Archive for the 'ministry' Category

02
Sep

Planning Center ROCKS!

I love Planning Center Online.  It Rocks.  It runs my ministry.  The awesome tech support I have received has been amazing.  I could go on and on but you have to check it out.  They just made some more updates today. Read about it here.  My favorite is text messaging! AH YEAH!

Here is what we use it for:

  • Manage Band
  • Manage Tech people
  • Manage all volunteers for before/after and during our services
  • Manage all Lifegroup leaders
    • Provide training materials as a downloadable attachment
  • Plan services
  • Communication between Adult and Student Ministries
  • Communication to all our volunteers

I encourage you to watch this video to get a small taste of what PCO can do.


Introducing Planning Center Online from Aaron Stewart on Vimeo.

14
Aug

Twitter - What’s The Point

**UPDATE**  Here is another example of Twitters Awesomeness!

I twitter. I love it. You would love it. Follow me on twitter here.

I get asked all the time, “What’s the point of twitter?”  Here we go. 4 reasons

  1.  Friends/Family - Since I have recently moved across the country twitter is a great way for me to stay in touch with my friends and family from Virginia and my new friends here in Texas.  Also every day twitter sends all my “twit’s” for the day to my blog.  My family and friends can see what I have been up to.
  2. Archiving my life - I have 3 kids.  I wish I had twitter when my first 2 were younger.  I can twitter things my kids do and will be able to back and search to see what day they started walking, first time they flew, etc.  Any milestones in their lives.  Also I can know what day I went to that conference, special event, etc.
  3. Ministry Resource - I follow a lot of people on twitter.  They each have different jobs but they give me ideas that I can use in ministry.  See list below to start following some of my followers.
  4. Ministry Tool - A lot of people in my ministry use twitter. It’s just another way to connect to people if I can’t get a hold of them.

Recommended twitterers:

  • Tech/Video/Media related
    •  AVCLUB
    • terrystorch
    • blankenship
    • WorshipTechie
    • EBOWES
    • motionhouse
    • AVCLUBBREAKOUT
    • Mstanley
  • Youth Ministry
    • DOUGFIELDS
    • JOSHUAGRIFFIN
    • BCooP
    • DanielHarper
    • outsideallday
    • daveyblackburn
    • Jakerutenbar
    • kurtjohnson
  • Worship/Music
    • mcdzl
    • DanielHarper
    • lincolnbrewster
    • davidcrowder
  • Ministry - General
    • perrynoble
    • Rickwarren
    • JimmieDavidson
    • scotthodge
    • KEMMEYER
    • MarkBatterson
    • TPMORGAN
    • MarkMatlock
    • Newspring
    • TimAStevens

To follow these people txt “follow TimAStevens” or whichever of the usernames from above you want to follow.  *_OR_* go to twitter.com and search for their username and if you have a twitter account, click Follow button.

Twitter doesn’t make any sense until you start using it.  Go create an account and then start following some people. Leave comments below of some of the people you follow that people should know about.d

03
Aug

Greg Laurie’s Son dies in car accident

Back in the day I used to listen Greg Laurie on tv late at night on Saturdays. I always enjoyed his messages when I was a struggling teenager. It saddened me to hear about his son dying. Please take the time to watch these videos. You will be touched. The first one is the best!

23
Jul

Amazing Testimony

WOW. Speechless with tears in my eyes! This is amazing. Love to hear stories of God working in people’s life. Props to Newspring for presenting it in such a moving way!


Neicy_Salvation_Story from NewSpring Media on Vimeo.

28
Jun

Breakout D - Building and Leading a Music Ministry - Rory Noland

Rory Noland

Calling all team builders - 1 cor 3:10

Suggestions for team building

  • Visualize what it is you’re trying to build. (Cast a vision) don’t duplicate another church
    • Question - within the next 5 years what would you like to see happen in your ministry? (services, volunteers, leaders, vocals, instrumentals, musical styles, level of musicianship, fellowship, discipleship, musical growth, spiritual growth)
  • Communicate your vision in a compelling way
    • remind them often
    • you are recruiting people to a mission, not yourself
  • Build your ministry one volunteer at a time
    • not once in all of his years of ministry did he sit back and say, wow I’ve finally got enough volunteers
    • challenge musicians to reach out to their talented friends
    • Pray
    • adopt a “go after them” mentality - Jesus went after his peeps
    • Build your ministry around strong people
    • Make sure your ministry is a safe place for an artist
      • Encouragement is huge in an artists life
      • Prov 3:27 - do not withhold good from those who deserve it
      • Moses hired artists - when done he blessed them - he inspected their work and encouraged them
    • Implement processes that work
      • Constantly evaluate our processes
        • Music selection
          • if one person selects all the music it will lack variety
          • use a team to select music
          • have one non-musician
          • make time to listen to new music
        • Music preparation (meetings, rehearsals)
          • spend time making sure everything is setup a head
          • Think ahead of time about the layout of the rehearsal
          • start with easy songs (ones they know) then throw the hardest one at them.
          • if you can work with vocalist and artist separate that is the best in his opinion
          • tell the vocals at what you want them to sing
        • Evaluation
          • This is how speak to each other
          • Give your ministry a letter grade in terms of its processes. What can be done to improve the area that scored lowest?
          • Is there anything you’re doing that’s inhibiting the ministry’s effectiveness in song selection, preparation and evaluation
        • Don’t ignore problem, fix them.
          • Question: are there any problems within your ministry that you’ve been putting off? How can you address them?
            • A lady just asked I have a problem - I’m married to the Senior Pastor :)
            • BE CONSISTENT
            • The way we talk to each other is extremely important
    • Utilize volunteers to help you manage your ministry more efficiently
      • What do I need the most help with right now and are there any volunteers who could assist you in that task?
    • Invest in the lives of your people
      • do life together
      • phil 2:19-20 - Paul was frustrated because he didn’t have others who cared like Timothy.
      • Don’t be too busy doing God’s work that you’re not doing God’s work which is dealing with people
      • Looking back on his ministry the people is the best thing that stands out, not a song, book, cd, event, etc.
    • What specifically are you doing to invest in the lives of your volunteers?
    • Live a sustainable lifestyle
      • There is a crisis in our ministry today. People are working way too many hours.
      • from me - Learn to say NO! enjoy the video below from Doug Fields I heard at a youth specialites concert
    • Don’t stop being a musician just because you’re a leader
12
Jun

Breakout C - Refining Your Worship Leading - Joe Horness

  • Confusion is the enemy of Worship
  • Improve Your Process
    • Before taking stage you have already made hundreds of decisions
    • Understand your role
      • Am I a performer or Facilitator?
        • Chris Tomlin on albums is in the key of F# because his voice sounds best there. But when leading worship, lowers keys so people can join in

      Craft a great worship order - like having blueprints for your house - bad blue prints awesome carpenters = bad house

      • Details/?/tools/order
        • Details - child dedication, Bill Hybels says you can’t do a certain song
        • ? - prayer time, what does God want to say? Celebration? God’s promises are true?
        • Tools - what songs work for that
        • Order - Then go through songs and pick an order.

        Where does my heart long to go from here? - after a song what song does your heart want to sing?

        • Go to the band/vocals and say, “here is what we want to accomplish. We want to remind people that God’s promises are true

        Lead a solid team

        • Great people, carefully prepared
        • Tempos, Trans and Scans!
          • Tempos - Tama makes a great programmable metronome
          • Transitions -
          • Scans - know where the song is going

          Prepare for Spontaneity

        • Communicate to Tech Teams
  • Refine Your Reflection
    • Ask the Question: What will turn this song time into a worship time?
    • Identify Sticking Points!
      • Through private worship
      • Plan for moments ahead of time
  • Craft your Comments
    •  Use scripture as often as possible - anytime you can replace your words with God’s words is a good thing
    • Ask a compelling question -”lord I’m amazed” ask what there amazed about, then tell God right here, now let’s sing it again.
    • Tell a compelling story - “my Jesus I love you” - his wife put post it notes everywhere saying different ways she loves him.
    • Be authentic, honest and real - confess
    • Write it out - write out ahead of time what you want to say
  • Sharpen Your Leadership
    • Sharpen your preparation - you should know the song better than anyone in the room
    • Memorize -
    • Know it best - lead
    • Worship through it in private
    • Communicate - with your band, your team, your congregation
    • Prayer - individual and team
  • Action Plan
    • Which elements would make the greatest difference in your personal worship leading?
      • Improve your process
      • Refine your reflection
      • Craft your comments
      • Sharpen your leadership

Awesome Breakout! Want to buy this for worship leaders back home!

12
Jun

Breakout B - Less Pain More Gain - Stacy Brewer

  • @Willow Services start getting planned 16 weeks out
  • Team is made up of video, drama, music, etc
  • RIP Meeting - Raw Ideas Planning
  • We are planning out willow’s Labor Day service
    • Start with a dance - Flight of the bumblebee with men in business suites and briefcases

HEH… that was enough notes for that one.

12
Jun

Breakout A - Immitation to Innovation - Matt Lundgren

Finding your unique voice as a worship leader

4 things every worship leader has in common:

  1. Need to be theologians - we need to know who we’re worshiping
    1. met his wife and asked her, “who has the sexiest adam’s apple” it worked. they started dating.
    2. point of story. He had no idea ahead of time of what he was going to say to her. We need to know what we are communicating
  2. Need to be disciples
    1. do you love the Lord passionately?
    2. do you have a love for the word of God?
    3. Do you exemplify the fruit of the Spirit in your life?
  3. Need to be artists
    1. We do ourselves an injustice by just learning the chords to the top 20 worship songs
    2. God calls us to do more than just get by.
  4. Need to be Leaders
    1. It’s in our title, “worship leader”
  • God is not calling us to be the Chris Tomlin, God is calling us to be ourselves
  • Book from Parker Palmer quote about burnout that was way too long to type out. :)
  • “Is the life your living worth …” sheesh I keep dazing out. I’m tired.
  • Three questions asked
    • Who am I? Who Am I
    • What about God am I most uniquely suited to reveal to others
    • How is that meaning best lived out?
    • Think about what is the world going to miss out on if you die today?
  • Man he’s going fast and there isn’t a handout. :(
  • 3 things (don’t know what)
    • knowledge
    • talent - identify your unique talents and find other ways to make up for your lack of other talents
    • ?
  •  Hedgehog example from “From Good to Great”
  • 3 circles - find something in all 3 circles where they overlap
    • what are you deeply passionate about
    • what can you be the best in the world at
    • What is the church/people “hungry for”

Q&A

  • How do you create boundaries
  • What techniques do you use to prepare on sunday morning for worship? They sing a song backstage prior to service to worship together
  • How to be a worship pastor vs song leader? Be sensitive to the spirit of the room. Last night he felt like “Here I am to worship” was a great moment so instead of going straight into next song, he just acknowledged the moment
  • How do you feed your artistic talent?  Stretch yourself musically. Try different styles
    • They hope people leave saying three things
      • I connected with God
      • I laughed a little
      • I can’t believe they did that
        • creativity because our God is creative - not for creativity sake
  • How do you encourage participation from stage
    • Pastor is encouraging the people - saying, “we are a singing congregation right?”
    • Worship Leader is reminding them
  • How do you discover your style?
    • Start watching people and ask yourself is there some things they are doing that you feel comfortable with. Also take note of things you don’t feel comfortable doing.

Books:

  • Good to Great
  • Now discover your strengths
11
Jun

ARISE 2008 - 3rd Session - Brian McLaren

Nancy Beach and Brian are having a “conversation” on stage.

  • Starting with same story from student conference. See my post here
  • Looks like same from last time. So I’m done with notes. Just go here if you want to.
11
Jun

ARISE 2008 - Opening Session - Nancy Beach

Psalm 40:1-10 - MSG -

  • I waited, waited, waited, and waited
  • Drama - Rom 7:18-19 - lady who can’t stop lying at work, guy addicted to porn, teenager who binge eats in bathroom and throws up - then broke out into a song. Awesome Drama!
  • Can’t sing a “new song” until we acknowledge the pit we are in.
  • Time for reflection - what kind of pit are you in now or if not in a pit, what pit might the devil use to catch you?
  • vs 2 - David tells us that God pulled him out of the pit
    • Nancy’s pit is usually laziness and apathy

    How many times has God rescued me from a pit - some I may not even know about (what happened to my bullet)

  • We need to put ourselves in a place of surrender and a place of waiting on the Lord - to sit and hear his voice - his still small voice
  • move from solitude to surrender to ministry
  • When we realize, during that time of solitude, we are reminded of his awesomeness and surrender to Him again
  • Last part verse 3, 9, 10 - He taught me how to sing the latest God-song.
  • We need to remember the people at our church may look ok, but they are in a deep pit.
  • We need to offer them our new song God gives us - whatever that may be. Song, poem, lights, video, message, testimony
  • What happens when we do that? A Miracle

Mark Batterson - “If we are not careful we will do ministry out of memory instead of imagination”

  • Where are all the new songs? At a panel at last years conference one concern was all the new worship songs sounded the same
  • Chased a rabbit :)
  • What are you proclaiming to your people? What new songs are you proclaiming? He loves the church more than we do.
  • Craig’s Story - very creative, voice over video of b/w scenes featuring craig with dancing on stage
  • St Patricks prayer



*Disclaimer*

Everyone else is putting this on their blog, so maybe I should too! Allthough I am on staff @ The Met the thoughts/views/opinions expressed on this site are my own, and in no way reflect the views of The Met or its staff.



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