of most useful sites for learning about Twitter and ministry. We’ll also be constantly updating the E-Book with regular updates that reflect the fast-changing technology world.

Please join me in thanking two incredible guys who pulled the book design and website together: Nathan Davis and Evan Calkins!

Nathan is a graphic designer with an incredible design eye coupled with a ministry servant’s heart. He’s simply been tremendous to partner with and is responsible for making the E-Book look as great as it does. I highly recommend him as a graphic designer for those of you needing the kind of top quality he delivers.

Evan is a web development master and owner of Intrinsic Studio. Evan built the back-end website tools, made sure we were up and running on launch day and, in general, has been above-and-beyond in his commitment to this project. Evan has made it easy for me to give him a full endorsement for his web design services.

Thank you, guys, for helping bring this E-Book and website to life!

The reviews have already started rolling in on my first E-Book, “The Reason Your Church Must Twitter”.

The site is only hours away from launch and I’m very excited!

Before I say anything else, let me pause and give praise and credit to God for His plan for this simple E-Book.

He’s led this entire effort. From the ideas to the people who helped me brainstorm and edit to the fact that I met the designer, Nathan Davis (@mediapeople), and the web guru, Evan Calkins (@evancalkins) on Twitter; it has all been the provision of God.

Thank you, Father!

I made the pre-release copy available to a small group of people for their honest feedback and review. A couple have already posted their review, knowing that the site launches on Friday.

Many thanks to Mary Beth Stockdale of Suncrest Christian Church for her thoughtful review.

Also, thanks to my friend and peer Jim Walton, a consultant and very humble man who helps churches much the same way I do, for his extremely thorough review.

When was the last time your church collaborated with another church? Or when was the last time you collaborated on a project with someone outside of your organization?

If you’re like me, you have a natural tendency to “do it yourself". For me, the reasons are many and varied, but chief among them are my excuses:

I can do it faster by myself.

I don’t want to have to explain it to someone.

I must have total control over my project.

I don’t have the money to hire an outsider

I believe strongly in this project, so I must be the one to get it done.

None of those are bad reasons. They may all actually be completely true statements. But are they the right reasons?

It Takes More Than You
Even if you can do it by yourself, is that best? What if you brought in others for creative input? How would you receive critical feedback? Are you withholding the blessing of allowing someone to serve with their gifts because you won’t let it out of your hands?

Though not everything can or should be shared, I would submit that much of what we do could be better if we did share our projects.

What would happen if a group of churches did a billboard campaign - as one - in your city?

Could your sermon be better if you used a creative team to plan months in advance on sermon series?

What would happen if you shared musicians and vocalists with smaller churches each month?

How many more volunteers would you have if you offered to include them beyond weekend services?

Where else could you make an impact in your church and community if you collaborated?

I had a friend on Twitter (@mbstockdale) send me a link to an article hostile towards social networking. Knowing that I’m about to release an e-book about using one of the most popular social networking sites, Twitter, she thought I’d find his thoughts interesting (if not controversial).

Actually, I appreciated the context of his position. One of his key points was best summed up when he said:

“I choose not to open myself to an endless series of electronically transmitted social diseases, including the presumptions of proximity.”

I thought this a curious statement and decided to reply to the post. As of this moment, I’m waiting to see how, or if, he will respond.

This is what I asked him:

I enjoyed reading your thoughts, but have come to some conclusions that I’d prefer not to assume about you; therefore, I would ask you to help me understand a few key points:

1) I would surmise that you are heavily invested in creating & delivering content for others to learn from, apply and, potentially, succeed.

Therefore, I wonder if your position is one of only delivering content but not dialoging about it. If you write an article that provides your contextual perception of an economic issue, do you not wish to have people look at your viewpoint from multiple angles and converse with you about the pros & cons of your thesis?

2) Your article comes across as someone who is an isolationist. If that is not the case, I wonder why you’d distance yourself from interactivity with a sphere of influencers outside of your personal relationship network?

If you are an isolationist, then your perception that social networks are a nuisance would make sense. Then again, isolationism has the tendency to stifle creativity, trade & commerce. That makes me wonder if there’s value in that position. What say you?

3) A unilateral conversation is an oxymoron. Isn’t that “dogma"?

I look forward to seeing if he responds and, more importantly, what he has to say.

The link for Mr. Morton Marcus’ article, which was well-written and showed his depth of thought on the subject, can be found on The Times of Indiana (NWI.com)

I’ve heard a lot of reasons why people don’t use Twitter. This short post asks those people a very simple question:

Do you know what you’re missing?

It seems everyone goes through a process of hearing about Twitter and wondering if it’s worth their time. This should help.

Rohit Bhargava, Senior Vice President at Ogilvy (an international advertising, marketing and public relations agency founded in 1948 by David Ogilvy, who is often called “The Father of Advertising”), wrote what I think is an excellent evolution of people and their experience with Twitter:

Denial
“I think Twitter sounds stupid. Why would anyone care what other people are doing right now?”

Presence
“OK, I don’t really get why people love it, but I guess I should at least create an account.”

Dumping
“I’m on Twitter and use it for pasting links to my blog posts and pointing people to my press releases (or stuff about me).”

Conversing
“I don’t always post useful stuff, but I do use Twitter to have authentic 1-on-1 conversations.”

Microblogging
“I’m using Twitter to publish useful information that people read AND I converse 1-on-1 authentically.”

Collaboration
“Actual, meaningful relationships and collaborations have occurred out of my usage of Twitter.”

Personally, I’ve been through every stage that he described! In fact, my new e-book:
The Reason Your Church Must Twitter, proves #6 - Collaboration.

The design and layout of my new e-book was done by Nathan Davis (@mediapeople on Twitter). I found Nathan by posting a tweet (a post on Twitter) asking for recommendations for graphic artists interested in design work. One of the people who follows my tweets is Matt Knisely (@mkinsely on Twitter). He knows Nathan and recommend him to me.

The rest, as they say, is history. I actually found the designer for my e-book about Twitter because of Twitter!

But the story doesn’t end there! Nathan then introduced me to Evan Calkins (@evancalkins on Twitter), a web developer who owns Intrinsic Studio. Evan and Nathan are the guys responsible for the new E-Book website (to be announced very soon!) and my new website.

Complete collaboration done entirely through Twitter.

That, my friends, is the power - and value - of leveraging a social network like Twitter!

As the author of a new E-book on using Twitter for churches, I’m clearly biased towards leveraging social networks. But when I was asked to give a short description of how it helps the church, you’ll now hear me quoting Sam Rainer (son of the famous church research guru Thom Rainer). He said:

“In short, social media enhances personal communication in the church. Some will use it to hide from personal face-to-face communication. Others will use it excessively and annoy everyone around them. And others will see it as a tool and use it on mission for God.” - Sam Rainer on his blog post about five significant trends of American churches

That is the best way to describe the value of social media for (and in) churches!

If given the chance to expand on my thoughts (and Sam’s quote), I’d also bring up a few additional points.

Social Networks allow for fast - sometimes immediate - communication

• Change in venue? Let everyone know via Twitter
• Want to share pics of that church event? Flikr and/or Facebook
• Keeping up with small groups? Facebook & Roov
• Online meeting for brainstorming or staff meetings? TokBox

Conversations Happen

• It’s impossible for medium to large churches to keep up with everyone - even with a ChMS solution. Enter social networking sites.
• Beyond email, fast updates and quick snapshots of each other keep us abreast of life changes.
• Tweetups - meeting of people who Tweet (Twitter) at a local venue.
• Social networking keeps small groups up-to-date between meetings.
• Sharing from our own lives compels people to share from their lives, too.
• Helping answer questions and asking questions of our own provides not only answers but relationship opportunities.

Access is as limited or as open as I choose

• I can share deeply about something in my life or keep things light and topical.
• Sharing prayers - and offering prayers for others - online is powerful!
• I don’t have to follow people on Twitter or Facebook. I control what I receive and send.
• Private (non public) accounts are easy to set up in every social networking tool online. You don’t have to be on a public timeline.

What other benefits have you found from leveraging social networking for church and ministry?

Today Robert Morris of Gateway Church shared an interesting thought in his message on the Holy Spirit:

“The Holy Spirit is my best friend and He is not weird.“.

As a person who’s a follower of Jesus and not particularly interested in being part of any denomination, I thought his statement made a lot of sense. My background of Catholicism and, later, Southern Baptist, used to skew my perceptions about a lot of things. Over the years I’ve taken the approach of looking at Scripture without a bias or pre-conceived idea and found a great deal of liberation over my attitudes about the things of God.

If I had to be put into a box, I’d say I’m a conservative charismatic. My personal preference doesn’t get close to pentecostal or fundamental extremes. I once heard someone describe that as “Bapticostal".

Anyway, one of the areas I need to have my cynicism removed is from what is often associated with Pentecostal or AoG churches: a hyper-focus on a spiritual prayer language. Yet I have also come to believe and fully accept that all of the gifts of the Holy Spirit can be active today.

Now, all of that to say this:

I don’t care to debate people on their personal convictions about spiritual gifts and, in particular, about the “need” to speak in a prayer language. At the same time, I recognize that my overall negative perception about many in the pentecostal crowd comes from how many (especially those in the pentecostal tele-evangelist crowd) make the Holy Spirit out to be weird.

Since the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are in perfect harmony and comprise the Trinity, then it doesn’t make any sense that one would be unbalanced from the others. Yet my observations and experiences of the Holy Spirit was warped by the “weirdness” displayed by people. Robert summed up my thoughts exactly when he said:

“Some people say that they can’t help themselves from acting strangely because the Holy Spirit made them do it. No, He didn’t. You’d be weird without the Holy Spirit.”

This humorous thought helps me see something interesting as I study more deeply the Trinity: If God is a God of order and not chaos, then the Trinity is balanced and not unbalanced.

I’m stretching my mind to listen to the Holy Spirit and open my mind to what He has to say about Himself, not what my cynical thoughts have pre-judged based on some negative experiences. During the next five weeks, I look forward to learning more from this series of messages.

My friends at Church Media Group launched a new (online, kiosk & mobile) electronic giving solution for churches called Ministry Give - COOL!

It’s the first solution I’ve seen that offers all three electronic forms of giving. There’s plenty of competition in the online giving model (websites) and a few that offer kiosks, and only one other I know of that does it through mobile (I’m sure others exist).

But all three in one solution? Golden.

I hosted a free, brief, live video & audio chat today using TokBox to help me brainstorm an idea. In 20-25 minutes, we covered a lot of ground and I left with several practical solutions.

Part of the value of Social Media Networks like Facebook, Twitter, TokBox, etc. is in the ability to have fast (sometimes instant) feedback. Before this, I’d have either called or emailed people and tried to coordinate schedules to see when I might hold a conference call (audio only). Ugh.

Today I took less than 15 minutes to make this brainstorm a reality. Coolness.

Yet making this work was more than the technology involved, it was that I, and others, have been intentional about leveraging Twitter as a very large network that’s manageable in small groups. While it’s ridiculously easy to get started with Twitter, it does require just a tad bit of effort to find people you want to follow and begin building your own group of followers.

To help you expand your own Twitter network, simply go to either (or both) of these sites:

Mr. Tweet

Twubble

Once you’ve created a Twitter account and followed a few people, these sites will quickly help you follow a lot more. The more people you follow, the better the results they give in finding other people with similar interests. Cool, huh?

Perhaps the most impossible question to answer so far at the ChurchTechCamp Dallas (#CTCDallas on Twitter) today is: “What makes a good church website?”

Current content - nothing worse than outdated info
Contact/Location - let us know where the church is at and how to contact your church
Easy Navigation - how the avg. person will use the site, not how a webmaster will use it.
Mobile usefulness - opt
Member login/member access
Keeping the “online giving” off of the main page
Blogs as part of the site
Twitter as part of the site

Interactive content that isn’t used = bad
Blog with no comments = bad
Forum with no posts = bad

What is an online church? How are small groups virtual?

The discussion included some interesting questions, like those above and the discussion was lively. There’s a lot of questions that have to be asked in order to define what the purpose and goals of online (or even brick-and-mortar) churches. Therefore, the very definition of “church” is up for grabs in this discussion.

Some questions and statements made were poignant and included:

• Is there a difference between community and church?
• Is online church a starting point (a tool) to get people to attend a physical church or is it a standalone church entity?
• How does a healthy understanding of the Incarnation influence how we navigate these questions regarding “Online Church."?
• I’m wondering if we are just defending what we are doing and trying to create the relevancy of it. At one point do we talk about the negative side of what we are doing?
• What do we mean when we say “Community” or “Church” are we redefining these terms to meet our own personal passions. Could any of us do ministry anymore without a laptop or cellphone?
• Albert Einstein said “It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity.” When we have technology that exceeds the human equation - or, at the least, minimizes the involvement of people in community, groups and life - we have an issue. That’s the same issue that exists in “Overflow” rooms potentially as much as an online service.

A very interesting discussion. I couldn’t keep up with it all and maybe just blogged about 3% of it! I’ll try to keep up better as the day goes along! D’oh!

Today’s first discussion is about the term and position of “Digital Pastor"?

Is it a legitimate pastoral role?

Is a person that works in the virtual world as a pastor, missionary or simply a “group member” ultimately trying to take the relationships of that community from virtual to IRL (In Real Life)?

The discussion in the room seems to have concluded that A) yes, a “Digital Pastor” is a real, valuable & needed role; the community building is the big “C” church in exactly the same way that believers and non-believers meet in the physical world.

How do we help “digitize” our pastors? In other words, how do we help pastors understand the role and value of helping them engage the online culture?

A thought I had during these discussion was that we should:

Educate, Illuminate and Propagate

Educate - show them on what’s happening online;

Illuminate - reveal to them how they can be a part of it (regardless of their ‘techie-ness’);

Propagate - show them the value of expanding reach, influence and growth.

What say you?

I’ve volunteered to “live blog” the entire conference today, so you’ll see quite a few blog posts from me today. Stay tuned to this blog and feel free to join the conference LIVE yourself! Ask questions, interact and attend virtually by joining the conversation.

To join live, go to: http://dallas.churchtechcamp.com/live.html

More to come…

Today, through a short tweet from Carlos Whittaker (@loswhit on Twitter), I read about a family facing tragedy, heartache and pain that I’ve never known. Though there are many, many stories like this one, God pulled my heartstrings and the tears flowed freely as I read the story of a young family struck by an accidental tragedy.

In my time of prayer both this morning when I read this and again tonight as I went to their website for an update and to pray again, God burdened my heart to lift up this family in earnest, passionate prayer.

I encourage you to also pray for the Lamberths.

This is what the Lord gave me to write as a prayer for their family - especially for Angie, Mark’s wife, and their son, Nolan.

When the pain is numbing and hurt is strong,
When there’s no one there to right a wrong;
Cry out in anguish, spill out your tears,
The Father above relieves your fears.

Crumpled down and curled into a ball
Into His loving arms is where you fall;
He holds you close, you feel His heart,
The love He whispers is a healing start.

Cry out to him, wail and yell,
Or whisper quietly, He hears you well;
The pain, the hurt, the sadness now
Will be replaced one day, somehow.

He knows the plans He has for you
They include a reunion, a time for two;
If not in this life, then rest in certainty,
That He’ll host you both in eternity.

I read something very interesting about how we learn:

“Learning has been mathematically modeled using a differential equation… Learning does not occur if there is no change in the amount of knowledge and learning is negative if the amount of knowledge decreases over time.” Fadul, J. “Mathematical Formulations of Learning: Based on Ten Learning Principles” International Journal of Learning. Volume 13 (2006) Issue 6. pp. 139-152.

Stated simply, we learn only when we’re given additional knowledge. Though this sounds self-evident, it made me wonder in what ways church staff are learning how to grow in their jobs and roles.

My role as a staff member had me doing the job so much that I learned new things only when I got out of the routine of my work. For many church staff members, this is actually a rather difficult thing to accomplish. People not on church staff rarely understand or appreciate the unique challenges required of working in ministry; they simply expect staff to “get better over time".

Certainly, we can all become more proficient at a task or job, but does that automatically equate to learning? I don’t think so.

Learning includes sharing our ideas, questions, solutions and tools with people outside of our church. Social media, such as Twitter, Facebook, Ning and blogs have helped us exponentially in peeking outside of our weekly church world into a world that my friend Terry Storch refers to as “the new flat earth". Electronically, the world is flat and we each have same-level access to information, resources and even individuals unlike any other time in history.

But having access to information and actually applying that information to our roles are two very different actions! We can find quite a bit of information, but creating strategic plans around the purpose, plan and payoff requires more effort.

I’ve found that when I seek information or answer, starting with the goal in mind is good; but I must be careful to hold on loosely to that goal when researching because I might find a better answer than even the question I was asking!

In what ways do you learn? How do you train your staff to think strategically? How often do you bring in outside experts to help you think through new ideas and rethink old ones?

It’s great to ask questions. It’s wonderful to learn. But the question is: Will you re-imagine the possibilities with an outsiders’ help?

Chances are your church leadership is sitting down to re-think about your planned & assumed strategies for this new year. But here’s a question: How many of you will ask “How?” as much as you think about “What?” when it comes to online social networking, communication strategies and media development?

At a time when text messaging is overtaking cell calls and online usage is growing exponentially, many churches are still operating from a place of ignorance when it comes to leveraging technology for more effective communication.

With the economy in a recession, many of you will be looking at cost-cutting and budget reductions in an effort to be wise and good stewards over the projected monthly giving. Financial belt-tightening is a good start, but may either be too much or too little based on the effectiveness of the budgeted ministry, item or event.

For example, if your printing and mailing costs are reduced by 10%, it’s possible that the effectiveness of those mailers was so minimal that reducing them by a small percentage isn’t enough of a cut in an area that needs further reduction. Conversely, not properly evaluating the usefulness and interactivity of online communications and information may lead to a budget shortfall in an area that needs time, money and people (even outsourcing).

Getting a Fresh Perspective
It’s not enough to simply ask “What should we do about our communications, online presence and media?” The church leadership must also ask “How?” and, the most important question, “Why?” Of course, those kinds of questions should extend into the evaluation, metrics and tracking of every ministry of the church. I think it’s good to consider this quote God gave to me years ago: “Good stewardship has less to do with how much money is saved and more to do with how much money isn’t wasted.”

When have you had an outsider come in and help you look at your church from an outsider’s perspective? That’s what I do. In fact, I think the best compliment I ever received from a senior pastor was when he said “We brought in a media consultant and I felt we got an entire church consultant.” That really humbled me and made me so glad to know that I’m doing exactly what God wants me to do!

2009 has started and I’m wanting to see churches take a new look at how they can become more effective and leverage new technologies while simultaneously ensuring that they’re making the most with what they’ve got right now.

To reach me, just click on the email icon up at the top of this blog post. That goes right to me and we can set up a time to chat on a phone call.

I was reading a short but very effective post by Jenni Catron and responded to her post with my comments, which I’ve included here on my blog, below.

“What am I letting go of this year?”

In a culture and time when “more is better” and fast beats slow, we’ve entered the life of exponentialism; we have not merely added or multiplied our efforts, tools, technologies, facets and goals, we’ve seen an exponential increase in our time. Problem is, we can’t add, much less get exponentially, more time!

The art of subtraction is part of my 2009 equation.

• What was good, but not redeeming, that I can leave behind?
• Where have I spent too much effort with little ROM (Return On Ministry) or ROL (Return On Life)?
• Where have I added more balls to juggle instead of deciding to not juggle at all, but instead share those balls with others?

I’m all about GTD (Getting Things Done), but not at the expense of exponentially adding to my life’s equation.

Less isn’t more; less is strategic.

How are you refocusing your 2009 life equation?