Ok, ok, ok….I know this is really geeky stuff, but sometimes it’s nice to just have a little fun and not be so serious. I first heard about these decals through Churchdrop.com here.
They’re originally from Topdecal.com and they make some creative decals for your iPhone, iPad, and MacBooks.
One of my favorites is the camera decal. Check it out below:
So what do you do to connect with and get to know your community?
A few years ago I did a short-cut and just ordered a demographic report that told me lots of interesting tidbits. For a time I felt pretty good. It showed me various trends. It told me what denominations were most prevalent and what age groups were living within a five mile radius of the church. But I realized that I didn’t really have an understanding of my community. I’m still trying to grasp with what my community is all about.
In this post I wrote about why I think it’s important that you actually live in the community that you’re trying to minister to. At the moment I live about 40 minutes (on a good day) from where my church is. So I certainly feel handicapped. Lord willing I’ll be able to sell our house and move closer. But I’m trying to do what I can where I am. I’ve been thinking about it, and I’d like to get your input for how someone can connect and get to know their community in a more personal and real way.
I’ll share a a quick thought first, and then I’d love it if you could share some ideas:
A few months ago the NY Times posted a great article on how businesses are using Twitter to connect with people.
Screenshot from article
It’s a great read with some creative uses. At the moment there’s over 190 millions users on Twitter (as on June). That’s bigger than many countries. So I think it’s important that churches pay attention and create a “missionary outpost” on Twitter as well as on Facebook.
And by the way, here’s a just released article from Newsweek on how many financial firms are taking to social media as well.
If that’s where the people are, shouldn’t we try to be there as well?
They’re name sounds a little funny: Gungor. It’s the last name of the lead singer. I heard them for the first time at the Catalyst conference. Let me just say this about them. They’re one of the most musical groups I’ve heard in a long time.
It’s easy for many similar groups to do the basic stuff with rhythm guitar, electric guitar, bass guitar, drums, and maybe a keyboard. Not only did they have these instruments, but they also had a xylophone and a cello. And at one point the bassist pulled out a bow normally used to play on violins and used it to make some cool sounds on his bass. And they didn’t just play some basic chord progression. It was complex and they changed the dynamics throughout the song.
They sang the song called “Beautiful Things” which was very powerful and beautiful. Below is a video and I included the lyrics so you could follow along as you watch the video. Check it out.
Do you use a “signature” line at the end of your emails? You know, it’s that space at the bottom where you include whatever personal/professional information you deem necessary?
Well for the last two weeks or so I’ve been experimenting with something called about.me, which just may be a more helpful version of a signature line. It also makes it easier if you want to include any social media links (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc) or website links.
I have a “professional” signature line for church purposes in which I include certain information, but I’ve started to use about.me/rodlie for when I send things from my personal email account. It includes a variety of different templates that you can use, and you can actually be up and going in less then a few minutes. This is somewhat similar to the digital business card or personal landing page that John Saddington wrote about here and here. This is what his current one actually looks like at the moment. I think those done by John Saddington are pretty genius, but I think for those that are less technically inclined, about.me would be a perfect option.
I just read this great post on ChurchDrop.com and they highlighted a new iPhone stand that’s about to hit the market. Since the iPhone now does HD video, you’d think that there would be a large number of companies running to make good tripods for it to shoot the video. But you’d be wrong. I ordered this one on eBay some weeks ago, but it’s really, really cheap and flimsy. I’ve only used it a few times, and it’s already on the verge of breaking. I don’t recommend it at all. On the other spectrum, there are ones like the Owle Bubo that look great and come with cool extras, but it’s pretty expensive at $169.
So I was quite happy when I learned about this one. It’s called The Glif. It’s $20 including shipping. It’s built simply, so it won’t break. And it has many unique ways that you can use it to hold the iPhone. Check out the video:
Glif Montage from Glif on Vimeo.
So were you there at the Catalyst Conference in Atlanta, Georgia? If not you missed out on some special stuff. I’m going to post some links of some people that gave some really great recaps of what it was all about. I had to leave little bit early on Friday, but I wanted to briefly touch upon two people that really stood out to me.
As always, to kick off the event, Andy Stanley preached a powerful message on the effect of controlling our “appetite” for more. He spoke on the story of Esau and Jacob, and how Esau’s desire for the momentary pleasure of stew caused him to trade in his entire destiny. Now the lineage of the messiah would be known through the line of Jacob other than Esau. Powerful.
But I felt like something extra special happened on Thursday evening when Francis Chan spoke. He’s been the senior pastor at Cornerstone Church since he founded it in 1994. But on that evening he shared his story of why he stepped down from leading this church four months ago. He felt like God was guiding him to go to Asia to minister. No, he doesn’t know exactly where he’ll go. He doesn’t know exactly what he’ll do. But he shared that God was telling him to go. So he sold his home and is even now preparing to go.
