Social Media Pulse

What are churches current social media patterns?

• We are living in a world people dreamed of.
• There used to only be a computer at work… then it went home… then to your lap… now to your hand.
• Mobile ubiquity, where everyone has a phone, presents challenges and opportunities for the church.
• There’s an embedded value system in social media [public/participatory, new media].
• There’s value in it that it’s instant.
• Everyone is an equal creator… it’s user-generated content.
• We’d rather buy something someone tells us about than what we are told by businesses or corporations.
• Users have a voice and are able to generate content.
• In a relationship economy, what people say matters deeply.
• We now have greater accessibility to information.
• Churches need to move from having “please have your phone off” signs to “please have your phone on” signs.
• The media is affecting our small group communities and the way that they interact.
• We’ve torn down the boundaries of distance; there’s now a worldwide conversation going on that anyone can participate in.
• The definition of “presence” is changing.
• We HAVE to think through these things theologically.
• Is physical presence necessary for you to be a part of and “be” the church.
• Social media allows customization [personalization].
• One size does not fit all … [MySpace, my reviews, my favorites, etc.]
• My can be consumer oriented, but it reflects the fact that media is in the hands of every person and every person has the ability to create media.
• Everyone is a content producer.
• We now watch TV on our own terms [TiVo].
• New generations are being raised with these new ideas embedded in their everyday interactions.
• As technology becomes cheaper and more effective, the Church is confronted with one of the greatest opportunities along with one of the greatest challenges of how to steward it.
• The Men of Issachar were able to see the times and were able to know what to do.
• Let’s go to the next level… let’s find out what we are capable of doing and how are we able to frame it in a Biblical context?
• The word of our testimony is the critical story we have that’s a powerful conduit [Christianity is viral] to reach someone we may have not been able to reach any other way.
• We’ve moved to a digital age.
• It will be normal for us to connect online, first and then meet in person.
• 43% of churches say social media is one of the most effective ways for them to communicate and engage with people.
• Church websites are the front doors to churches.
• 77% of people say the church website was an important part of why they chose to go to church.
• If people can’t connect to your website they may not go to your church.
• People make judgements about a church based on what the church communicates across their website.
• It’s a missiological issue.
• John 17:18
• Facebook is the 4th largest nation in the world if you look at the number of people that are on it.
• Non-Christians do not go to your website.
• Your website is primarily visited by believers looking for information about churches.
• 20% of all data people are accessing on church websites is information for new visitors… that’s a significant portion where you should invest your time.
• Use the web to help people new into the church to get deeper into community.
• Your web strategy should be looked at as an Internet Presence Management.
• What are you communicating online?
• How are you connecting to where people are talking and engaging?
• Where are you present? Where are you absent?
• Who is responsible for your church’s online presence?
• What does it mean to be the Church online?
• How do you define presence? What’s your theology of presence?
• We need to recognize that participatory media is decentralized.
• It’s unregulated.
• We have a lack of control.
• We have to look deeper at our theology.
• A mobile, extended presence can be used missionally.
• Is virtual community real community?
• What is Biblical community?
• We need to define Biblical community before we define online community and if it’s possible to have church online
• We need to ask if we can use an online presence to build real life community?
• We need to intently be on the internet, it’s a mission field.
• We, the Church, are called to be counter-culture… what does that mean at this technological crossroads?
• We are willing to be transparent online, but vulnerability is not often seen online.

Top Social Media Sites

1. Facebook
2. Twitter
3. Private Member Portals [ MemberHub, Monk, Tangle, Unifyer, etc ]
4. GoogleGroups
5. MySpace

• Greatest needs online: events, post prayer requests, get connected, finding small groups and ways to connect throughout the week, integration with their church website and resource sharing.
• Churches are wrestling with how to use participatory technologies.
• The Cobblestone Community Network is a tool that’s been developed to help churches have private communication that’s integrated into social media channels.
• If you don’t set a strategy you’re going to have a difficult time pulling it together later.
• What is your strategy for the community online?
• Pick a horse.
• If you don’t lead your people, they will find their own way and go their own direction.
• This is something we need to pay attention to but we don’t need to know the mechanics of it; you can find volunteers or someone on staff to help manage this.
• Things are easier than they were before.
• There are challenges and effort required but it’s more centered on your strategy.
• Let people tell you how they want to be contacted… be platform neutral.
• Let people choose how the content gets to them.

Kevin is the Creative Lead for Catalyst Conferences and Founder of Bradpoet, a design, branding, and storytelling agency.

• This stage is too big for me but it’s not too big for my God.
• The devil does everything to push us towards anonymity and indifference.
• We serve a creative God.
• God’s story is being told in letters too big for some of us to see.
• Ephesians 1:18 – may the eyes of our heart be enlightened…
• We need to aspire to be more.
• We are all storytellers.
• God is not in the business of selling Himself.
• God does not sell beautiful Apple products in clunky Microsoft packaging.
• Our God is in the business being excellent.
• He’s in the business of differentiation.
• He’s in the business of telling compelling stories.
• The Gospel is the most compelling story ever told.
• The cross is the most recognized symbol in the world.

Convincing vs Compelling

• There’s a difference between being convicing and compelling.
• Being convicing uses the power of persuasion to get into people’s minds.
• Being compelling uses excellence and causes people le to be drawn to you in their own minds.
• People are sold, but it’s in their own minds.
• Are you, or your churches, being a “me” monster when you’re telling your story?

Story Sequencing

Impression – Brand Identity + Brand Story

• Story is going on all the time, going on over the lifespan of our communications.
• We have an up-front responsibility in the process.
• Excellence has stopping power; story has staying power.
• The responsibility of brand identity is getting people stopped in their tracks.
• When you do something with excellence, it stops people… they notice.
• Your brand identity is not a logo, it’s anything that touches people that represents who you are.
• Story has staying power.
• Story’s responsibly is to draw people in.

Brand Identity

• Brand Identity creates an impression; Brand Story creates intrigue.
• Story needs to take us on a journey and create transcendence.

Brand Experience

• The Brand Experience allows people to experience, to taste and see.
• When we do that, we pay off our promise.
• We deliver what we said we would.
• Brand Experiences surprise and delight.
• Exceed expectations.

Brand Association

• Customers internalize how they feel about when they first met you
• Branding is building relational trust in storytelling.
• Are you truthful? Are we giving what we promised?
• Are you trustworthy?
• Are you temporary? We want to see relationships go the distance… we want to be a part of something we believe will be lasting.

• Branding manages and challenges perceptions.
• Read  Blue Ocean Strategy
• We can create uncontested market space.
• You can’t tell a story without good assets.
• We need to use words that have the power to move people, re-create imagination.
• “I’m on a personal mission to rid church logos with fish, crosses, and globes…”
• You need a brand that can stand beside any other brand and tell a beautiful story of what God is doing through what you are doing.
• Brochures are pre-experiences… not just paper and ink.
• People don’t get excited about copy.
• You can’t effectively tell stories unless you can effectively document stories.
• Besides a brand consultant you need a brand photographer.
• You won’t get what you need out of stock photography.

We are creating the image of the living God for the world to see… we are telling His Story!

• If you focus on the problem you will never see the solution. – Patch Adams
• Don’t see what everyone else is seeing, see what people are afraid to see.
• Look at the world differently every day.
• We have a doubting audience.
• Do something unexpected.
• Get people’s attention.
• In the end, you’ll be branded.
• We serve an excellent God who wants us to look past problems/conflict and see His Story and retell it in a way that’s irrresistable.

• This conference is really about communication.
• We are telling stories.
• On Sunday morning when we step into the pulpit, we have a choice.
• We can choose to help people make it through life better.
• Or, you can help them see another world.
• You can help them recognize a parellel reality.
• You can illuminate a Kingdom they say the believe but rarely have seen.
• You have a choice to educate or illuminate.
• You can inform or inspire.
• You can teach or you can preach.
• When people come to church, they believe there’s something outside of this world.
• People are looking for evidence of the other world.
• They want to feel and experience the transcendent.
• That image is veiled by consumer practicality.
• We’re taught that preaching is all about conveying Biblical information.
• Pastors/leaders have more Biblical knowledge and our job is to communicate it to people who don’t know it as well.
• We preach information.
• We always preach practical.
• We give how-to’s, 3 points, etc.
• The instructional model of preaching is an utter failure.

2 Fatal Flaws of Instructional Preaching

1 – It doesn’t work.

• The worst way to teach anyone is by gathering large groups of people and lecturing them for 40 minutes.
• People don’t retain information.
• Lecturing to audiences is not an effective way to communicate.
• Small, relational community environments is the best place for teaching to happen.

2 – It doesn’t challenge people’s perceptions of reality.

• People have spent 6 days marinating in the both of the world of consumerism.
• This worldview shapes everything about us.
• We have a consumer worldview that teaches us we are the center of the universe and that everything [jobs, marriages, etc] revolves around us and value is found not in what things are, but in what they bring me.
• It teaches that the goal of life is to satisfy our desires.
• It teaches us there is a pill, program, or person to solve their problems.
• It reduces Jesus Christ to a commodity.
• We have spent decades convincing
• We’ve inoculate people to the Gospel.
• We’ve made it our mission in life to make people feel like Jesus Christ is the relevant answer to their unmet needs.
• We’ve made Him an end to our means, not an end.
• We’ve made Jesus into the equivalent of a DuctTape, WD40 Combo pack… just about all you need to fix anything.
• We’ve made Him into an instrument to fulfill our desires.
• Christianity is the most irrelevant but most beautiful worldview.
• The call of the Christian life is to deny yourself and follow Him.
• We’re not challenging the presuppositions people have, we are just reinforcing them.
• People who are walking in darkness don’t just need a cane to help them cope; they need to see a Great Light.
• They don’t need to see how to live in this broken world, they need to see another world, another reality.

Teaching is important; but when you give people how-to’s, they have no vision for why they should.

VIM – Vision, Intention, Means

• Teaching how-to fulfills the Means
• When people have no vision – the reality of God’s Kingdom – they won’t implement the means.
• When people have a means and no vision, it’s like unused home gym equipment.
• When you have a vision, the means take of itself – when there’s a will, there’s a way.
• A culture in which you have a ton of means and no vision is the culture of the church today.
• It’s a generation that has more access to teaching and Christian resources than ever before, and yet has a moral decline.
• We don’t lack instruction, we lack a vision for why it matters.
• Our people do not intend to follow Christ.
• Nothing in the Church is challenging their consumer values, it’s just reinforcing them.

How Do We Help Them See the Other Side?

• When the Kingdom of God is preached, it breaks the darkness of the world and let’s people see a vision of another reality, a place of peace, righteousness, wholeness and justice.
• We get enraptured in this beauty.
• It doesn’t happen through instruction, it happens through inspiration.
• It happens when we don’t see preaching as an act of informing but an act of inspiring.
• There’s an alternative way to preach, preaching as illumination model.

The Illumination Model

• Targets the imagination.
• Turns on the lights.
• Helps people see the reality.
• Solves the problems of remembering and challenging.
• Recognizes there’s a difference between preaching and teaching.
• In the NT the most common word for preaching meant “to announce.”
• Jesus came “preaching” the Kingdom of heaven was at hand.
• The word of teaching in the NT was “to instruct.”
• They are used differently.
• Jesus told His disciples to go out and PREACH, then He told them to TEACH.
• Teaching expects you to be competent with a set of knowledge.
• You don’t have to know jack to preach.
• Preaching is not about conveying information; it’s about announcing a new reality you have experienced.
• Peter and the disciples has experienced the Kingdom of God through the presence of Christ.
• Preaching is announcing flight 500 from Denver has landed; teaching explains how and why a plane landed.
• I can’t tell you how, but I can tell you it happened.
• Preaching requires experiential knowledge of the reality of the Kingdom of God.
• Our job is to help people see the reality of the Kingdom of God illuminated through the ancient words.
• Teaching engages intellect; preaching is an experience that illuminates.
• Preaching alters our vision – it helps us see beyond the darkness.
• Nothing Jesus taught made sense until people had their way of thinking altered… once you see the alternate reality, it makes sense.
• Once you see the Kingdom, things that don’t make sense, connect.
• Their vision of reality has to be altered.
• Vision has to come before instruction.
• Most of the people in our churches don’t need more Biblical teaching, they need their minds set free from the mindset of consumerism to see the beauty of the reality of the Kingdom of God.
• Jesus told people to “go back and tell what you have seen.”
• That’s our call… to help people see the reality we have seen.
• To help people see with new eyes.
• Our role isn’t to help people cope, our job is to help them see what’s unseen.
• We do that through our lives, stories, experiences and illuminating the ancient Scriptures.
• An awful lot of the verbs in the NT Greek are in the present tense.
• It’s not “Jesus went to Jerusalem…” it really is “Jesus goes to Jerusalem…”
• It was a literary device used to help the listener enter into the reality of the story.
• Don’t just share information, lift people’s vision.

What are you doing on Sunday morning?

• Are you getting people to DO the Christian life, or to SEE the reality of the Kingdom so they will want to DO the Christian life?
• We need to ravish people with the power, beauty and wonder of His Kingdom.

Preach in season and out of season, don’t just teach. Don’t just instruct, inspire. Don’t just educate, but take up your divine calling and illuminate.

• A good story has a character that wants something and overcomes conflict to get it.
• What’s meaningful in a story is meaningful because it’s meaningful in life.
• Story teaches us what is beautiful, what’s worth dying for and what’s worth sacrificing for.
• Story has an incredible power to engage the human mind.
• There’s a difference between music and noise.
• We engage narrative differently than the language of experience.
• Narrative teaches us what we should be living for.
• Lists of values outside of narrative are meaningless.
• Stories in the Bible don’t stop and tell you what the moral of the story is.
• The story is ongoing.
• We sit down with the text and ask, “what’s in this for me?
• What if God was just in it?
• What if it’s just a relationship with Him that we’re meant to engage in?
• Story adjusts our moral compass.
• We learn by living a story.
• It’s possible to live a good story.
• All of the elements of stories are conditional.
• Characters are important, but they don’t have to be perfect.
• Characters have to sacrifice of themselves for the benefit of others to make a good story.
• Oftentimes our stories are selfish and self-serving.
• Success doesn’t tell a very compelling story.
• A character is not who they feel they are, think they are, or who they want to be.
• A character is only what they actually do.
• What we do tells a story about who we are to the people around us.
• The story we’re telling ourselves is often different than story we’re telling other people.
• We have to want something.
• If the protagonist doesn’t want something, the story can’t start.
• What story are you telling with your life?
• A story cannot be meaningful unless it involves conflict.
• We are taught that there’s not supposed to be conflict [ by the media and in church ].
• What does it mean to be “who God designed you to be?”
• We are born into conflict.
• We cannot reverse the role of conflict in our lives.
• Conflict is here to stay.
• Dark conflict entered into our lives as a result of the Fall.
• God created a protagonist in us.
• We desire what we cannot have.
• Conflict is beautiful.
• Conflict is the only way a character changes.
• The only way we can change is through pain.
• It’s true in a story and in real life.
• Conflict adds value to what we are trying to obtain.
• The Christian worldview has been hijacked by commercialism.
• It’s robbing of us of great stories.
• We need to look at conflict differently and share our stories, embrace conflict.
• If Christians could have a courageous attitude toward conflict, we could change the world.
• In story, there’s a desire for a climax, an act 3.
• In one action, conflict is over.
• The desire for climax is fascinating.
• We are a protagnoist… conflict has to take place to give life meaning.
• There’s always been a desire for conflict to go away.
• It manifests itself like wishful thinking in our lives.
• We’re taught conflict goes away through the climactic act of Jesus.
• The an inference is that Jesus is the climax and an end to our suffering.
• Jesus was not the climax.
• The truth is, in our theology, our conversion is not the climax.
• Conflict just gets worse.
• Can you imagine an infomercial with the Apostle Paul trying to sell Jesus?
• There’s a difference between the Biblical epic and the story we are taught.
• We’ve filtered our theology through commercial messages and lost the true power of our story.
• We are in Act 2 right now.
• Act 3 takes place at the wedding feast of the Lamb.
• When we die and are reunited with Christ.
• Paul didn’t sell Jesus as a product to take pain away, he talked about HOPE.
• What we have is incredible hope.
• The number one way America consumes stories is not through film, television or books, the number one way we consume stories is through each other.
• Tell beautiful stories with your lives.

Stacy Spencer is the pastor of New Direction Christian Church in Memphis, which has grown to over 14,000 members in eight years. Stacy leads numerous efforts to revitalize the Memphis community, including a charter school, restaurant, beauty salon, and car wash, where young people can learn relevant skills and trades. Stacy is the author of Naked and Unashamed, a guide for Christian married couples. He and his wife Rhonda are the parents of four sons.

• We all have a story.
• We communicate and find out about one another through our stories.
• People learn about us by our stories.
• The walls of caves have stories inscribed on them.
• We have stories of our ancestors.
• The Hebrews had the amazing stories of their deliverance.
• If you hear the stories of your past, you too have a story to share.
• The Gospel is the story of Jesus Christ.
• Preaching is a way to get the old, old story of the Gospel to a group of people who may have not heard it.
• Preaching allows people to get into the story and experience the Gospel afresh and renew.
• Preaching is a way to get the Story out.

5 Different Types of Preachers

1 – The Comfort Dispenser

• Tell you everything will be alright. Minister of mercy.

2 – The Scholar

3 – The Social Prophet

• The one who looks at the unraveling of culture and calls it out.
• We need people to cry out for justice, but we also need people who can help you with personal crisis.

4 – The Bible Repository

• One who seeks to be an expert of the content.
• Knowing the content is great but knowing the God of the content is more important.
• People don’t care about how much you know until they know how much you care.

5 – All of the above.

• We all need to help people with their pain; empower and help them understand; who care for what matters; and who know how to help…
• It’s not what you have on paper, its what the Holy Spirit leads you to do.
• Sometimes you have to throw your manuscript out the window.
• You don’t know where God is going to lead you.
• Keep a sermon in your pocket and a sermon in your heart.
• You’ve got to have your Bible in one hand and the iPhone in your other hand… you have to know the culture to know how to speak to it.
• You have to have a hand in God’s word and a finger on the pulse of society.
• We live in a society where everyone has a story… but are we listening to them?
• There are sermons on Twitter, blogs, etc., but we have to listen for them.
• Jesus drew people right in without them even knowing.
• People don’t want to be hit on the head, they need to be invited in.

Story as Movie

5 Ways to Tell the Story as a Movie

1 – Why should they listen?

• Why should they give us their time/attention?
• When you go to a good movie, they will show you a compelling scene that will capture your attention.
• There’s an iPhone app to let you know when to go to the bathroom in movies.
• He recently preached a message called “Christ for Clunkers.”

2 – Introduce the text to the dilemma.

• Preaching is showing a postmodern audience that the Bible still has relevance has today.
• That’s what Hollywood is doing with Superman, Spiderman, etc.
• The story still has relevance.

3 – Put them in the movie.

• When Jesus told parables it was an open parable for the listeners to get in and be a part of what He was talking about.
• We have to allow people to get into the story.

4 – Have a twist.

5 – Have redemption.

• I don’t need a horror movie, I’ve got the news.
• I need some drama that leads to redemption.
• There needs to be hope.
• We need to offer redemption.
• Hope is a dangerous thing.
• One day the movie is going to be over [ i.e. Michael Jackson’s “This is It” ].
• One day it will be over.

Nancy Beach is executive vice-president of the Arts for the Willow Creek Association and a teaching pastor at Willow Creek Community Church. A champion for the arts and artists in the church, she is the author of An Hour on Sunday: Creating Moments of Transformation and Wonder and Gifted to Lead: The Art of Leading As a Woman in the Church.

• There’s wonder in the four magic words: Once upon a time…
• We treasure a good story.
• Can you make a difference for God as a storyteller or an artist?
• We steward the most powerful story ever told.
• Our stories are rooted in redemption and God’s amazing grace
• The Gospel is bad news before it is Good News.
• The news of Gospel is that extraordinary things happen…
• The stories we tell from the pulpit or through the arts need to be rooted in tragedy and comedy.
• We need to share stories of pain pain alongside transformation, renewal and God’s grace.
• Only 10% of the Bible is in a thought-organized format.
• The rest contains love stories, drama, history, and parables.
• Jesus spoke openly about the stark reality of the absence of God’s presence and the transforming power of His presence.
• Are we being truthful as we steward the Gospel?
• We have swung too far in one direction or the other.
• We either live in tragedy too deeply that we fail to offer the light of hope.
• Or, we jump too quickly to the light, impatient on the gap between God’s timing.
• When we fail to speak truthfully, our offerings of grace come across as naïve, out of touch, premature, or not as nearly as wonderful.
• All of us, have a childlike response ot the whimsical words “once upon a time.”
• There’s never been an age that hasn’t produced fairy tales.
• “The mark of a good fairly tale is that turn, catch of the breath… “
• There’s a child lurking inside all of us.
• We persist in our hope that fairy tales still can come true.
• These days, we figure out how to responsibly tell stories of God’s grace.
• We wrestle how to be truthful with the darkness while sharing God’s grace.
• Use our imagination for illustration.
• The best way to see God is in the faces and stories of others.
• Stories restore people’s faith in God.
• The best stories awaken our faith in God.
• They remind us that we are not alone.
• They remind us our stories intersect.
• They remind us of God’s amazing grace.
• Tell your tories as truthfully and beautifully as you possibly can for Christ.
• We are stewards of God’s Story.

Chris Seay founded Ecclesia in 1999 with his wife Lisa and brother Robbie Seay in Houston, TX. This missional community houses a fair trade coffee shop, bookstore, organic food market, recording studio, art gallery, music venue, and a number of community events. Chris is the author of several books including The Gospel According to Tony Soprano, The Gospel Reloaded, Faith of My Fathers, The Last Eyewitnesses, and The Voice of Romans. He is also behind The Voice, which teaches the Bible in the narrative as the story of God.

• People love to fight over the Bible.
• Many of the examples we’ve been given have been combative.
• We need to come a place where love the Bible not as an object that informs us, but something that points us to a loving relationship with a loving God.
• Words only point us someplace.
• We’re called to tell the creation story, instead we fight over how long a day is.
• Creation is one of the most beautiful stories ever told.
• There’s 2 accounts of creation in Genesis… God speaking and God stepping in.
• In John there’s another account.
• The logos is the forming point of all creation.
• It’s like fire… moving, active, forceful, beautiful.
• The Word is active.
• John’s account of creating centers around Jesus.
• We fight over what a day is or if there were dinosaurs,
• All things that exist are in Christ.
• God is the cosmic force that has created all things… let us tell you the story.
• We need to reach the narrative of Scripture, not just the propositions of it.
• We are shaped and made by other people’s stories in our lives.
• Too often we read the Scripture like it’s someone else’s story that we can get some good information out of it.
• We oftentimes read it actively so we can learn how to argue with people.
• The Bible is not your sword to pick up and hit people with – it’s meant to do surgery on our hearts.
• It reveals our need for a rescuer.
• It’s not meant to inform our ideas.
• The way we teach history is very broken.
• We are totally, completely focused don the proposition.
• We gear our learning around propositions.
• We forget them.
• We miss the story.
• Propositions will not save you.
• Check out the book Historical Thinking and Other Unnatural Acts
• You can’t tell a story.
• You need to tell a story that invites people into inquiry.
• Explore tensions in the story so students will want to research and investigate.
• Jesus told stories that humbled people.
• We summarize Jesus’ stories in to three propositions.
• Jesus tells a beautiful story that invites us into it.
• We need not propositionalize everything.
• The logos is what we are called to engage.
• We thrive together on mission; we wither in anger, dissent and institutionalism.
• Matthew 11 – Jesus tells us to take His yoke.
• There’s a yoke that’s been created for us.
• We’re not tired for doing the right things; we’re get tired by doing the wrong things.
• There’s life and vitality found when you are doing things with Jesus at the center of them.
• Jesus needs to be at the center.
• Every social concern is an opportunity for God to be about His business of restoring what is broken.
• We need to engage, not just write checks.
• We are called to engage in restorative work.
• There is life in doing God’s work.
• As we put a yoke on us, something comes alive within us.
• There is no one more inclusive than Jesus.
• We must call sin, sin.
• We like the BIG sins… but we can’t point out a sin and say you have to get it together before you can come.
• We can only deal with sin and restoration in the place of community.
• Until we bring the whole Gospel to the whole world we’ve missed something significant and beautiful.

Dave Gibbons leads the Newsong Global Alliance, which catalyzes new churches all over the world. He serves on the Board of World Vision and is the Chief Vision Officer of Xealot, an organization that develops leaders of movements. Dave is the author of The Monkey and the Fish: Liquid Leadership for Third Culture Leaders. He has been married to his wife Rebecca for 25 years and is the father of four children.

• We have a deep desire to connect.
• Not only in relationships, but with a person and a dialogue.
• A true, meaningful conversation where you know and are known.
• We need to know the connecting points.
• The conversation starters are different for each generation.
• We need our new nomenclatures.
• We tend to only communicate with one language.
• We need to communicate from a platform of pain.
• There’s a great emphasis on strength and size in culture.
• Like flexing our might will deter people from fighting with us.
• We’ve defined successful churches by size and budgets.
• The way we spend our money is in hiring professional staff and building.
• What would happen if we turned that around?
• What if our budget was focused on helping with the needs in our community?
• Would it make a difference?
• What if our capital campaigns were done as a city church for the city?
• What numbers define your success?
• Our metrics are skewed.
• What are the real numbers.
• What are the success metrics in your community?
• What if they were descending, not ascending?
• Less people in need; fewer orphans; etc.
• We’re so consumer focused we’ve become barbarians in how we treat the marginalized in our communities.
• The church has the potential to eradicate poverty and to care for orphans and widows.
• The Eastern people view the way we treat the elderly as being barbarian.
• Our communication gets skewed.
• We put up good stories all the time.
• Most of the time what we say or share about ourselves is positive.
• Isaiah 6How many times have you head this message in the context of reaching out and loving your neighbor?
• The story doesn’t end at verse 8.
• God gives Isaiah a message to preach to the people that’s tough.
• A stump will become a seed and it will grow.
• When there are personal revelations of your weakness reveal the power of the Holy Spirit.
• If you don’t talk about the pain, we’ve got some problems.
• Superficiality will continue to propagate in our contexts.
• The holy seed can be planted and the Holy Spirit can begin to work.
• There’s liberation in our weaknesses – the Holy Spirit is able to do His work in our lives.
• As we are honest with our pain, while offering the hope we have, the holy seed is planted in people’s hearts that can make a true difference in our cities.
• It’s not when you speak a story, but when you’re at a private level listening to a story.
• We often use assessments to get people engaged in volunteering/assimilation.
• We use them to tell people where they can serve in our church.
• We don’t have everything people need to grow.
• We need to be listening to meta-narratives of person’s story, they are key in understanding who they are.
• Assessments are merely windows.
• Use tools to get to the real story.
• You want to see the strengths, but you want to know people’s timelines [ key people, person and places in their life. ]
• People’s pain guide them – it leads them to where they want to focus.
• If you focus on their strengths, you’ll just reach the same people.
• Spiritual formation is a scared journey.
• We’re not listening to people’s stories and intersecting the Holy Spirit’s voice with it.
• In listening to other people’s stories we can better understand ours.
• We “don’t have time” to listen; but if we do, we can help people find healing.
• It’s not one-sized-fits-all… people are complex.

1 – Let’s re assess our assessment process.

2 – Include a person’s story, intersected with the Holy Spirit’s voice and create a customized path for people to follow that our connected to your resources.

• What if we developed a theology of suffering?
• We often focus on what makes people feel uncomfortable, what if we focused on what makes them uncomfortable?
• It’s not a choice.
• Do you think Jesus felt like going to the cross?
• God allows us to go through times where we are at a stump to produce a holy seed.
• We can feel cut off, dried up or not seeing any fruit, but remember God is producing a divine seed.
• Be real with pain.
• Confess sin.
• Listen to people’s stories.
• The revelation of your brokenness will release the power of the Holy Spirit in your midst.

• A lot of believers are parked in the marina and not out in the deep water rescuing people who are drowning.
• Too many of us have a marina mentality, we’re tied up, smiling and waving, and smacking each other on the but while people are drowning and sinking into a Christless eternity.
• The guy who was drowning was just far enough away that they couldn’t see what was going on.
• There are people just out of reach who are dying without Christ.
• The Bible is a story of the Great Rescue.
• The Old Testament is about the rescue… Moses, Abraham, David, Disciple.
• In the Bible it says “the thing is the ring.”
• If you stop and consider what happened…
• Humanity was drowning, trying to use poor flotation devices [pleasure, possessions, etc] and God tossed “the ring” [Jesus] to us, giving us an opportunity to let go of what we are holding to and cling to Jesus.
• The Bible from cover to cover is a story of the Divine Rescue.
• The life ring symbolizes what Jesus did for us, Jesus came from the top to the bottom to bring us from the bottom to the top.
• The radically rescued should be rescuing radically.
• Are you in the rescuing business?
• Yacht clubs originally started as rescue societies.
• Some of the people in the rescue societies got tired and got more comfortable in the marina.
• The Church is not a yacht club; the Church is a rescue society.

• The thing is Jesus.
• If you want your life to soar, your church to hit on all cylinders, you’ve got to figure out the thing is the ring.
• Everybody wants to reach people until you start reaching people.
• Once you start introducing change, creativity and innovation, a lot of people get tired of it.
• Is the ring the thing in your life?

The hope is the rope.

• Can you imagine tossing a life ring without a rope?
• God had the rope [ the Church, the House, the boat, fellowship ] tied to the ring  [ Jesus ].
• When we’re rowing the boat together we don’t have time to sit and rock the boat.
• If you have people complaining on your boat, remind them you are a rescue society.
• Don’t be shy to release people.
• It’s healthy for people to leave.
• Don’t chase the leavers.
• When you get serious about the rescue mission, all of heaven and hell will open up around you.
• Church work is brutal-ful.
• It’s hard, but seeing the beauty of God at work around you is like nothing else.
• You’ve got to be called to it.

You better pull so the boat will be full.

• What’s the main thing in Church? Souls, Rescue. The Ring.
• Every single person in the church is part of the pull.
• I would rather a church have volunteers as much as small groups.
• You can have both, but I’d rather have volunteering.
• To get people off of the their rears and up on the bow of the boat, tossing the rings, pulling, so the house will be full… there’s nothing like it.
• We need everyone pulling so the house will be full.
• It’s not about church style or programs, it’s about reaching people.

The question that always messes me up is, “Who are you reaching?”

• We don’t like to address that question.
• It’s not who’s coming, it’s who you are reaching.

The other question is, “What are you doing?”

• In the Church world, chaos is your friend.
• Chaos is good.
• Some of the churches that boast great attendance, when asked who they are reaching, get very quiet.
• How many people, for example, are actually baptizing adults? That’s the public confession of someone’s faith! How many people are you liquidating? J
• We have to fight to keep the ring as the thing.
• We want people to be forced to delegate and get people involved in the pull.
• Usually staff members want to hire people to do their jobs.
• What would happen if we depended on a volunteer basis?

Rescuses [excuses] People Have…

• The Devil wants us to be members of the marina mentality yacht club.
• We have to come up with a great rationale for disobedience.
• Get your AS in gear! AS you go… make sure the thing is the ring,

1 – The “sheeple”

• Are we reaching  new people or pulling other sheep from other churches?
• If we’re not careful, Christian culture can create a faux faith.
• They’ve never reached people from other churhces.

2 – The Safety Excuse

• We just stay safe…
• Change – Conflict – Growth
• Most people resist change because of the resistance to change.

3 – The Depth Excuse

• “I’m looking for something deeper…”
• All rescues happen in the deep water, not in the shallows.
• If you want to get deep, you begin to rescue.
• Do you not understand the depth and complexity of the local church?
• Be active in sharing YOUR faith.
• Oftentimes when we think we’re being deep we’re really muddy.

4 – The “God in the box” Excuse

• We think we’ve got God figured out
• We think the “ring” will go and find people.
• We use election as an excuse to not evangelize.
• We don’t know where election begins and choice ends…
• But we do know Jesus told us GO.
• No matter where you are, TOSS THE RING.
• The knowledge excuse keeps a lot of people in the acht club.
• Encourage people to share their rescue story.
• Get the radically rescued, radically rescuing.

5 – The “Past” Excuse

• “You don’t know what I’ve been through….”

6 – The “Not Far Way from God Friends” Excuse

• Oftentimes the more involved we get in church, the further away we get from people who aren’t Christians.
• What’s your passion?
• Do it with a  passion.
• Leverage your passion with a purpose.

7 – The “We Need to Pray About It” Excuse

Where did the summer go?

I Tweeted about a week ago that I think September is the new January, especially in the church world… how do you all feel about that?

I don’t know about your churches, but at Park, September is when we officially kick off the ministry year. Summer is a major down time for us in the city… people are on vacation or just outside enjoying the three reasons why most people live in Chicago: June, July, and August.

So, September, rather than January has become our natural “reset” for the ministry year.

For me, it’s shaping up to be a wild month for a few reasons…

1 – I’m moving.
I’m moving from Lincoln Park to Wicker Park. From the land of the preppy “Chads” and “Trixies” to Hipsterville, I’m moving across town and I’m really excited. Wicker Park is an awesome neighborhood that has a lot of diversity and it’s literally like moving to a whole new city. So much to explore and experience, and I’m confident there’s new opportunities to minister. Catch is: I don’t move in my new place until September 15 and I have to be out of my place today… so today commences 15 days of couch surfing at some different places. Should be exciting!

2 – Park’s new website + Social Networking site launch.

It’s true.  A year after a major website overhaul we are going to launch Park 2.0 in late September. We had a winning team working on the redesign… CHANGEffect on the design and Ekklesia360 on the implementation and CMS. We’re also excited to be one of the first churches to implement the Cobblestone Community Network, a resource I really is going to help the church be the church in MASSIVE ways! More on blog entries on why the change, the process and design coming soon! (And, bonus… we’ll be launching a mobile site, too!)

3 – My first speaking gig.

I posted about this last week but my first speaking gig on the topic of church communications is right around the corner. I’ll be presenting a workshop called Do-it-Yourself Church Communications at MinistryCOM. Super excited. REGISTER! BE THERE!!!

4 – Innovate

So excited for Innovate at Granger Community Church. It’s seriously one of the best experiences for your team. Hear from some of the best and see a church that’s doing some incredible things that are making a huge impact for Christ. The thing I love about Innovate is that you don’t just hear ideas, you see them in action and get a hear the heart behind it all.
And if all that weren’t enough don’t get me started on October… Catalyst, Cultivate, and Story.

(By the way… what’s with all the cool kid conferences being one word?)