The dog that visited my mom in hospital and made her smile and cheer up

I don't write goodly...but

I don't write goodly...but

I never thought of myself as a writer because my brain thinks more in images than words.  My wife is the writer, while I am a jabber box as my children call me on Sunday morning as they try to get me out of the church after its ended.  But, I have this manifesto of post Christian missional thought in my head, and its raddlying around too much.  So, please be patient with me as I write my thoughts about this and do not focus on the grammatical errors.  That will be my wife's job. I think the problem has been since I started doing mindmaps 8 years ago in seminary.  Because the thoughts are going so fast and I put short snippets on paper, it loses something in translation when I try to share it with others.  So here we guy.

Snow!

Chicago train station

Without a belt!

LifeWay Christian Stores Pull Gospel Today Magazine

If they only knew my wife....

 

 

LifeWay Christian Stores Pull Gospel Today Magazine

via Ragamuffin Soul by loswhit on 9/19/08

According to NBC 11 Alive… because there are 5 Female Pastors in the cover…

That women in the pulpit…”defy scripture”

Thoughts?

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3 Ways to Get Chips in Your Pocket

Years ago I heard that when you start out at a church you will recieve 5 chips. You get to use them or invest them. By using it you demand something for your job or make a stand on an issue that you think is relavant. Or you can invest it in the church at the beginning of the ministry and in the people and you might actually get chips put back in your bucket to use at other times or when you make mistakes or want to ask a favor.

 

 

3 Ways to Get Chips in Your Pocket

via MoreThanDodgeball.com by Josh on 9/17/08

Just starting out in youth ministry? In some ways, we’re always going back to basics and the fundamentals of youth ministry. Here’s 3 ways to get some chips in your youth ministry credibility bank right from the start - if you ever have to push “all in” these will have come in handy:

Communicate … no, over-communicate
I’m confident that no parent in church history has ever said to a youth worker, “I just wish our youth ministry would communicate less with our family.” Instead, I’m always wondering if we communicate enough and effectively. Are we really expecting that a promo flyer handed to a student will make it home? When was your website last updated? Have we clearly articulated the vision for the change, or are we expecting word to just somehow get out? List all of the ways you’re communicating - then ask, is my message really getting out?

Show up during a crisis
Youth ministry shines when pastors and volunteers step in during a crisis. The opposite is almost always true - youth ministry takes a huge hit when someone’s urgency doesn’t elicit a matching urgent response. It only takes a few days of “not getting to it” before irreparable trust damage is done. A huge win for your youth ministry future is knowing when to drop everything to help a family in need. Reflect for just a second on who you should call or visit before you leave the office today.

Make meetings worth it
If you’re going to ask anyone to meet with you - make it worth their time. In just a few minutes your volunteers know if you’ve really planned the time together or if you’re making it up as you go. Parents are eager to see a glimpse inside what the youth ministry is doing, but the enthusiasm can quickly be doused if you’re unprepared. If you’re calling the meeting, start on time, end early and make whatever was in-between remarkable. Look over the agenda for your next meeting - if it can be emailed with minimal instruction, do that and save the meeting time for significance.

JG

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Moleskine

I have a thing for Moleskine journals. I met my first Moleskine journal in 2002 while in England. I have all types now. But I love to do two things; 1)doodle in my Moleskine and 2) view other peoples doodles that are posted on flickr.

 

 

the cross

via Recent Uploads tagged moleskine by Strange Red on 9/11/08

Strange Red posted a photo:

drawn by my buddy matt pav

Posted by email from kick4jc's posterous

PIcture day at school

Office Supply Addiction

We went to Minnesota last week for a sud o vacation. I went there to help my brothers with the stuff left over at my mom's old house. We moved my mom into assisted living last month (which by the way rocks. I told my wife to put me on the 30 year waiting list). As I went through my mom's stuff, I realized where I get my office supply addiction. She had 4 of everything!!! She had hightlighters, pens, pencils, painbrushes, gel pens, post its....etc.

The moral of the stor is, if you see me purchasing office supplies....shoot me.

What Christian Community use to be like

I think Justin is giving an example what we (as society) really want. We want a caring community. Before Roosevelt installed the SSN act local churches used to do this for each other. I believe that we are heading into a reformation as a faith and I wonder if this is one way a church could rethink community.

clipped from drinkingoatmealstout.com The Power of Offline Community In our Web 2.0 world we seem to talk an awful lot about online community but the offline community is almost equally if not more important. Recently, in my parents’ neighborhood, there was an awesome example of the power of offline community. One family woke up one morning to find their house on fire. They got out with their lives but lost everything. I can’t even imagine. The neighborhood… this offline community came together: That’s when the neighbors kicked into action. A next door neighbor serves as a coordinator for offers of help. Another neighbor, Tracy, who lives across the street from us went door to door in the neighborhood with a bucket where neighbors were asked to throw in contributions. Five hundred dollars was collected to help the family pay expenses during the next few days. Are you aware of what’s happening in your neighborhood? Would your community kick into action if a member was in need?

why use a web page anymore?

clipped from drinkingoatmealstout.com More Evidence of the Decline of the Web Page Found this kind of interesting when I was doing my morning RSS readering. Michael Arrington did a story about a new feature on Twitter’s Web site. This is what he said about it… I didn’t notice it myself (I use Twhirl and rarely visit the Twitter site)… I think this is more evidence in the decline of the notion of the Web page. Because of all the great Web platforms and APIs that are being made avaiable, the Web is no longer being constrained by the notion of a Web page. For example, there are many people like Michael Arrington who are using Web applications like Twitter with out ever actually going to the Twitter Web site.

What is a Blog Party?

Please answer me world!

Windows Live Writer

This is a test to see if I will like using the Windows Live Writer with my blog.  I usually hate Microsoft

Leadership is...

GOOD WORD

clipped from bobhyatt.typepad.com PastorHacks Leadership is... "Leadership is about bringing out and mobilizing the best in the people around you. It’s about helping a group of people work together towards a shared goal or set of goals. When leadership works, it creates leaders, not followers." What do leaders do? Leaders listen. Leaders empower those around them. Leaders recognize others’ strengths. Leaders are trustworthy. Leaders are confident. Leaders make decisions. Leaders recognize the value in other perspectives. Leaders commit to action. Leaders demand commitment from others. Leaders share ownership.

Kim Meyer's Blog is starting to be my favorite

Great Insight from moms

clipped from kemmeyer.typepad.com Kem Meyer on Less Clutter & Noise Increasing quality of life and church Helpful advice my mom just sent me...

Gen Y information

Tony Steward refered me to this article...good reference. Make sure you read the whole article through the link

Why Gen Y Is Going to Change the Web Gen Y is taking over. The generation of young adults that's compromised of the children of Boomers, Generation Jones, and even some Gen X'ers, is the biggest generation since the Baby Boomers and three times the size of Gen X. As the Boomers fade into retirement and Gen Y takes root in the workplace, we're going to see some big changes ahead, not just at work, but on the web as a whole. There's some contention over where exactly Gen Y starts and stops - some say those born 1983-1997, others think 1982-1997. In this week's Entertainment Weekly, Gen Y is defined as "current 13 to 31 year-olds" and BusinessWeek says they can be as young as five. Regardless, we know who they are - they're the young kids of today, the most digitally active generation yet, having been born plugged in..... clipped from www.readwriteweb.com

I have issues #1

Okay as most of my youth through the ages know, I have have an office supply addiction...but mostly i love moleskines and i love looking at other people's moleskines on flickr.

clipped from www.flickr.com

Drinking Coffee in Church

What a great article from this blog. I have been enjoying their comments on church life. Check out the rest of the article to see how come coffee has become so popular in church

clipped from stufffchristianslike.blogspot.com Ten years ago, if you drank coffee during the middle of a church service you were known as "that coffee guy" or "that tea lady." It's not that it was unheard of, but it certainly wasn't as popular as it is today. Now, forgetting your coffee cup before service is like leaving your Bible at home. While the rest of the people sitting near you enjoy Triple foam Hazelnut Creme Flavor Mocha Venti Explosions, you sit there like some sort of drinkless hobo. It's embarrassing. When I open up the SCL gift shop, which will have all 6 promise products, I'm going to sell a Bible with a hollowed out spine that you can put coffee in. There will be a little screw top spout at the top and anytime you need a sip you can just tip your Bible back. I'll call it, "the bean of God" or the "JAVA edition of the Bible" or "hot coffee hidden inside a Bible." The last one lacks pizazz but they can't all be winners.

Text Polls

Sounds priceeee but it sounds like a great potential versus purchasing an inhouse polling system

clipped from polleverywhere.com Captivate Your Audience with Text Message Polls

DoAble Evangelism

This has great potential for a starting point in the ministry I am trying to start.

clipped from doableevangelism.com The current practice of “counting” only conversions is counter-productive and biblically suspect. It seems that the fundamental building block of evangelism — connecting — is a much better place to start. Ok, so the reality is that at best, only 10% of Christians have the “gift” of evangelism. So where does that leave the rest of us ordinary types? Pretty much on the sidelines watching and cheering (and writing checks). This seems unacceptable to us. It’s time evangelism became a spiritual practice again, instead of a program. After practicing what we call “ordinary attempts”, many people tell us that they feel "validated" and empowered, having discovered that God counts what they already do and knowing they can do more of that, with greater intention. That gets more people in the game…something we’ve failed to do in recent history.

Why I texttwitterfacebookbloggoogleustream... from Kem Meyer

I saw this blog the other day and I think it answers the question why I use all these social networks...

Why I texttwitterfacebookbloggoogleustream...
from Kem Meyer

It's true. I use them all. Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, Jott, Spinvox, Xobni, YouVersion, Ustream and more.

At first glance, it seems completely contradictory to my mantra: Less Clutter. Less Noise. But, in reality, these technologies effectively help me to COMPRESS time, INCREASE my knowledge base, ORGANIZE my thoughts and calendar, ENHANCE my relationships and hold me ACCOUNTABLE. I link them all together, and set preferences to auto-deliver the stuff I need NOW and organize the stuff I'll reference LATER in categories. Depending on the circumstance and objective...I have both close and extended people groups, regular and intermittent interactions, public and private content.

There's no one size fits all approach for the "how to" of this concept. So don't ask for it. You can't make a well-informed decision from an explanation; it has to be experienced. The best advice I can give is to try one at a time and see how it fits.

There was an article in last month's Wired about using today's Web apps to separate out the good stuff. Some excerpts:

• We've hit this critical point where our ability to create information has outstripped our ability to manage it. Knowledge workers spend more time sorting stuff than actually using it.
• What I needed was some help-an assistant to do some sifting for me. Ding! Robot psychology. Awesome. Amplify human intelligence with machine intelligence.
• My Facebook page attracts my friends with whom I share social bonds. Meanwhile, my science blog attracts complete strangers with whom I share a common interest in a topic. Sometimes these strangers tend to tell me things and point me to links that are more useful than the social stuff on my Facebook. [Kem here: In my world...Twitter accomplishes both. It's the hybrid app for me; social and semantic.]
• Our information overload isn't going away. To find our way, we need a Web that organizes itself.

Holy Failure

I have a blog on Holy Failure when it comes to helping youth to find their spiritual gifts. Go check it out.

Lee

check out o2ministry.org

Hey checkout this great worship service in Canton. It is relational, it teaches and is relevant.

www.o2ministry.org

Lee

#35: How to help students discover their spiritual gifts

Hey I've been part of a podcast for youth pastors. Its called "Who Are These Guys Podcast." the recent podcast is #35: How to help students discover their spiritual gifts.

Emergence 120 service to start April 20th in Canton

At Emergence 120 service practice service. good stuff!
This was President McKinley's church, in fact his funeral service was held right there, where all that praising is happening, data projectors, sound equipment...wow
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Why we're not emergent?

I think this is a great article on emergent movement in the church.

Lee

I am reevaluting my web goals

Okay today, I am going to work on my blog and email habits. I keep on saying that I will do a blog on something, but I fall asleep instead. Email is much the same way...I am going to work on some scheduling of my blog time and then use some ideas from "4 hour work week"
and schedule my email responses even.

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Story time for kids

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Excellant

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The james plan mindmap

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Thought

Would some people rather watch a service in a coffee shop with a big screen....hoping to make conversation at each table?

At first I thought they were protesting Easter!

Easter Morning!

Okay spent the morning putting together Chinese wannabe Transformers into a bigger Chinese wannabe Transformers. I was tempted to lick the paint off of it too....mmmm

I am helping with a podcast

Hey! I recently started helping with a podcast with a bunch of other NON famous youth ministers. Check it out at www.whoaretheseguyspodcast.com

Conversion

I had a thought stuck in my head the past few days....In a Post-Christian culture, how do you define Conversion?

In the Christian world we have become a Holy Club, Members Only, Gentleman's club mentality. As soon as they come to the altar, we pray over them, cry with them, then we teach them the secret handshake, pat them on the back, give them their offering envelopes, and say "See ya next Sunday."

I'm working through this as I think about becoming a Post-Christian Missionary.

Lee's First Utter

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