ChurchBIT (a group of people who are involved in and passionate about how to use technology for the church)  Here are some suggestions from discussions about ways to enhance a church website.

(1) Use stories in your community.  Eg. Watermark Testimonies

(2) Allow people to participate in 'journal- like' responsive writing.  Eg. a church 'reading through the Bible' plan (http://www.jointhejourney.com/).

The Journey" is a church-wide bible reading plan. Each day everyone who has joined the journey gets an email with a devotional that has been written by a member of the church. This has been going for about 3 years and I have seen a lot of fruit from this approach. This approach has fostered great discussion within our Body.  With everyone reading the same passage everyday, there have been several opportunities for questions/difference perspectives. I like the continuity that this approach provides.I also think that the daily  emails serve us a eAccountabilityPartner reminding you to get in the Word that day. Our church has a bi-monthly meeting that allows people to ask questions/process what they are reading in the "Journey."

(3) Find the right social networking sites to participate in. Eg. The Rock ISU

Our ministry (rockisu.com ) is focused primarily on college students at Iowa State University.  We have a reputation for "out advertising Coca-cola" as far as flyers, etc, but we rarely see visitors show up simply because they saw a flyer.  Flyers tend to act as a name-recognition driver (ask most people around our campus of 28,000, and they have heard of the Rock, even though our average attendance is only "130-give-or-take-20"), and event reminder for most people.

However, advertising events using Facebook, there have been several times we've seen folks with no other connection come to check The Rock out.

In the next couple of weeks, I am going to lead an advertising charge using Facebook, and attempt to track results by measuring average attendance over a couple of weeks and comparing it with pre-advertising numbers.  I'm also going to try to randomly sample new folks to get an idea of how they heard about the event.

Join ChurchBit to participate in these discussions.   Members include the founders of Church Marketing Sucks , Godbit, MyChurch Blog Ministry, Beta Church, Strategic Digital Outreach, Ekklesia 360, and the list goes on…

The Problem of Evil & Suffering was the topic of this months Men's Group at Kaleo Church.  I encourage you to visit David's site, as he put the study up and it an excellent work on the subject (philosophically, theologically & pastorally). 

One observation: David quotes a professor at Oxford by the name of John Mackie. Mackie states, "If God exists, there couldn’t be evil unless he would have a reason for justifying his permitting it."  And Mackie assumes God couldn't have a reason to justify this.  This reminded me how evil is necessary for us to understand God. Since we are created in God's image and are not like the angels, we have been created for a different purpose.  It is only through evil we are able to see God's mercy, grace, righteousness, justness, love, compassion, etc.  In light of eternity, we would not truly comprehend the fullness of God if we didn't go through this season.  (Now I say this knowing this is not the comment I'd give to someone experiencing suffering.  And the article clearly states it is wrong to deal with the problem of evil and suffering purely academically.  It must always be done with the heart of a pastor.)

Read the article, it begins:

Q-How can an all-powerful and all-good God allow evil and suffering in His world?

INTRODUCTION

This question has a long history. It is a question that is not asked in academia alone, but increasingly the man on the street is aware of this problem and is either seeking an answer out of genuine curiosity, or is using this problem as a way to bolster their reasoning for disbelief in the Christian God.

As we come to this problem and attempt to consider whether or not a solution is possible, let’s do so from a couple of different perspectives. Since this is as much a personal problem as it is a professional academic one, we should strive to understand how to handle this question from both angles.

We need to think of this problem at the level of the philosopher as well as a Christian or counselor. For me to give you tips and hints to disarm someone from a philosophical perspective without addressing this issue as a pastor or counselor who is seeking to reach the person is not only damaging, but has no warrant Scripturally.

Continue reading: Problem of Evil & Suffering

Over the years I've done a lot of sales (staffing/recruiting, consulting, application development, websites, etc.).  Of course, most 'traditionally trained' sales people would now say, "Everything is sales" or "Everyone is in sales" but I digress. 

There are a few books I've thought are the best.  The first two by Heiman/Miller are 

The New Conceptual Selling: The Most Effective and Proven Method for Sales Planning

The New Strategic Selling: The Unique Sales System Proven Successful by the World's Best Companies

I have a document you can download (Conceptual & Strategic Selling notes WORD document ) that provides an overview with notes on these two books.  The document includes things like:

6 Keys Elements to Sales (Analytical Tools)

1. Buying Influences

2. Red Flags/Strengths 

3. The Buyers Perception of Reality 

4. Win/Results 

5. Ideal Customer Profile 

6. Sales Funnel 

3 Phases of a Sales Call

The Essential Sales Tasks 

5 Types of Questions during the Sales Call  

Another book I stumbled on recently is CustomerCentric Selling which I'm reading now.

One of the inevitable conversation moments that occurs when pastors (particularly church planters) gather is the question of size.  How big is your church?  Certainly there are times when size helps determine context, but often it seems to establish a pecking order among who hopes to learn from whom. The same can be said for blogging.  I was talking to one recovering addict recently who started blogging and became addicted to it.  Unfortunately, he wasn't addicted to the writing portion, but to the stats.  How many people have commented?  How many unique visitors today?  What can I do to get more?  His sense of worth (and right-standing) was determined by these numbers.   

It made me realize how quick I am to be proud and want to talk about the areas I'm having 'success' (as I define it of course.)  If the attendance from Sunday was low, maybe I had a big week at work, or I'll have a good blogging week, a post gets a lot  of attention or I get mentioned by a few other bloggers who link to me.  These things help me feel better.  It is sad how quickly we turn to functional Messiah's other than Jesus, the only one who truly can give us a righteousness that is perfect.  It is only through this gospel living that we can be truly humble and yet more courageous.  Daily I need to go read Preaching the Gospel to Myself. 

Lately, we've been gripped with the idea of what a city would look like as it's changed by the Gospel.  Oddly, in several situations in prayer and conversation the love for strippers has come up.  How would a church reach women and men in strip clubs?  One woman (wisely, only women are allowed to go in the ministry) from our church plans to attend a local ministry that reaches out to strip clubs.  Women pay the entry to strip clubs and buy lap dances from stippers.  It is during the lap dance they use the time to witness to the strippers.  

Last Sunday David mentioned one city changed by the gospel and how it impacted prostitution: 

There was an old preacher in Wales in 1735 which none of us have probably heard of because his messages were in Welsch.  His name was Daniel Rowlands.  He was an Episcopal minister who was spiritually dead.  No one liked his messages; his church was dying.  He thought Christianity meant being a moral person. 
He went to hear a man preach who was visiting, who said, “The determining factor in your relationship with God is not what you have done, but what Christ has done for you.  It is grace alone, through faith alone because of Christ alone.”  Daniel went back and thought about this for a month, until one night he was taking communion and this truth exploded in his heart.  He realized what Christ had done for him and it became a power to him. 

The first thing that happened to him was a revolution in his identity.  This is always what happens first in someone’s life as the Gospel becomes objectively and subjectively true.  You see yourself and a child of God first and everything else second. 

Secondly, the things that once controlled his life and scared him, like failure, simply lost its hold on him.  He no longer was ashamed of the Gospel. 

This truth exploded in his church and it began to experience revival.  This revival flooded out of the church into the streets of Wales to the degree that the prostitutes began to attend prayer meetings and morning services. 

People were inquiring as to why this was happening so they went and asked one particular prostitute why she was going to these meetings.  She said that there were a couple of factors.  One was that the business had but left.  People were no longer visiting the streets and looking for prostitutes.  But the most important factor she said was that for the first time people on the streets began to treat her with dignity and respect.  She couldn’t deny something was going on and had to come see.

This woman had previously been vilified by the religious people who spat upon her and scorned her and she was used by the irreligious who objectified her and treated her like peace of meat.  Not any more. 

Now if the Gospel had not come in power to these people, what would have happened if it were just religion?  Well, she may have no longer found clients, but she would have been more severely vilified and made to feel less human by the religious who spat upon her and scorned her.  Instead, these people were converted by God’s grace who understood the Gospel and treated her like she’d never been treated before. 

This is the power we need, this was the essence of the Christian faith, and this will cause a revolution. 

View/listen to the whole sermon:  Early Transformissionaries

Ed Stetzer has been working an a number of church planting statistics that we've all been waiting for…well wait no more: 

Statistics are a dangerous thing. Some use them well; some use them badly; but most evangelical leaders use them—and church planting is no exception.

One of the statistics that is frequently cited but never sourced is the survivability and health of church plants. I've heard quite an array of statistics—but one of my favorites is that often repeated "80 percent of new churches fail in the first year."

Well, not so fast.

Full report by Ed Stetzer:  Church Planting and Survivability

People spend roughly sixty percent of their life in work or work-related tasks.  Yet, according to a poll conducted by Career Impact Ministries, ninety percent of Christians had not heard a sermon, read a book, listened to a tape or been to a seminar that applied biblical principles to everyday work issues.  Sadly, if you view sixty percent of your life as 'not counting' or not valuable to God (other than 'witnessing' or 'supporting ministries') we're talking series life/faith implications to a large part of your congregation.  People will either seek to reject Christianity because they will find their meaning from work or feel guilty they aren't in ministry.  

Sadly, most of us don't recognize God created us in His image as co-workers.  This means, God is a worker and we were created to do work (not labor post-Fall but the beautiful creativity of reflecting God's glory in His intended creation.) We are "co-workers in his creating, sustaining, redeeming and consummating work in both the church and the world." (The Other Six Days R. Paul Stevens)  Stevens goes on to say, we must be one people loving and serving in both the church and the world.  

Increasingly, churches need to understand the significance of people's work, in both the amount of time their congregation spends there, but in the redemptive process of God's great concern for humanity.  When we work with a Christian distinctive we see the world 'fabric' as unraveling because of sin. Our work of cultivation is to seek the knitting together of the 'fabric' to bring about shalom. Our call to the workplace is to serve the ordinary needs of others. We are here to meet our needs and the needs of others, knowing this redeeming process will not be completed until Jesus comes.  Your congregation needs to see that working in technical support or as a receptionist has value in itself.   We are fighting against the loss of shalom, miscommunication and chaos caused by the fall to provide and serve the needs of others.  People's work is God's work.  Only when your people have this type of theology, will they be set free to view their work in a Biblical perspective and see a holistic Gospel Redemptive plan that uses salvation but ends with the restoring of all things to God.

Some suggested resources: 

Your Work Matters to God

The Other Six Days: Vocation, Work, and Ministry in Biblical Perspective

Anointed for Business

How do you develop leaders at your church?  This is a common challenge for churches, who must utilize the volunteer pool to lead important ministries in their church.  Harbor Presbyterian, Kaleo Church and a group of other church planters meet monthly to discuss these types of challenges.  This is a document Dick Kaufmann put together that we will unpack further in the months to come.  The first 6-steps occur prior to identifying the leader and must be in place prior to the second 6.  (Based on a triperspectival model for those keeping track)

1.    Understand who develops leaders In developing leaders in the church, the most important question isn’t “how?” but “who?”  Who develops leaders?  The Bible makes it clear: Christ develops leaders in the church (Mt.16:18; Acts 1:1, 20:28; Ep.4:11).  Christ does it by exercising his leadership, in our midst, as:  prophet, priest and king.  

A.  Prophet – Authority >  Vision >  “This is where God is leading us!”

B.  King – Control >  Plan >  “This is how we can get there!”

C.    Priest – Presence >  People > “You can be a part of this.  I’ll help you!”

2.    Clarify the values we want to instill in leaders
A.  Gospel-Centered – Committed to viewing all of life through Gospel

B.  Missional – Committed to living in mission to engage culture

C.  Grace-Renewal – Committed to on-going grace renewal

3.    Commit yourself to developing leaders
To develop leaders you must be willing to:

A.  Share the ministry
    
B.  Make it a scheduling priority

C.    Pursue personal growth

4.    Cultivate and communicate vision   Leaders who develop leaders cultivate and communicate Christ’s vision for:

A.  The work of the church (Mt.28:18-20; Mk.16:15-16; Lk.24:45-49; Acts 1:8)

B.  The development of leaders (Ep.4:7-13; 2Tim.2:2)

C.  The potential of each developing leader (Mt.4:19, 16:18; see also A. above)

5.    Organize the ministry

A.  Develop a Ministry Map  

B.  Insert existing leaders

C.  Use brackets to show needs

6.    Pray for leaders

"One of those days Jesus went out to a mountainside to pray, and spent the night praying to God." (Luke 6:12-13)
"The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field." (Mt. 9:37-38)

A.  Pray  

B.  Look

C.  Receive

7.    Understand the process

A.  Potential leaders  -To potential leaders, Jesus said, "Come and see" (Jn. 1:39). The key word during this phase is "know." The followers get to know Jesus, his character, his vision.  And Jesus gets to know the followers on their turf. (Mk. 1:16)

B.  Emerging leaders - to emerging leaders, Jesus said, "Come and follow me" (Mt. 4:19, Mk. 1:17). The key word during this phase is "show." Jesus models his life and ministry as the emerging leaders observe and listen.

C.  Existing leaders - to existing leaders, Jesus said, "Come and be with me" (Mk. 3:14). The key word during this phase is "grow." Jesus calls them into an intimate relationship with him and involves them in ministry.

8.    Know the potential leaders

A.  Where do you find them?  

B.  How will you get to know them?

C.  What’s the next step?

9.    Show the emerging leaders

A.  Identify (Three questions)

B.  Invite

C.  Involve

10.     Grow the existing leaders What do they need from you?

A.  Clear expectations

B.  Personalized leadership

C.  Regular and honest feedback

11.      Take time to reflect

A.  Evaluate

B.  Celebrate

C.  Recalibrate

12.      Help your leaders develop leaders Things to consider as leadership needs/base expand

A.  Revise Ministry Map  

B.  Assist leaders in developing apprentices

C.  Facilitate leadership connections

Download  Church Planters’ Meeting Developing Leaders pdf

I have new weddings scheduled this year.  I moved to a diff't wedding message I received from Stephen Trout (who is starting the Kaleo Christian Counseling Center) that is a redemptive historical/gospel presentation.  Feel free to download it.  Gospel Wedding Message (Word Doc)

ChurchBIT is a Google group centered around what’s next in church web applications and internet technology. If this is something you are actively involved in and passionate about, apply to join ChurchBIT and join in the conversation. 

This is our second survey on the missional nature of our church (read the first one about Sunday service & individuals) and we wanted to examine how missional our small groups are and the people who attend.  We sent out a request to people in our church to fill out a 10 question survey asking them about the small groups teaching, community and missional aspect.  We want to (1) learn what people felt about the missional nature of these small groups, (2) their response to the teaching and group accountability and (3) see what suggestions and recommendations that had to make them more missional.  

Here are some observations: 

1. Accountability is a tricky thing in small groups.  At Kaleo, small groups are open to anyone.  With new people showing up, the groups growing larger and the changing environment, many people struggled having an environment of accountability. (To remedy this we created Gospel Christianity discipleship/accountability groups and limited the size to 3 people who meet regularly.  Many people in our church have been very blessed by this environment.)

2. Being Missional doesn't always happen spontaneously.  Many of the responses to  How well do you feel your home group is preparing you to be on mission? requested more specific, creative tangible ways to be on mission.  Simple suggestions like having dinners together to invite others to, having one night a month be social only for visitors, adopting a mercy ministry and inviting other to serve.

3. It is challenging to teach a range of Christians.  Some people felt like the teaching would go over their heads.  Others wanted to ask more deep theological questions.

4. People do not attend a small group to be on mission.  Most people are looking for teaching and community, being missional was not a reason people cited as why they attend a small group. 

RESULTS: If you'd like to see the rest of the results, I've attached a pdf summary of our Small Group Missional Survey.   Again, this does not include the pages of comments we got that were quite helpful.

HOW-TO:  If you'd like to do a similar survey, here is the online form & questions we used to conduct the Small Group Mission Survey Form.  We used Wufoo to build our forms. 

Once a year Kaleo preaches a 'state of the union' address of where our church is and where it is going.  This was done in a dialogical format by David Fairchild and I last Sunday.  In it we were able to cover:

1. An overview of Kaleo's brief history.
2. Purpose of the Church
3. Gospel Renewal Dynamics in our church
4. A missional ecclesiology 
5. Our vision for San Diego

You can view the whole sermon: Kaleo 2007

The Gospel Gone Public: Worldview·Mission·Preaching
Regional Event | San Diego
March 31, 2007

There is nothing more beautiful than to see a city transformed by the Gospel. As a fellow laborer for seeing Gospel going forth in San Diego, you are invited to the next Acts 29 regional event in San Diego, The Gospel Gone Public: Worldview·Mission·Preaching on Saturday, March 31, 2007.

Covered at this one-day conference will be topics that affect every pastor passionate about transforming San Diego with the Gospel, including the Church’s biblical mission, how to prepare and preach Gospel-centered messages, Gospel transformation, and much more.

Learn about the speakers, sessions, schedule, registration and the conference partners.

The cost for this conference is $45, and will include the conference materials, lunch, and a copy of Michael Goheen’s The Drama of Scripture.

Go check out a primer on Five Perspectives on the Emerging Church from David Fairchild.  David attends the National Pastors Conference and each contributor (Karen Ward, John Burke, Doug Pagitt and Mark Driscoll) of “Listening to the Beliefs of Emerging Churches” was present except Dan Kimball. They had those attending break up into 4 different groups of 8 people and then had each speaker sit in the groups to answer questions.  David gets to ask each person about their beliefs.  Here is a quote regarding Karen Ward: 

Our second guest was Karen Ward from Church of the Apostles. This was an interesting exercise in nailing Jell-O to the wall. Part of what concerns me about this new form of liberalism is its purposeful vagueness as if it is to be commended that we obfuscate rather than clarify our words and ideas. The disdain for definition is felt immediately when I began to ask questions about what acts as her underlying belief or presupposition for theology or ministry. The word games and semantic shuffle makes you feel like your herding cats with a bubble blower. I realize this form of communication is considered avant garde in our pomo/post-pomo culture, but this is nothing more than repackaged deconstructionism sprinkled with postmodern Christianese to be passed off as deeply intellectual thought.

Another quote: 

 This session ended with all four of the speakers sitting up front to field questions which were written down for them to answer. Low and behold my question was the first up- “What role does the cross-specifically the aspect of penal substitutionary atonement play in your ministry.” it saddens me that Karen and Doug gave your typical “cross as example” answer and left John and Mark having to explain the significance of the cross of Christ. John did this very politically correct and Mark basically said (and I’m paraphrasing) that if you don’t get the cross, you’re not a Christian. It is what sets Christianity apart from all other beliefs and faiths. Mark then gave a great explanation of the many aspects of the atonement and what Christ accomplished for us on our behalf. 

Read the whole post:  The Truncated Cross & Emerging Reductionism

For more on Listening to the Belief's of Emerging Churches, read what the authors say about their own chapters:
Doug Pagitt
Dan Kimball who also links to the statements of faith from these author's churches
Mark Driscollwho links to a sample PDF of his own chapter.

Bob Hyatt's associate pastor wrote another review: Listening to "Listening To The Beliefs of Emerging Churches His take on Driscoll is a bit different:

While Driscoll is to the modern Calvinist/systematic theologians as Barak Obama is to the Democratic party (a young voice that older folks are putting a lot into) he doesn’t participate in the same way as the rest of the contributors….To put it crassly, Mark puts on a black and white striped shirt and spends a majority of the book blowing whistles on what he sees to be theological fouls. But it’s a little like having a referee at a poker game, its somewhat out of place. It doesn’t really work that well. He’s given himself the role of whistle blower on the emerging church.

Another TallSkinnyKiwi post Listening to the Beliefs of Emerging Churches. Part One.  In it he writes:

Mark Driscoll (Biblicist Theology) is the elephant in the room, the crabby schoolteacher, and one continually wonders whether he is on the defensive to protect his own reputation from participation in this book project or if he considers it his ministry to bring the others back to Calvin. Or, as a pastor, he is worried about his flock going into spaces where there be dragons. Maybe all of those. Reformed folk will be cheering him on as he chastises the others for treating theology as if dynamic rather than static. But his comments open up so many questions that the book almost needs a place for the other authors to respond to Driscoll's comments on them…

Doug Pagitt (Embodied Theology) is brilliant. I have said this before but The Pagitt has not been able to display it in such a way as to prove I am right.

Karen Ward (Communal Theology) also does exceedingly well, perhaps better than anyone.

John Burke (Incarnational Theology) offers a gateway for those feeling stifled in the World of WillowBack and are pilgrimaging forward into emergent territory, but he also speaks out for global issues (also my role in conversations like these) and the good news for new age and neo-paganism.

So the debate continues,  I'm sure many will have different view points based on their theological convictions and where/what they see the church to be.  Can you be reformed and emerging?

I had a discussion with a few guys from Kaleo Church about what makes a church 'emerging'.  My assumption is that there is an emerging in the 'form' (styles, place, methods) and others in the 'substance' (theology, beliefs).  So are churches like Kaleo (and Mars Hill or other Acts 29 churches) truly emerging?  One person suggested that at the very center of the emerging movement is an undefinable quality that is part of the definition.  I guess this means you can be an emerging church if you want to be.   

My friend Ed Stetzer is working on a research project with The Leadership Network (www.leadnet.org) on the state of church planting in the U.S. One key aspect of this study is a close look at multiplying churches and networks: what are they doing, how they are doing it, etc.If your church or organization has been actively involved in supporting new church starts over the past few years, and you have not already participated in the study, would you take a moment to fill out an online survey about your work and efforts? If you know others who should be involved, would you please forward this to them?

The church planting church survey can be found at http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.asp?u=861003202740

The survey for organizations/denominations can be found at http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.asp?u=545713205672.

We appreciate your time and effort to share your thoughts, experiences, successes and challenges. You won't want to be left out of this groundbreaking study.