Outreach, Inc.

Posted by D. Goodmanson on Nov 9, 2005 in Church Technology, Sheep&Goats | 0 comments

In 2005, churches will mail over 50 million direct-mail postcards created by Outreach, Inc., the largest provider of Christian outreach products and services in North America. In addition, churches will hang 200,000 Outreach door hangers on houses, hand out several million bulletins, and display 160,000 banners to promote their church. “2005 was a big year for us because of The Passion of the Christ ,” said Matt Harper, product manager at Outreach. Outreach’s goal is to help churches reach local communities and convert people to Christianity. Last week, several thousand pastors and church leaders attended an Outreach conference in Mission Valley on how to attract non-Christians. The conference offered workshops “led by some of the fastest growing and most innovative ministries and church leaders.” The workshops included, “They Like Jesus — Not the Church,” “How to Attract Visitors Through Direct Mail,” “The Modern Day Orphans: Ministry to Kids in Single-Parent or Blended Families,” “Reaching the Business Leaders in Your Community and Reaching Today’s Urban Youth: They’re Closer than You Think.”

Exhibitors promoted additional outreach services, from golf events by In His Grip Golf Association, financial management seminars based on the Bible, to business-leadership seminars with telecast lectures by people like author John Maxwell, supermodel Kathy Ireland, and NFL quarterback Peyton Manning. Outreach promoted a comedy event for churches. “A comedian will come and perform 40 minutes of stand-up comedy that is family-friendly,” said Paul Pickard, Outreach events general manager. “The events are effective and are not something that the community expects from a church. It allows people to attend a church that might otherwise not feel comfortable.”

Full Article : National Outreach Conference

Outreach Seminar: The TurnOut Solution: Solving the Problem of Plateau and Decline

Posted by D. Goodmanson on Nov 8, 2005 in Church, Teaching | 0 comments

Churches lapse into plateau and decline because, over time, they turn more and more inward. The solution is simply that churches must turn outward in order to correct spiritual negatives and to reach lost communities strategically. When they do, they foster health and growth, and see an increase in turnout.

You will learn:

* The origin and nature of plateau and decline.
* Spiritual and strategic dynamics of moving from plateau and decline to health and growth.
* The first steps in turning their churches around by turning their churches outward.

Speaker: Ken Priddy
Consultant, United Front Ministries
Bio: Ken Priddy is a seasoned church planter and church development and redevelopment specialist. These disciplines merged in Ken’s ministry as Senior Pastor of Bridgeway Community Church in Phoenix, Arizona, the ReStart of a church that was founded in 1906 and that had dwindled down to six families. In 1993, Ken accepted the call to transplant the remnant of this dying church. By June 2000, Bridgeway was a church of over 300 with an annual budget approaching a half-million dollars. The once struggling church conducted ministry in a new facility on 14 acres of land. Over 100 had been baptized by profession of faith, and Bridgeway was providing dynamic ministries in its own community and in nearby northern Mexico.

The TurnOut Solution

Leading church analysts such as Lyle Schaller, George Barna, and Mike Regele stress the alarming truth that over 80% of American Protestant churches are in plateau and decline. The church in America has lost its ability to reach its transitioning communities for Christ, turning ever inward in the service of itself as it abandons its zeal for evangelism. The time is now for the cycle of plateau and decline to be broken.

The 3 Phases of the Church Lifecycle

1. Incline : Future oriented, vision driven, community focused, $ is seen as an investor in the future, conversion is the goal.
2. Recline (plateau): Present oriented (wish they could ‘freeze time’), program driven, congregation focused, $ is a provider for the cost of programs, growth is from transfer as people seek better programs.
3. Decline: Past oriented, structure driven (“it’s the way we’ve always done things), core group focused (a subset of the congregation that are the old-timers from the good old days), $ is to be preserved to survive.)

Recommended Reading: Historical Drift: Must My Church Die? by Arnold Cook

There are four types of people in every church:

1. Theorists
2. Realists
3. Pragmatists
4. Preservationists

The TurnOut program focuses on changing the vision of the church to identify need and reach out to the community around them. This can be both outward ministry and changing the way ministry functions (worship styles, etc.).

To begin change you build a team of theorists who identify a vision and begin to execute. As progress is made, the realists are brought in and begin to see the vision. After change starts to show results, the pragmatists jump on board. Often as this vision is cast and executed, people from outside the church catch the vision and join in.

The Two Pillars of TurnOut

1. Spiritual Renewal
2. Strategic Initiative

If this is something you are interested in, learn more at their website. You can start with a church assesment tool to determine whether your church is in incline, recline or decline.

Also see: Churches: Breaking the 125 Barrier
Breaking Attendance Barriers

Angels & Demons

Posted by D. Goodmanson on Nov 8, 2005 in Church, Sermon | 1 comment

Kaleo began a new series about angels and demons. There are so many questions and confusion about what exactly angels and demons are. What is the involvement in our lives? What are demons? Is it possible for them to possess us? What are angels? Can we communicate with them? These are questions that many of us have and yet getting answers can sometimes be frustrating and confusing. Come and explore these questions with us as we attempt to find answers from the most definitive source on these subjects, the Bible.

Sermon: Angels

Serenity the Movie

Posted by D. Goodmanson on Nov 8, 2005 in Culture | 1 comment

A review of the movie Serenity from Mike Gunn (Pastor @ Harambee in south Seattle and co-founder of Mars Hill) at our Kaleo site:

This big-screen version of the short-lived TV series Firefly is set 500 years in the future and focuses on space captain Malcolm Reynolds and his crew, who make a living with petty crime and transporting people throughout space. After they pick up their latest passengers ‚Äî a doctor and his mentally unstable, telepathic sister ‚Äî they realize that they’re now being hunted by the Alliance, an out-of-control government that’s out to bring the rogue sections of the galaxy under control.

The Long Tail and Power of Church Planting

Posted by D. Goodmanson on Nov 7, 2005 in Church, Church Planting | 0 comments

Bruce Chant tackles one of my favorite concepts, the long tail (For work we're devloping on a long-tail content management system. Not Ekklesia our church content management system.) and discusses it's implications for church planting:

Within my own city, you see “niche’s” of people everywhere, not just geographically, but in terms of demographics, lifestyles and values. And where these niches exist so to does opportunities for new churches to be planted in order to take the good news to these people in indigenous forms. The more new churches and the greater the sum of these churches the greater the total, overall impact for the Kingdom of God. That is the effect of the Long Tail and the power of church planting.

Full Article at his blog: The Long Tail and Power of Church Planting