He said that the main thing they are trying to figure out is “How do we mover our people to be passionate about the kingdom of God?” Not just who they are as individuals in Christ but about getting involved in what the church is doing as a whole.

Within that Keith sees a number of things they as church leaders could be doing better: helping people to understand their own gifts and how they could be used; communicating about existing ministry opportunities; identifying and going after new ministry opportunities.

To Keith, the challenge isn’t that there aren’t enough people in their church participating in ministry. They have plenty of volunteers.

He wonders, though, if people look around don’t see opportunities to step in to help, so they don’t get involved. It made me think of how a new member to my church described a previous church they had been members at:

The church met in borrowed space and even in the sanctuary you could see boxes and stacks of things that hadn’t found a home yet. Everywhere you looked you could see something that needed to be done and as a result it was easy to roll my sleeves up and dive right in.

Keith’s desire resonates with me. At our last Elder meeting I expressed my frustration that it didn’t seem like we were doing anything to try and set the people, who are currently comfortable or indifferent about their faith, on fire with a passion for what it truly means to be a child of God. To me, the urgency of this is made obvious when you hear Jesus’s warning to the church in Laodicea in Revelation 3:15-16:

¹⁵“‘I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! ¹⁶So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.

Keith and I are going to find a time to talk again soon to discuss this further. I’d love to hear from you what your experiences have been. Is this an issue your church has faced? What do you believe can be done?

“God’s networked kingdom finds expression as people cluster together, centered in Christ, living in the way of Jesus.” –Dwight Friesen

Thy Kingdom Connected by Dwight Friesen

[<Disclosure> I received this book to review through my participation in The Ooze's Viral Blogger program. I have not been compensated financially in any way for reading or reviewing this book. </Disclosure>]

Thy Kingdom Connected is written by Dwight Friesen, associate professor of practical theology at Mars Hill Graduate School in Seattle. In it Friesen uses Network Theory to describe various theological implications, perspectives and applications pertaining to the kingdom of God. Friesen’s goal in writing the book is to shine light upon the inter-connectivity of creation and prepare readers for “living into the image of God” and “incarnating the mission of God.”

I Like This Book, But…

I was very excited when I learned about this book. Judging it by its cover (what? you don’t judge books by their covers?) it appeared to be about things that I am passionate about: the kingdom of God, advancing the Church, and social networking. All topics that I discuss regularly on this blog.

And I discovered upon reading the book that Friesen does address these things, more or less. But a better tagline would have been “What Theologians can learn from Network Theory“, because in my opinion, this book is more a theological exposition built upon the concept of networks than a discussion of practical applications of insights from social media.

That being said, the book is interesting and important for Christians today. Network Theory is an interesting field that has helped to advance the thinking in many fields. By applying this type of critical thinking to the different aspects of Christian faith can yield numerous benefits and help shape how individuals seek to live out their faith… which is Friesen’s goal for the book.

To achieve his goal, Friesen goes through a number of different implications of network thinking applied to areas like leadership, Christian community, missional strategy, and spiritual formation. For example, in the chapter on missional strategy, Friesen makes that case that if we understand the fact that we are meant to be connected to others and that God intends the establishing of connections to ultimately bring people into relationship with Him through Jesus Christ, we will intentionally seek to be relationships and practice hospitality so as to establish and strengthen such links connecting people to Him. Makes sense to me.

What to expect from the book

The book is 178 pages long but I must warn you: Friesen writes like a college professor. He makes his points through effective but burdensome use of specialist language and complex thought processes. I found myself reading and re-reading passages just to make sure I was understanding what he was saying. The book is conceptual and the little narrative that Friesen includes is only used to introduce concepts. As I was reading, I imagined I was sitting in a lecture hall… do with that what you want. Me, I enjoyed being a student.

Implications for a Kingdom Strategist

At it’s core, this book explores very important truths about the kingdom of God. It offers a different perspective and in the process highlights key implications that will shape the way you think about how to strategical advance the mission of Christian organizations. Network Theory focuses on visually depicting the relationships between elements of a system, as you think strategically about how to achieve the goals of your organization or church it is helpful to visualize how the different people involved are related. Not only that but it is valuable to incorporate relational elements into those kingdom goals.

Overall, Thy Kingdom Connected is a good book. The premise is interesting and the discourse is valuable. The readability is lacking and thus it requires commitment to draw the value out of the book. But in the end, the investment of your time and attention is worthwhile.

To purchase the book from Amazon.com, click here.

…Just so you know, all the book links are affliiate links. So if you click them and purchase the book, I’ll get paid… like $0.04.

For me, high school was the first time I ever witnessed a fight. I’d seen fights on TV and in movies but in high school I actually experienced a number of fights close up. I remember vividly how I felt every time I witnessed a fight. I felt scared. I felt kind of sick. I’ve talked before how violence is unnatural and it affects us profoundly whenever we are exposed to it. That is what I experienced those times I was around when a fight would break out.

I say all this because in the past week, I’ve witnessed in the Christian blogosphere a number of “fights,” examples of Christians trash-talking other Christians. And just like in high school, the commenters on those blogs crowd around yelling (in essence) “Fight! Fight! Fight!” I’m not going to link to any examples because I don’t want to perpetuate these fights. But if you read Christian blogs you know what I’m talking about.

What I witnessed this week left me with that same sick feeling I felt in high school. I honestly thought to myself, “How can you write such things and still proclaim to love Jesus?” I know deep down that all Christians are flawed and left to our own devices our sinful nature will inevitably screw everything up, even the profound blessing that God’s Kingdom. But still…

So this morning when I read about the kindergarten project on Stuff Christians Like my spirit was immediately lifted. “Yes! This is what it means to be a Christian!” I thought (mental fist pumping and everything). So I immediately blogged about it, added my support via the comments (made a few jokes as well; it’s a satire blog after all.) and have been tracking the status of the fundraising all day.

As of the time this post is published, the Stuff Christians Like community has raised $18,486.79 dollars to build a kindergarten in Vietnam. $18,486.79 dollars!!!Now you have to realize something, this has only been going on for six or so hours. That’s $3,081 per hour!!! We’re already at over 60 percent of our goal! On the first day!

This is what it means to be a Christian!

This is the immeasurable, incomprehensible, incomparable power of Jesus Christ at work redeeming this world.

If you haven’t already (I say as if I have readers), please please PLEASE go to the donation page and help. Be encouraged by your Christian brothers and sisters actually loving others and not just talking about loving others. This is a chance to love and serve the poor, to bless the children of Vietnam and to proclaim the glory of God before the nations. Please be a part!

The link for the donation page is here: http://www.firstgiving.com/SCL

The project on Stuff Christians Like is here: http://stuffchristianslike.net/2009/11/this-cant-be-real/

And some additional details of the project can be found here: http://twentytwowords.com/2009/11/09/22-questions-to-jon-acuff-about-raising-30k-to-build-a-school-in-vietnam/

Go!

If you are part of a ministry I encourage you to participate in our research by taking the following survey. Click here to launch the “Excellence in Online Ministry” Ministry Leader Survey.

Thanks, Kevin

As we discussed different ways to collaborate and help churches and ministries develop web strategies I got an idea that wouldn’t go away. “What if there was a model for ministries engaging online that took exception to the givens of worldly-wisdom? What would that look like?” The answer that I kept coming back to was:

Kingdom Excellence

It was like that thought popped into my head and suddenly by brain exploded with all these ideas about what Kingdom Excellence is, why it’s important, what it looks like, how to define it, how to assess performance against it… It became very clear (in my mind). But unfortunately (or fortunately), by it’s very nature, a definition of Excellence can not be defined by a single point of view. Rather, it is a standard that transcends any individual’s or group’s values, experience, beliefs. So in order that this idea of Kingdom Excellence not be limited by my personal limitations and weaknesses, I have been working with Drew for the past nine or so months to turn this idea into a reality.

And so I am pleased to announce the Online Kingdom Excellence Project, a collaborative research effort to define an approach to Internet strategy and activities for ministries that is centered on Kingdom principles, based on excellence, and aimed at long-term success through Kingdom advancement and benefits to the organization and to society.

The project will consist of three (3) phases:
Phase I - Concept Development: working with leading organizations and thought leaders in the areas of ministry and Internet strategy, we will identify guiding principles, core beliefs, and a strategic framework for evaluating online excellence. We will approach excellence from many different angles including theology, practical experience, best practices, intuition and insight, previous research to identify what constitutes Online Kingdom Excellence.

Phase II - Ministry Evaluation: based on the framework developed in Phase I, we will utilize a variety of research and analytic methodologies to evaluate a broad sample of ministries. We will look at the perceptions, practices and performance of these organizations in order to better understand what impact Online Kingdom Excellence can have for organizations.

Phase III - Publication: in order to help advance the mission of ministries, we plan to use an opportunity available to promote and share the outcomes from this research. The primary opportunity we currently have is to present the findings at the Christian Leadership Alliances 2010 conference which will be held in San Diego, CA in April.

This project is being led by myself, Drew Goodmanson (CEO of Monk Development and cofounder/pastor of Kaleo Church) and Dave Bourgeois, PhD (Associate Professor of Information Systems, Biola University). So far we have had a tremendous response from people about this project and are in talks to collaborate and partner with a number of well respected Christian organizations and leaders. I’m excited to promote these groups as they join the project so look for further announcements.

The primary home for information about this project will be a new site: The State Of Ministry www.stateofministryonline.com. I’ll be posting throughout the project both here and there. So head on over, bookmark it, add it to your RSS reader and stay tuned as we work together to define what Online Kingdom Excellence is.

If you’re interested in more information about the project or if you are with a ministry organization and would like to participate, please email me at research@unconventionalmethod.com.

Be Jesus To Me

I had the thought the other day that as we endeavor to grow, to learn about our faith and explore the mysteries of our relationship with Jesus Christ, we often become isolated from those who have not or do not study the issues of Christianity as much as we do. Everything from the complexity with which we explore issues to the language that we use separates us from others.

In light of this, I’ve spent a lot of time trying to distill the essence of a life of Christian faith and service in such a way that despite any situation I can know if I am appropriately oriented towards others the way that Christ calls me to. How to express how I am suppose to serve others?
Note: Jesus already answered this when he was asked which was the greatest commandment:

³⁶“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” ³⁷Jesus replied: ” ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ ³⁸This is the first and greatest commandment. ³⁹And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ ⁴⁰All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” –Matthew 22:36-39

What I keep coming back to is:

BE JESUS TO ME

This approach is simple, yet the power and truth in that phrase is amazing.

I am broken. I need a Redeemer. I need Jesus. You are the Body of Christ.

BE JESUS TO ME

On Monday, Molly Piper (who I met at the Christian Web Conference earlier this year) posted a powerful story of how a friend was Jesus to them through the simple act of reading a book before he gave it to them.

It’s not my story to tell so you should definitely read Molly’s post here.

What you see is that this gentleman willingly took on their pain, did not shy away from the unknown, did not avoid their suffering. Because he loves them.

This was no quick-fix, at-arms-length gift from someone who didn’t know how to handle someone like me. He had decided very consciously to enter into our pain, into our hell, even just for 184 pages. But that decision meant more to me than almost anything. It was a decision to love.

You see the power and love in this man’s gesture. Now imagine the love that must have driven Jesus to endure infinitely greater suffering, suffering that was not His to bear. What love must it be that He willingly sacrificed Himself, was tortured and died nailed to a tree — our suffering, our pain.

Do you know that Jesus Christ, God Himself, loves you so much that he entered into your pain, into your hell, and not just for 184 pages but to the extent that He was completely separated from God, so that you might live? Do you know this? Who do you know who needs to know this? To experience this love? Be Jesus to them.

The world is broken.

The world needs Jesus.

We ARE the Body of Christ.

Be Jesus to me.

Now is a time in the church when we need to ask ourselves if we are willing to sacrifice our empire to help strengthen the kingdom, what we call the global church – the body of Jesus.

It’s important to note that he is not devaluing the process of empire-building. I think Mr. Steward would agree that collaborative effort toward a common vision, group goals, authority structures, rules and procedures are not bad. Instead, he is making a key distinction which is has to do with our orientation.

In an empire, our internal, personal goals define how we fit within the empire’s structure. Our goals are either aligned with those of the empire and we end up thriving. Or our goals are subjugated and are oppressed by the system. Either way, as individuals we are oriented inwardly towards our self and let our own desires drive how we interact with the world.

In the Kingdom, we are called to abandon completely our internal orientation and solely focus externally: first on God, then on others (Matthew 22:37-40). Jesus says in Matthew 10:39 “Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” Only by focusing externally can our efforts have any significance or can we build something that lasts. Empires will fall.

The point that Mr. Steward makes is that in God’s Kingdom, we all have been given a specific role to fulfill, focused on accomplishing God’s goals by loving and serving others – the very essence of Kingdom strategy!

Who am I? How have I been shaped? What is God’s will for my life? What have I been called to do? What opportunities am I facing? Which people can I love and serve, both right now and in the future? Given all of this, what is the best way for me to serve? This is your Kingdom strategy.

It all starts with a change in orientation from internal to external. Dying to yourself so that you can live for Christ and others! This is how the Kingdom is being built right now. Without this shift, though, all we are doing is building empires that can not and will not last.

Cynthia Ware and Drew Goodmanson hosted a Webinar today reviewing findings from an exploratory survey we did on Church and Christian Social Networks. The slides from the presentation can be found here. Some key findings:

1. Facebook was the most used Church Web Media strategy.
2. Of the Christian Social Networking sites reviewed 82% of respondents had no awareness that they existed.

Number 1 is interesting given that Twitter has surpassed Facebook as the top social networking tool for business marketers. Especially because Twitter posted 76 percent growth (in unique visitors) last month compared to Facebook’s 23 percent. (Source: Compete)

Check out Twitter’s growth velocity compared to Facebook’s:

Just as valuable as the findings discussed in the Webinar was Cynthia’s introduction where she highlighted many of the characteristics of social media that have a significant impact on how the church can serve in this world. One thing that stands out to me when I look at those key findings is the overwhelming awareness in the church market of Facebook yet very little brand awareness of comparable tools designed specifically for churches. You might chalk this disconnect up to ineffective marketing strategies but I believe it points to a more crucial issue which is: churches aren’t approaching social media strategically.

I speak to this in my previous post: Facebook’s popularity and your church’s social media strategy, and Cynthia addressed part of this in her introduction. Social media (as an industry) has a clockspeed that exceeds most church leader’s ability to keep up. Basically, things happen in social media (new tools are introduced, trends emerge, etc.) faster than most other industries. And the church, when faced with the onslaught of new information about social media, has a difficult time identifying the relevant insights on which a successful church strategy should be based.

So instead of churches taking a strategic approach to social networking by:

1. understanding theological and Biblical interpretations of technology as a culture and as a ministry tool,
2. applying that understanding to the church’s existing Kingdom strategy to determine key goals for a social media strategy,
3. identifying the relevant factors, needs, and motivations of the people the church is trying to serve (both within its congregation and without) that can be met through a social media strategy,
4. and developing a social media strategy that fits within the strengths and limitations of the church’s staff and volunteers.

Churches dive headlong into social media (primarily on Facebook and more and more on Twitter), investing their time and their churches reputation without a solid sense of how exactly their efforts are going to redeem lives and bring glory to God.

Don’t get me wrong, I do not discourage churches from engaging this aspect of culture. I agree with what Cynthia said in her introduction:

If lifestreaming becomes commonplace, let’s add our voices to the landscape.

I just want us to be good stewards. The Parable of the Minas (Luke 19:12-27) teaches that good servants are good stewards. The need for churches to better understand this topic was driven home by a side discussion during the presentation:

According to our survey respondents, the top 5 requested Features/Functionality sought in a Church/Christian social network solution are:

1. Ability to find, register, and/or get details for events.
2. Ability to post prayer requests or needs.
3. Ability to find serving opportunities at the church based on interest or gifts.
4. Ability to join and interact with home/bible study groups.
5. Integration with existing church website.

Look at number 2. During the Webinar two different church tech leaders commented that their members hardly used the Prayer Request function on their site. Yet, the majority of church leaders surveyed indicated that this was a key feature.

Is there a disconnect? I don’t know. There are a number of factors about the two church examples that could have contributed to their experiences. Or maybe church technology leaders believe their members want/need something that congregations aren’t really invested in. Or maybe congregations think the ability to post Prayer Requests is a good idea but in practice they’re not comfortable exposing their needs online where everyone in the church (and possible the world) can see.

The point is we don’t know enough about how Christians approach social networking to say conclusively whether or not posting Prayer Requests is a good thing. We can’t say definitively if the value of social networking is in building Christian community or in Christians engaging culture… or both.

This is why there is a Phase II to our research. I believe we need to understand what churches are doing with regard to social networks, what individuals are doing with regards to social networks, and most importantly what the authoritative view of Scripture says we should be doing with regards to social network. We will be working with the providers of these solutions to develop empirical research that addresses these issues. Ultimately we desire to support the efforts of the church by defining a value proposition for social networking other than “you can reach 200 million active users if you sign up for Facebook.”

Are you interested in participating ?

If you are a church leader and social networking is something that your church is dealing with (or even has dealt with), we would love to have you help in our efforts in the following ways:

1. Take the survey. We would love to get your perspective on this space and how your church is approaching online community.

2. Distribute the survey within your church. We are looking for feedback from as many people as possible within churches and, if you are willing, we would ask that you pass it along to staff, members, and attendees. We will follow up with you after the launch of the survey to discuss the best way to do this and any concerns that you may have. To express our gratitude, we are offering a free copy of our findings report to churches that participate in this way.

3. Tell your friends about this project. That fact that you are aware of this work means that you are fairly tech-savvy. To make our research valuable to the church, we need to include feedback, perceptions, and experiences from churches that aren’t as comfortable with these trends. To that end, it would be especially valuable if you would be willing to reach out to other church leaders in your area or network to tell them about our work.

If you want to participate, please send me an email with your contact information to research@unconventionalmethod.com.

Thank you for your interest in this. I hope the findings from the exploratory survey are of value to you and hope you’ll continue with us on this journey.

Seems rather inane to state it like that, but a lot of people don’t know what to make of Facebook. Some don’t even know what Facebook is. Facebook’s incredible growth over the past year has far reaching implications not only for how people spend time online, but also how people interact in their daily lives. And this, in turn, affects the way we as the church operate. So the question is: how does a church make heads or tails of this bellwether of social media?

Since this article is long (1860 words, at last count), let me tell you where I’m going to go with this.

• First, we’ll try to understand the magnitude of growth that Facebook is experiencing.
• Then we’ll look at the factors that have contributed to this growth.
• I’ll present an interpretation of why Facebook is popular that should change the way churches approach it.
• We’ll conclude with a discussion of major implications for churches and their social media strategy.

So, just how popular is Facebook?

The facts:

• According to comScore data, Facebook reached 200 million unique visitors in November of 2008, reflecting a staggering 116 percent growth over the previous year.  Now 20 percent of everyone on the internet uses Facebook. That’s one out of every five people. (Table source: VentureBeat)

Facebook achieves 116 percent growth rate in 2008.

• Facebook is a world wide phenomenon. Here are some facts about Facebook’s global reach:
  • Number of active users : 175 million
  • Percent of Non-English users : 40%
  • Percent of Non-US population : 70%
  • Available number of languages : 43

• Facebook is no longer just for college students. Here’s a look at it’s growth across age groups (Source: Neilsen):

Facebook's 2008 growth by age group.

• Though 55 percent of Facebook’s users are under the age of 25, it is seeing the largest growth among people ages 18 to 49.

CNN Money puts Facebook’s size into perspective this way:

If Facebook were a country, it would have a population nearly as large as Brazil’s. It even edges out the U.S. television audience for Super Bowl XLIII, which drew a record-setting 152 million eyeballs.

In this era of online churches, is it too much of a leap to start sending missionaries to serve online?

But what is even more significant to churches is the increase in time people are spending on Facebook.

According to Compete , US residents spent more time last year on Facebook than any other website. According to Neilsen between December 2007 and December 2008, the total amount of time spent:

• online (globally) increased by 18 percent;
• on ‘Member Community’ sites increased by 63 percent;
• on Facebook increased by 566 percent (!!!!!).

More than 3 billion minutes are spent on Facebook each day. It also has the highest average time per person (three hours 10 minutes) amongst the most popular online brands. Not only is Facebook reaching more people but it is consuming more and more of their attention.

So what?

Well, there are two ways to respond to the Facebook phenomenon.

1. Me-Too-ism -or- The Relevance Trap

You may be thinking to yourself, “I don’t understand Facebook, but it’s clear that it isn’t going away so it’s something that our church has to do.”

Given that approximately 61 percent of Protestant Senior Pastors are from the Baby Boomer generation (source: Barna research), the increased popularity of Facebook among their age group may make venturing on to the site less daunting. And so someone from the church staff or  congregation volunteers to set up a “fan” page for the church. Local members begin to sign up, proudly displaying their affiliation. Maybe someone posts some pictures or starts a discussion about a sermon. And VIOLA!! your church has a Facebook strategy!

But what’s the benefit?

Increased awareness of your ministry? Yes. A reputation for being tech-savvy? Sure. Enhanced spiritual growth or gospel-centered community living among the body? It is possible. Enhanced teaching/missions/service/pastoral care/worship/evangelism? What about looking after orphans and widows in their distress? And how helping your members keep themselves from being polluted by the world? How do you do that when you’re giving them a tacit endorsement of Facebook and by extenstion MySpace (gasp!) by having an official church page?

The problem is that developing a social media strategy this way is reactionary and is not start with a true understanding of Facebook and why people are attracted to it. Nor does it incorporate ministry goals or define web-relational models and strategies that are appropriate for Facebook. You’re so busy getting your church on Facebook that you’ve never stopped to ask whether or not doing so advances the mission of the church.

This does not mean you can’t have success without a strategy. Like Woody Allen says, “Eighty percent of success is showing up.” Churches can not address the Facebook phenomenon without being on Facebook. And good things are happening as a result. There a many stories of life transformation, online conversions, deepening of relationships with Christ, and increased proclamation of the Gospel that are occurring online through tools like Facebook. The value of these can not be diminished. But the truth is that these are the exception, not the rule.

For your consideration: the percentage of the 50 million active Facebook users in the US that express personal interest or affiliation to the follow is disappointingly small (Source: Unconventional Method):

• The Bible – 2.81%
• Christian – 0.77%
• God – 0.69%
• Church – 0.57%
• Love – 0.45%
• Jesus – 0.19%
• Worship – 0.16%
• Theology – 0.10%
• Missions – 0.07%
• Social Justice – 0.05%
• Praying – 0.04%

Compare that to these other popular interests:

• Barack Obama – 6.38%
• Harry Potter – 3.39%
• Football – 2.20%
• Sleeping – 2.13%
• Gym – 2.08%
• Beer – 1.50%
• Food – 1.49%
• Breathing – 0.21%
• Sex – 0.14%

There are more people in the US who are willing to publicly promote on Facebook their affinity for “breathing” than those who would for “Jesus”. Despite our best efforts, the majority of the Body of Christ is not living out their life for Christ on Facebook. (Disclaimer: I too am guilty of this. My personal Facebook profile only mentions that I am a Christian. Though I am a “fan” of Tim Keller, so that’s got to count for something.)

I believe that we, as the church, can and should do more. I believe that the global Body of Christ has the responsibility to engage Facebook (and other realms of social media) as ambassadors of Christ. I believe  it is the responsibility of churches not only to participate in Facebook (and/or) other social media, but to understand what need individuals are having filled at such sites and be able to minister to those very needs with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Which brings me to the second approach to Facebook.

2. Understand and Employ

Why is Facebook so popular? From a functionality perspective, Neilsen identifies the following factors that have contributed to Facebook’s rapid growth:

• Design – it has an organized, simple and easy-to-use interface which appeals to a broader audience;
• Broad appeal – Facebook isn’t targeted towards a specific demographic;
• Activity Focus –  it is focused on connecting as opposed to entertaining;
• Architecture – it combines inventive features and open architecture;
• Privacy – it offers high levels of control over who sees content;

Facebook’s creator, Mark Zuckerberg’s vision for Facebook is for it to become the main place people live their digital lives. The strategy for achieving this has three components:

• Facebook as the main tool people use to communicate.
• Facebook as the central place for coordination and digital interaction (event organizing, media storage, entertainment and games, job postings and other classifieds, etc.).
• Facebook as the primary mode of personal identification across the web (Facebook Connect).

Neilsen has measured which aspects of Facebook people mention when writing about the network.

The most discussed aspects of Facebook.

As you can see “Friends” and “Profile” received the most mentions while other features d0 not receive as much attention. At it’s very core, Facebook is designed to facilitate interpersonal connections (friends) and online expression of self (profile). And it does so in a way that is accommodating to the preferences of the greatest number of people (simple design, customizable control, variety of features).

When you look at it like that, Facebook isn’t that different from the church. Fundamentally, the church exists to facilitate connections (with God and with others) and to facilitate expression of self (living life centered in Christ).

The difference is that with Facebook, there is very little accountability other than the self-policing that occurs within any group. There are no standards or requirements for participation. There is no commitment involved. There is nothing to promote progress or personal movement. There is no greater theme connecting it all together. It’s just people existing and interacting with others, just at a magnitude far greater than what is possible in real life. But unlike the church, Facebook itself has no meaning.

I was speaking with Tony Ferraro the other day and he believes there is a deeper, more spiritual reason Facebook is so popular. He said that because we are built in God’s image and He exists in relationship, we are compelled to live in relationship. Facebook has simply (and unknowingly) tapped into man’s need to be deeply known.

I think there is great wisdom in that. Sure, you can make the argument that the benefit of social media is how it facilitates interaction, engagement and participation among an audience. But deep down, at the root of the issue is our human need to be known. And in the absence of Jesus Christ, nothing (even Facebook) will meet that need.

So the question the church must ask itself is: are you engaging Facebook for your own good or for the good of others?

Don’t get me wrong, a church social media strategy is a great way to address many of the growth, marketing, and financial challenges facing churches today. According to social media marketers, the top benefits of a social media strategy are (Source: Social Media Marketing Industry Report):

• generating exposure for the organization (81%)
• increasing traffic and growing lists (61%)
• forming new business partnerships (56%)
• increasing search rankings (52%)
• generating qualified leads (48%)
• reducing marketing expenses (45%)
• closing business (35%)

So how do we add “introducing people to Jesus Christ” to the top of that list?

Despite the plethora of research out there about the Facebook phenomenon, ministry groups are only in the early stages of adapting their traditional evangelistic and ministry models to work within this context.

How can we promote activities on Facebook that we believe are central to being Christian and being the church? How do we lead others to use their self-expression and connection with others on Facebook to glorify God and serve His Kingdom?

Unconventional Method is embarking on a project that seeks to answer these questions. We seek forward-thinking churches who would like to participate in a study that examines the effectiveness of social media. We would love to work with your church (leadership, members, and community) in our efforts. In the next few months, we will be distributing an online survey that explores these issues in depth and seeking participants.

If you would like to participate, please email us at research@unconventionalmethod.com. Also, I’d love to hear your comments on how your church is approaching Facebook and what you believe is effective.

Thank you for reading.

This is a good guest post over at ChurchCrunch.com by Eric Jones of Jonese.us.

Why aren’t there conferences for Joe the Churchgoer? Not a very easy question to answer. There’s good discussion in the comments of the original post. My response is too long to include there so I’m dedicating a post to it. Here I go:

First, there is a trend in business to move away from a centralized working environment, allowing workers to have flexibility in how and where they do their jobs. As the Church, I think there is also a need for decentralization particularly because all Christians are called to be Christian (minister, worship, be on mission, serve, evangelize, disciple, etc) all the time. When your local congregation is the primary manifestation of your Christian life, you are constrained by their ability to create touch points in all these areas throughout every day of every week. To that end, conferences could be a great way to augment support in people’s growth as Christians. I do not believe that conferences can or should replace the local church. (“Think Kingdom, Act Local.”)

The reason people attend conferences is for networking, learning/training, and to promote themselves (or their company’s products/services). I think there is room and value in creating equivalent opportunities within the flock. How great would it be to have a resource that specifically speaks to an area of need in your life or that connects you with people who have similar interests or experiences in their faith. Or one that puts you in front of those that you may be able to serve (both professionally and minister-ial-ly(???)). How powerful would it be to spend 2-3 days in intense fellowship with others are able speak into issues you may be having in my faith in ways that those within my church (both staff and members) aren’t equipped to and/or can’t afford to.

The problem with conferences is the cost (both dollars and time). As long as people segment their lives (my Christian life, my family life, my work life…), there will be the perception that we can’t afford to invest the time to go to a conference. Our excuse is often the trade-off that would be required in some other sphere of our lives. Before we invest in coordinating a conference, we should invest in addressing and breaking down the barriers that people build up between their faith and the rest of their lives.

For those who are blessed and don’t segment their lives this way, the challenge becomes organizing a conference that can add value to your areas specific of need. A universal “flock” conference cannot meet the needs of the entire body; efforts at providing resources to large, diverse groups always end up speak to the lowest common denominator of that group. Conferences aren’t designed to operate in that way, that’s what festivals and revivals are for. Conferences need to concentrate on specific areas in order to attain a level of perceived value among attendants. And that perceived value must exceed a conference price that’s high enough to offset the cost of putting on a conference (believe me, my wife used to be a corporate event planner, conferences are expensive). It will be impossible for conference organizers to convince the flock of the value of attending so long as we continue to prop up the belief that “church topics” should be left to the professionals. People aren’t going to pay to attend a conference on a topic so long as they think their pastor is the one who should be studying it and anything of value to them will be communicated as bullet points in 20 to 45 minutes on Sunday.

Maybe instead of a church conference for the rest of us, we can start by trying to spread the value of the thousands of conferences that already exist deeper within the body. What if conference organizers encouraged this by offering special “Bring a Member” pricing, giving pastors that brought a member a discount or letting the member attend for free. Not only would the church member be blessed through exposure to the spiritual issues and teachings presented at the conference, the local church would be blessed by that member’s glimpse into the life of his/her pastor. Imagine how much easier would it be to raise support for pastoral training if members of a church had actually experienced first hand what the pastor was receiving at the conference?

I think the idea of conferences for the flock is a good one and hopefully will become a reality in the future. Until then, how can we break down the barriers between clergy and laity, pastors and members that stand in the way of us working together toward our common goal.

As the body of Christ we are Christ’s envoys to the world today. His rescue mission is our rescue mission. Tonight I got a first hand look at a broken, shriveled, and hardened heart. The kind of heart that only the pure and perfect love of Jesus can heal.

I participate in a ministry every Thursday night called EMS (short for Elementary and Middle School). We provide dinner, playtime and Bible lessons for about 50 kids in our neighborhood. Tonight one of the boys came in looking for a fight. During playtime he got in the face of one of the leaders for no apparent reason. During the lesson, things just blew up and he had to be escorted out. Fortunately a fight did not happen but this kid was made. And when his dad came to pick him up he was mad too, and he yelled at one of the leaders.

It was scary and sad and maddening all at the same time. And to see the hurt and anger rooted deep in this boy’s heart reminded me why we do this. I am a Kingdom Strategist, I am in my God given glory when I am working with organizations creating strategies for improving their ministry and service efforts. I work with strategies, ideas, principles, trends, research, organizational design, programs… conceptual tools for coordinating the efforts of multiple people. But none of it is effective if I am not humbled and constantly reminded that my heart was once broken, shriveled, and hardened too. And every Kingdom strategy, no matter how creative, is empty if it is not rooted in the very truth that only the free grace of Christ can pour love into the hearts of those we seek to serve.

Father God, thank you for Your grace which is the power to heal my heart and others. Please work powerfully in the lives of the young men and women of EMS. Pour your love into their hearts and in their lives that they may be redeemed. Amen.