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Tag Archive - Technology-Social Media

Community Organizer+Grasp of Web 2.0/Social Media=President Elect Obama

November 6, 2008 in Ministry-Theology with 9 Comments

Last April
April 10, 2008: That is the date I wrote my post regarding an interview with conservative talk show host Hugh Hewitt and the authors of Millenial Makeover: MySpace, You Tube, and the Future of American Politics. There were tons of points that the authors made that day, but three continue to stick out to me because I’m really interested in social media and I love working with this generation.

Communication to this generation via text, online, etc. is how they make decisions, rather than listening to authority. They make decisions based on their connectivity network, rather than make decisions based on authority.

You should have two different strategies to reach the Boomers and the Millenials. And they should be, and better be completely different. The Millenials can sniff out any in-authenticity in marketing. They don’t care about or watch TV, because they would rather be online and communicating and networking with people.

Interested in Peer to Peer, Bottoms-Up organizing styles, and not Top-Down, Command and Control style. You can appeal to them if you can talk to them about communitarian solutions that are self organizing.

The Millenials Take the Election
I think those are really great observations that Obama seemed to understand and McCain didn’t. I’m not a political analyst, but I think that’s fairly accurate. “Young voters preferred Obama over John McCain by 68 percent to 30 percent — the highest share of the youth vote obtained by any candidate since exit polls began reporting results by age in 1976, according to CIRCLE, a non-partisan organization that promotes research on the political engagement of Americans between ages 15 and 25.” (Youth vote may have been key in Obama’s win). In fact, the article goes on to say, quoting the authors of the Millenial Makeover, the following:

Through a steady stream of texts and Twitters, experts agree Obama has managed to excite young voters by meeting them where they live — online.

“This is a group of people who are constantly checking in with everybody else in their circle to make a decision,” says Morley Winograd, the co-author of “Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics” and a former adviser to Vice President Al Gore. He defines Millennials as ages 18 to 26. Continue Reading…

Becoming a Heretic on Church Ministry: Church Leadership

November 6, 2008 in Ministry-Theology with 3 Comments

The Context
This is Part 2 in the continued series, Becoming a Heretic on Church Ministry.

Last week we looked at Becoming a Heretic on Church Ministry: The Sermon.

When we think about what a heretic on/in Church ministry is, I am taking a cue from Seth Godin’s book Tribes: We Need You To Lead Us. See my review for Leadership Network here.

Godin says:

Challenging the status quo requires a committment, both public and private. It involves reaching out to others and putting yourideas on the line. (Or pinning your Ninety-five Theses to the church door). (pp. 49)

and later in the book, Godin says:

Religion and faith are often confused. Someone who opposes faith is called an atheist and widely reviled. But we don’t have a common word for someone who opposes a particular religion.

Heretic will have to do.

If faith is the foundation of a belief system, then religion is the facade and the landscaping. It’s easy to get caught up in the foibles of a corporate culture and the systems that have been built over time, but they have nothing at all to do with the faith that built the system in the first place.

Change is made by people, by leaders who are proud to be called heretics because their faith is never in question. (pp. 84)

Church Leadership
One of the areas that I want to look at is “church leadership” which is such a broad topic and can literally mean anything. As we look at this topic, I want us to remember…I want to remember…that this is really an exploration on looking differently at some areas in Church that we have often taken for granted, or have always performed the function the same way. And I’m wondering, and believing, that we need to re-think, re-imagine some new ways to do things. As we look at this list you will see some of the strong influence I have received from the world of technology and social media, and how the tools they provide are setting the agenda for a new way of leadership…actually, I think it takes us back to a more Biblical form of leadership (minus the internet). So here are just 5 areas that I have been thinking about…that I think need tinkering, re-imagining, etc. What do you think? I would like to hear your thoughts on these ideas that seem heretical in some circles…but may be common sense to you.

How?

Participatory: Church leadership canvtake cues from the world of technology and social media and understand the need and desire for participation. The reason that Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Yahoo Answers, blogs, etc. are so popular is that it offers individuals the ability to participate. Not only can they participate in regards to their own content, but they have an opportunity to participate in the larger content…larger narrative of what is happening around them. They participate in the content they manufacture online, and they participate in causes, both global and local that have their source in origin in the content of others. I think most churches would love for everyone to participate. In fact, they hope they do. It’s just that church leadership doesn’t structure itself in such a way that communicates or makes it possible for everyone to participate. Participation is not about a few people telling others how to participate…participation is about opening up the avenues that allow others to participate more fully with the gifts, desires and skills that God has blessed them with.Does your chuch leadership structure itself in such a way that it communicates to the whole church that participation by everyone is important? How?

Economics Is More Than Money–Re-Thinking How We Use Our Time

October 10, 2008 in Ministry-Theology with 2 Comments

Seth Godin has a killer post, Is effort a Myth.

He has me thinking about the economy…but not in terms of money…but rather the economy of time.

How we spend our time is as important as how we spend our money.

I like the practical advice he gives on just taking a 120 minutes, and re-thinking how you spend it.

You can see his thoughts below:

And that’s the key to the paradox of effort: While luck may be more appealing than effort, you don’t get to choose luck. Effort, on the other hand, is totally available, all the time.

This is a hard sell. Diet books that say, “eat less, exercise more,” may work, but they don’t sell many copies.

With that forewarning, here’s a bootstrapper’s/marketer’s/entrepreneur’s/fast-rising executive’s effort diet. Go through the list and decide whether or not it’s worth it. Or make up your own diet. Effort is a choice, at least make it on purpose:

1. Delete 120 minutes a day of ‘spare time’ from your life. This can include TV, reading the newspaper, commuting, wasting time in social networks and meetings. Up to you.

2. Spend the 120 minutes doing this instead:

* Exercise for thirty minutes.
* Read relevant non-fiction (trade magazines, journals, business books, blogs, etc.)
* Send three thank you notes.
* Learn new digital techniques (spreadsheet macros, Firefox shortcuts, productivity tools, graphic design, html coding)
* Volunteer.
* Blog for five minutes about something you learned.
* Give a speech once a month about something you don’t currently know a lot about.

3. Spend at least one weekend day doing absolutely nothing but being with people you love.

4. Only spend money, for one year, on things you absolutely need to get by. Save the rest, relentlessly.

If you somehow pulled this off, then six months from now, you would be the fittest, best rested, most intelligent, best funded and motivated person in your office or your field. You would know how to do things other people don’t, you’d have a wider network and you’d be more focused.

It’s entirely possible that this won’t be sufficient, and you will continue to need better luck. But it’s a lot more likely you’ll get lucky, I bet.

I was thinking about how much time I waste just surfing. And I don’t mean surfing in the ocean. But surfing on the web, the TV, through magazines that are pointless and candy/bubblegum for the brain (i.e. think sensational, gossip, celebrity, etc.)

Here are some ways that I would like to re-think, re-do my time.

Check email only twice a day. In the afternoon (around lunch) and then before work is over (around 5 or 6).

Remove, or lower my data package on my Blackberry so that I can’t be online as much. And turn off my email that comes to my phone.

Reduce the amount of TV shows that I watch. I like a lot, so that will be tough. Replace that TV time with reading, relaxing, spending time with my wife. And by time, not the time we spend watching TV, but real interactional, connecting time.

Spend more time with my family when I’m with my family. That means cut back on texting, Twittering, checking the web when I am with them. So really be present.

Don’t spend my days off just running errands, especially the weekends. But truly take a Sabbath.

Ultimately, use the time I get back to do two things: 1) use that time to do important, life giving, learning stuff; 2) use that time to be present with my family…not just physically present, but emotionally present.

Give me your thoughts. How would you re-think your time, and what would you do with it?

“Technology as a Powerful Practice”

October 6, 2008 in Ministry-Theology, Technology-Social Media with 5 Comments

I believe technology to be a very powerful and important tool for the Church, but as Christians we must also be careful of how and what we embrace in regards to technology. That in the process we don’t become slaves to its means, but rather that we use technology as a transformative and redemptive agent for God’s Kingdom.

Recently I have been having more and more conversations with my friend Wess Daniels, whom I know from Fuller, and who I would on occasion meet up with to grab coffee as we pushed our daughters through Pasadena in their strollers.

Wess is an important and much needed voice in the way of technology and the Church. We are working on developing some online conversations in this area, but in the meantime, please read his article:

Technology as a Powerful Practice (Part 1).

If both the church and technology can be understood as potentially opposing powerful-practices how ought the church interact with technology? The first option is to treat technology as a commodity. We embrace as consumers whatever the latest and greatest gadget is in the name of utility and relevance; utility because it can help bring people in, relevance because irrelevance is the single greatest fear for the church-as-a-people-of commodity. Second, the church can seek to manage technology and keep it under control. The problem with both these options is that they do not recognize the implications of technology as a power and will themselves be reconfigured for the ends necessary of what we could half-jokingly call the imago tech rather than the imago Dei.

The third possibility is avoidance and/or ignorance. In either case this view operates under fallacy that we can remain untouched by “culture” and that maintaining group identity through isolation is the way forward. This is a reversal of the first view. The strength of this position is that it recognizes the power of technology but does not discern technology as an institution. If technology is an institution, a powerful-practice, it is in the air we breathe, we cannot escape its broad-sweep. The final option is to parry technology through participating in it but reorder it under the reign of God. This group acknowledges the universality of technology within the world, but resists its tendencies to reconfigure and dominate life under its particular ends. In one way, you might say this group remains indifferent in their attitude towards technology. They resist through engaging with technology but in a manner that rejects its own end goal and instead joins up with God’s redemptive work within the system.

Pastors and Technology: We Need to Re-Imagine Our Roles

October 2, 2008 in Ministry-Theology with 8 Comments

Some of the commenters from my post yesterday got me thinking about some things that I just briefly want to comment on.

I ended my post with two thoughts:

Two things I think pastors, church leaders need to start wrestling with if they haven’t already:

1) Shift from geographical based ministry to online community/networking based. This does not mean people still won’t gather, but how, where and when they gather will change.

2) Technology is allowing the people/congregants to self-organize, collaborate and participate without having to go through traditional means and hierarchies of the church. I think this will change the role of the pastor drastically from the top-down leader, to more of a facilitator. I think that means we will see less and less traditional roles of pastors, and maybe even less full-time positions, etc.

Here is what I’m thinking. And I’m thinking these things not on any official research I have done, but more on conversations I am having, trends I am seeing, what I am reading, etc.

One of the issues about #2 is that people are concerned about a “consumer” mentality in the Church…more than we already have now. Also, what will be the role of the pastor.

Couple of thoughts. And they are simply thoughts, not completely worked out, but stuff I am hypothesizing and thinking on.

I think the “modularity” of Church that Andrew Jones talked about won’t drive more church consumerism, but will actually reduce it.

Why? Because churches used to be the resource for all information (phone numbers, emails, addresses, theology, Christian education, prayer chains, etc.) and churches controlled the market on the ability to gather and organize. Think Sunday worship, Wed. night Bible studies, etc, etc. People traditionally have relied on the Church as the resource to gather people and dispense information.

Because of this, people would drive miles and miles to attend the church that could attract, gather and dispense the information for them. Often this process has pulled people out of community…driving miles and miles to attend a church that is not rooted in their community where they live, etc.

I think that now people can easily organize, collaborate and dispense information themselves, they will no longer need to rely on the Church as needing to fulfill that role. I think there will be a desire for people to organize and gather in their own communities of locality, rather than feeling the need to drive to churches who used to have to do that for them. I am not saying there will not be church or people won’t go to them. They will, but I think church will look different than it traditionally does now.

In Short: Technology=Ability to Organize and Collaborate=Congregants Taking the Responsibility Into Their Own Hands.

What about the pastor? I think there will always be the need for a pastor, but what is a pastor is my question? Have we possibly gotten away from the Biblical role of the pastor?

In the NT we see the correlation between the shepherd and pastor. I have been told before by some pastors that we are to be ranchers…not shepherds. That has a whole other connotation in my mind.

One commenter said that it’s actually not the pastors who do the shepherding anymore, but the small group leaders, etc. I agree with him. It’s hard to find a pastor who shepherds.

I believe that with the ability to gather, organize and collaborate that technology affords us, it frees up the pastor to do the work of actually shepherding, rather than being the CEO, rancher, etc. I used the word facilitator in yesterday’s post, and what I mean by that is that the Church is beginning to have the ability to organize on their own, which frees the pastor up to facilitate the movement and truly shepherd the people.

In Short: Technology=Ability to Organize and Collaborate=Congregants Taking the Responsibility Into Their Own Hands=Pastor Can Truly Be a Shepherd.

Of course my own theology and praxis is shining through there, some of which you may agree with, and some which you may not agree with.

But for any of this to take place (which I think is a great thing for the Church), churches, pastors and ministry leaders are going to have to let go of the “power” they have traditionally held, and instead be a church and people that walk humbly amongst the people they are there to serve. Even questioning their roles as pastors in the Church.

In closing, I’m aware that some traditions/denominations already seem to embody this theology and praxis. I wonder if Wess Daniels can shed some light on these thoughts in light of the Quaker tradition that he is a part of.

If you are wondering what to read on some of these issues, here are a few suggestions. There are a lot more, but here are some that I have found helpful and challenging. Please add to this list and let me know what you are reading that has been helpful in thinking about the issues of technology in redefining the role of pastors and the Church, especially as it relates to gathering, organizing, collaborating, etc.

Check Them Out

The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations by Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom.

Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations by Clay Shirky.

Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything by Dan Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams.

Facebook for Pastors: How To Build Relationships And Connect With People Using The Most Popular Social Network On The Internet by Chris Forbes

The New Media Frontier: Blogging, Vlogging and Podcasting for Christ, edited by John Mark Reynolds and Roger Overton

Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff

Changing Role of the Pastor and Church: From Geography Based to Online Community, and from Top-Down Leader to Facilitator

October 1, 2008 in Ministry-Theology with 9 Comments

Mark Brown had an interesting post over at Facebook and on his blog, Ministry in the not too distant future.

Here is what he says:

Seeing this visitor diversity reminded me of the huge shift presently happening in society: moving from relating geographically to relating through networks or interests. This is being driven by the massive growth of the internet. In the not too distant future where you live will mean very little to whom you relate to and the context of your work.

Your workplace may well be wherever you want it to be, your ministry field perhaps on the other side of the world. The most obvious positive is that we potentially can reach huge numbers of people for a fraction of the cost (no travel expenses, venue set up costs etc..) And the negative is that we won’t have as much face to face contact. And for most of us this is the biggest struggle : the idea that we relate without meeting face to face. To quote Hugh Mackay, no longer do we need to be physically present to be in community.

The massive challenge facing us in the church and church organisations is that we are all deeply invested in the geographic model. Parishes are located in suburbs, with autonomous Christian organisations, one to each country. So as this shift away from geography builds momentum we are in for quite a shock.

It is essential that leaders start to wrestle with this otherwise we may well be left wondering where all the people went.. wait isn’t that happening already?

I agree with Mark regarding the essence of his comments here. I think we are seeing a shift away from a geographical based model of church. That is not to say that people will stop gathering at church, but how that looks I think will be very different than the model we see now. I think more and more people will be connected through online networks and gather more locally then drive to church.

I think we will see more and more people connected physically to various networks of ministry, instead of attendance at one church where they participate in everything such as worship, small groups, prayer, etc. It will be more of a modular model that Andrew Jones talked about at GodblogCon.

Two things I think pastors, church leaders need to start wrestling with if they haven’t already:

1) Shift from geographical based ministry to online community/networking based. This does not mean people still won’t gather, but how, where and when they gather will change.

2) Technology is allowing the people/congregants to self-organize, collaborate and participate without having to go through traditional means and hierarchies of the church. I think this will change the role of the pastor drastically from the top-down leader, to more of a facilitator. I think that means we will see less and less traditional roles of pastors, and maybe even less full-time positions, etc.

Thinking out loud. What do you think? Where do you see this already happening?

The Inagural Church Tech Camp–And the Role of the Pastor in the Age of Technology

September 26, 2008 in Ministry-Theology with 8 Comments

I wish I could have been there this morning with the crew at Church Tech Camp, but since I couldn’t, it was great to watch it live and participate.

Props to Tony Steward for putting on the “unconference.” And props to #churchtechcamp making the Twitter trends today and making it on the Twitter blog.

Check out some of Tony’s thoughts on the day.

Check out the live blog from Church Tech Camp today as well.

You can see my question on the live blog that I posed to the audience.

11:22
[Comment From rhettsmith]
I’m wondering if we move more and more towards open source in the Church…what role do you see the pastor taking?

There was some lengthy discussion about my question and what I meant. But in general, I wonder with the ability for congregations to quickly self organize and communicate without having to go through the pastor, the hierarchy, etc., what role will the pastor take in the future? I think many pastors are nervous about losing power, status and position that has always been afforded them from behind the pulpit, so what if they are no longer needed? And by that, I don’t mean they won’t speak, preach or teach, but what if their particular brand of one person leadership is not needed? Will they become more of a facilitator? Are the traditional vocational roles of the pastor in jeopardy (as in paid staff)? Lots of questions I am asking.

But what I’m really thinking is that the decentralization of the pastor is actually a great thing for a church community, and it places the pastor in a role that I think he or she was meant to be in. That of shepherd, facilitator, etc. Someone who leads from within….not above or out in front.

P.S. Thanks to Rich Kirkpatrick for being my voice in person at the conference when I was actually in Dallas. He helped better finesse and define some of the questions I was having trouble articulating.

Technology and the Future of the Church

September 23, 2008 in Ministry-Theology with 3 Comments

There are a lot of amazing things happening in the world of ministry and technology. So much so that it’s hard to keep up with all of it. Some churches are on the leading edge of innovation, while others are still trying to get a website put together. Wherever you fall on the spectrum, below are four links that might interest you from this past week.

First:
Author, blogger, video guru and Church 2.0 leader Greg Atkinson has a great post which basically introduces the Digerati Team from LifeChurch.tv, SPOTLIGHT: LifeChurch.tv’s Digerati Team. Many of you don’t know that there exists such a team on a church staff. But I think that trend is changing, and as you read the article you will definitely see their fingerprints all over the world of ministry and tech.

Greg says:

You might be wondering: “What in the world does “digerati” mean?” To get to the bottom of something, I go to Wikipedia. Wikipedia reads:”The digerati are the elite of the computer industry and online communities.” From what I know of my friends Terry Storch and Tony Steward (and the rest of the Digerati Team) this fits them very well.

Maybe you don’t recognize the team, but you may recognize their work. Here is what the Digerati team has been up to and is responsible for:

* YouVersion (Web, Mobile, and iPhone)
* OPEN
* ChurchMetrics
* Internet Campus
* LifeGroups
* LifeShare
* OnePrayer

Second:
If you can make it to Pasadena, CA this Friday, then you need to so that you can attend Church Tech Camp. It’s the first in what I think will be a growing group of church leaders who are on the innovative edge of integrating technology and ministry, especially as it relates to social media, web 2.0 tools. If you can’t make it, then watch the live stream of the get together. Not only is the technology and its use in ministry innovative, but the organization of the camp itself is on the leading edge. Check it out and you will see.

Third:
Check out Andrew Jones’ Powerpoint presentation from his talk at GodblogCon, The Missional Church in the Internet Age. You can listen to Andrew’s podcast as well at Podcasts of Godblogcon 2008, as well as all the others from there.

Fourth:
Godbloggers Prepare to Invade ‘Sin City’

Blogworld and New Media Expo & GodblogCon

September 22, 2008 in Ministry-Theology with 2 Comments

This last weekend was a great time at Blogworld and New Media Expo, and GodblogCon.

It was my fourth year at GodblogCon, and my 2nd time at Blogworld.

I have some thoughts about the conference and I will be posting them this week, but just a sampler of some things that stood out to me.

Moving GodblogCon to Vegas last year to be a part of Blogworld and New Media Expo was a great choice. I would actually be interested in exploring with the Godblog people some ways that we can integrate even more, so it’s not two separate conferences.

Huge, huge props to John Mark Reynolds, Dustin Steeve and the crew from Biola’s Torrey Honor’s Institute for putting together a great conference. They are some of the most amazing and hospitable people there are, and I’m glad to be a part of such a great group. Thanks Dustin and crew.

Missional thinking: The connection between the two conferences this weekend was tech, new media, social media, etc. As Christians we need to do a better job of finding our common ground with others, with the world, build relationships, etc.

New media and tech people seem to be very accessible, patient and easy going to me. The Church can learn a lot from them, especially how they collaborate with one another, communicate from decentralized positions/relationships, etc, etc. I was super impressed with how accessible all the big speakers were, and how they spent a great amount of time talking to people. Chris Brogan, Andrew Jones and Guy Kawasaki come to mind. This conference doesn’t seem to have the speakers that roll in at the last minute VIP and then leave. The speakers are great. Very participatory feel. Again, something Church conferences can learn from.

It’s great to see friends at the conference who are involved in Church-land, but who get new media technology and are using it. I’m thinking of people like Matt Singley, Andrew Jackson and Lars Rood.

Again, I will post more this week on some more specific issues. But before I do I have a question.

GodblogCon seems like it’s on the verge of becoming more integrated with Blogworld. And it probably can take some more strides.

Are there any other major conferences where we can bring together the Church and the non-Church world, using our common interests to unite us, but allowing our differences to teach and learn from one another?

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