Reach 09 ver. 1.0
Today was the official kick-off day for Reach09. It started with a great keynote address by Eric Geiger, author of Simple Church. Previously I was not a fan of his book. I liked the concept and agreed with his conclusions, it just seemed like the book was too slow of a read. Seemed like a good pamphlet that was stretched out into a book. Granted, my favorite genre is classic Russian literature, so I am a little off. After hearing him speak, I am willing to give it another shot. Very dynamic speaker who hit on some very key paradigms that MUST shift within the church community if we are to be vibrant leaders once again. He talked a lot about the drift toward complexity and away from discipleship.
One of his points that resonated with me was that “if you personally can’t do everything you are asking your people to do, then you are asking too much. We should go to church, be involved in a small group (or whatever you call it), serve…but then be in the community with our neighbors. Be at the little league park. Be on the HOA board. Get out there and live life and be exposed to the rest of the world and let them be exposed to you.”
Another key part of his message was that discipleship is not something we “do” but it is the WHOLE PROCESS and anything that does not contribute to that process is causing us to drift off mission.
I can’t do it justice, but suffice it to say he was on point.
With the convention in full swing, all of the products were out there and on demo. I’ll try to have a few more pictures tomorrow including the fingerSCAN checkin system. (Don’t say fingerPRINT, it’ll make your members think of George Orwell. Say fingerSCAN and it is less scary.) The nice thing about the finger scanner is the odds of someone leaving their fingers behind are slim. It is also faster than a bar code or number look-up. No need to pull a card out of your wallet, etc.
The big hit of the day came from R&D. Who else? They unveiled their new Facebook app as well as a host of other projects that are either just completed or near completion.
What this app does is take your current online member database-AccessACS and bring the interface directly into the Facebook iFrame. It looks a little like this:
Yes, that is right. You are infact seeing tabs for your church directory, your church member profile and your groups right in Facebook. This picture shows the view when the “groups” tab is selected.
It pulls the information straight out of AccessACS. Oh, and see that little ‘mark attendance’ link? Yep, if you have the correct permissions within AccessACS, you can mark attendance for your small group right within Facebook, which will send it to AccessACS, which will send it to the church office. All automatically based on your login. Once you do the initial set-up, when you log into your Facebook account, you are logged into your AccessACS account.
Browsing Facebook and need a member number? That is what the Church Directory tab is for. Again, all based on security profiles.
Change your email address or cell phone? Make the edit under “My Profile” and it pushes back to the church office.
It is a “working beta”. There are no technological limitations at this point. There are some final details to work out with Facebook’s terms of service (go figure).
There is more customization coming as well.
Those of you who have issues with creation of “Christian Ghettos” have got to love this. This was born out of someone saying “As the body of Christ, we need to go where the current is. And the current current is Facebook.”
And all this time you’ve been “throwing sheep”.
I didn’t have time to check out the integration with Unifyer or some of the new features in Broadcast-digital signage pulling information dynamically from your church calendar. Hopefully tomorrow.
Follow the twitter hashtag #reach09 for all the latest up to the minute news.
Shameless Plug Monday – 5-18-09
Yes, I know. It’s supposed to be Shameless Plug Friday.
1. Jason Powelland CITRT. Monday night I was in a Communications Committee meeting and one of the goals was to explore the idea of having the meetings via web conference. There are a lot of reasons to do this- less trips by car (greener), volunteers can save probably an hour by time they drive to church, drive back and the associated getting ready to go, etc. The next day I posted a tweet looking for “free or dirt cheap” solutions. Jason retweeted and later put a page up on the CITRT.org site. Thus demonstrating the power of community.
I could spend several weeks searching for different solutions, trying them out, etc. Or I could just check into the wiki page every so often and let the discussion hash it out. Hmmm….
2. My buddies Scott S. and Kevin A. who keep noodling me to get back on the bike. The spirit is willing, but the time clock is weak. Gotta find time for that. (you can and should follow @kevinabbate on twitter. You’ll feel like a fat, lazy, out of shape, middle aged tree slug, but Kevin is a great guy, so it’s all good. He’s definitely a motivator when it comes to being in shape.)
3. Michael Hyatt. CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishers. I just added him to my blog roll. His blog consistently has great information on time management, staying connected via technology, leadership, etc. There is a good one here about twitter and another good one hereabout managing email. Great resource and certainly worth following.
A lesson in providing tools
I saw this post from Christopher Dawsonover at ZDNET:
“Just a brief rant here, folks…I talked a while ago about my superintendent and how he used AOL extensively for calendaring and communication. Basically, I came to the conclusion that if we don’t provide users with a range of tools to satisfy their needs, they’ll bring crappy ones on-site that we’ll need to support (like AOL).”
Now there is a little bit of wisdom! One of the challenges we face in church data is “silos of information”. People maintaining their Excel sheets, Outlook contact lists, etc outside of the main database. This became a topic of discussion at the FL.CITRT during the session on IT Strategy.
One of the axioms I picked up over 10 years ago from Calvary Chapel, Ft. Lauderdale was that their entire method of ministry had been boiled down to:
“Find a need and fill it.”
The same applies to internal tools: listen to needs, prove the tools, maintain ongoing dialog, be willing to set aside pride and the “I am right, you WILL do it MY way” type of thinking.
It is either that or fractured ministry, silos of information, frustrated staff on both sides and burned out volunteers.
