CONTENTS
02.18
12 the other side of bitcoin Never Before Have We Bartered With a Cyber-Form of Value.
4 REVEALING METRICS EVERY CHURCH SHOULD TRACK
show the love – for real! Love Thrives When We Make It Real
New Year; New Metrics
19 Create Advocates for Your Ministry Through Facebook The Best Practices for Creating Social Media Champions
6 STARTUP: PhotoUp Serves Clients and Its Employees........................................................................................ 9 TECH CHECK 02.18..................................................................................... 15 3 Ways to Demonstrate God’s Love in Your IT Ministry........................................................................................22
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technology across generations From Cassette to CD to Bluetooth, You’d Be Surprised Who Uses What!
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A Word from the editor Ray Hollenbach
Marketing Manager Rudy Kovac
Managing Editor
Ray Hollenbach
Art Directors
Troy Irvin, Henny Vallee
Contributing Editors
Matt Farrand, Russ McGuire, Caleb Neff, Nick Nicholaou, Yvon Prehn, Jonathan Smith, Steven Sundermeier
Copy Editor Laura Severn
ADVERTISING
VP Advertising Sales Jared Bryant
National Media Consultants
Charles Fleece, Joseph Landry, Stephanie Large, Seth Rankin, Dan Whitfield, Barbara (McDonald) Wolfe
Account Associates
Pamela Burton, Megan Foster, Alice Gifford, Trish Hughes, Gabriel McKinsey, Bethany Payne, Syndie Porter, Lara Whelan
Administrative Director Rebecca Meyer
Publisher
Outreach Inc. 5550 Tech Center Dr. Colorado Springs, CO 80919 (800) 991-6011 Ministry Tech® is a registered trademark of Outreach, Inc. Written materials submitted to Ministry Tech® Magazine become the property of Outreach, Inc. upon receipt and may not necessarily be returned. Ministry Tech® Magazine reserves the right to make any changes to materials submitted for publication that are deemed necessary for editorial purposes. The content of this publication may not be copied in any way, shape or form without the express permission of Outreach, Inc. Views expressed in the articles and reviews printed within are not necessarily the views of the editor, publisher, or employees of Ministry Tech® magazine, or Outreach, Inc. © Copyright 2017 Outreach, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
One of the great joys of working congregations and our communities on MinistryTech magazine is that well. Nearly everyone has a clear each month I encounter such a idea of the meaning of the word diversity of topics. For example, in “technology,” but what sets our work this edition we will read about apart (and what sets this magazine Bitcoin, also the various technologiapart) is the word “ministry.” cal capabilities of each generation, “Ministry” means to serve. Yes, it’s and also about a tech always fun to read and start up on the other side learn about the latest of the world that is software and the coolest empowering believers to gizmos and gadgets, but all not only to use their of these things are emtechnical abilities but also ployed in the service of to use their creative others. That’s why I abilities. appreciate articles this In this issue we get to month by contributors like Galatians 5:13 hear from long time and Nick Nicholaou and Yvon trusted partners, such as Prehn, who both make the eChurch and Church Community connection between love and the Builder. Both of these partners are work of tech ministry. bringing technology to small churchLet’s remember that the great es all across the world. These difference between doing tech work Christian companies combine in the business world and tech work technology and ministry to strength- in the church is that all of our work en churches toward greater organiin the church should be motivated zation, communication and effective by love: the love of Christ, the love ministry. of our congregations, and to show What’s not to like about working God’s great love for the world. on a magazine like this? Each month I am reminded that the purpose of technology in the church is to enable us to serve our
through
love
serve one another.
Ray Hollenbach is the Editor of Ministry Tech magazine. He has previously served as the editor of Outreach’s Better Preaching Update, and as the editor of the Pastor channel at Churchleaders.com. You can reach him at rhollenbach@outreach.com.
February 2018 | 3
revealing metrics every church should track
Everything You Need to Measure in 2018
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h, a shiny, new year. It comes with the hope of a clean slate. New year; new you. Or for church leaders, maybe it’s New year; new metrics—doesn’t exactly have the same ring, does it? But its meaning should still ring true for those church leaders looking to grow and evolve their church in the new year. We get it: It can be hard to get excited about data. But too often we use the human elements of ministry as an excuse to ignore important numbers. Data, statistics and numbers directly reflect what’s happening within and through your ministry; they’re what help you really know if you’re making a measurable difference in the lives of those you shepherd. Still, numbers don’t often get top billing. Leaders can be derailed in their attempts to collect, analyze and leverage data by those who don’t understand that each number counted in a worship service or volunteer activity represents a face, a name, a story or a life in need of transformation. There are as many approaches and lines of thinking around the idea of ‘measurement’ as there are church leaders out there. Every leader has a different perspective on what measurements mean and whether their ministry efforts are truly making a difference in the lives of people in their churches. Generally speaking there are nine areas where consistently measuring progress can empower you and your leadership team to make even more ministry progress. So what numbers really matter when it comes to building true community in your church? How do you know which numbers to monitor, and what they’re telling you? We list here the nine areas to think about measuring consistently in 2018—and beyond.
1. Attendance. This may sound like an obvious one, but a surprising number of churches don’t track attendance. Not for worship services, not for small groups, not for events. But attendance is a key metric; you need to be tracking who exactly has shown up—not just how many people showed up. An accurate understanding of attendance data gives you a high-level overview of what’s going on.
Do you ever ask? 2. Mission participation. Who’s getting involved in mission If you do, do you activities, and who isn’t? Who has indicated they want to track the answers? participate in missions but haven’t done so yet? By recordSpeculation isn’t a ing service project participation, you can invite people to participate in other ministry options that match these good strategy. interests and abilities as indicated by their individual track
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record.
3. Volunteering. Finding the links between volunteering, attendance, giving, serving, leading and other activities will give you valuable insights into who’s really engaged with your church, and who is not. By tracking and ministering to volunteers, churches can reduce unnecessary turnover. Regular contact with your volunteers will avert issues and burnout. 4. Online activity. Where are people spending time on your church’s website? How often do people access your online church management software, and what do they do once they get there? These measurements will help you design a better site and maximize your church management software. The availability of website analytics makes it easy to know what the people in your church community are viewing and what they are missing—or ignoring.
5. Giving. Look at how giving trends change over time. Major shifts in an individual’s giving are signs of spiritual activity or inactivity. Though the analysis of financial data can be a touchy subject, there are some valuable trends that can be identified in the frequency and consistency of an individual’s giving pattern.
6. Event outcomes. Make sure each and every event you plan is connected to changed lives. Are the time, energy and resources you’re putting into events ensuring that people really are connecting with God and with each other? You can learn a lot if you track participation by each individual as well as what happens after an event.
7. Connections. Putting people into a onehour new members class and telling them to call if they’re interested in ministry isn’t enough. How are you making sure people aren’t falling through the cracks? How are you tracking the connections people are making in your congregation? How are you making sure those connections are lasting? Following people along a growth path allows you to discover the differences between the behaviors of members and attendees.
Know, grow, and keep your people. Connect your church leaders to resources that streamline ministry operations and equip church members with opportunities to engage.
8. Growth. Where is spiritual growth happening in your congregation? In small groups? In service opportunities? Knowing the answers to these questions will help you make critical decisions about where you invest resources in the future. Spiritual development can be measured by getting to know people, revealing each person’s propensity for obeying God.
9. Attrition. Why are people leaving your church? Do you ever ask? If you do, do you track the answers? Speculation isn’t a good strategy. Asking the question might be painful and awkward, but it can lead to some very necessary changes in the way you do ministry. Learning and recording why people have left the church will help you adapt, adjust and create a better future. By tracking these nine key areas in the new year and beyond, you will learn what needs to happen in order to increase your retention and the health of your church. MT
churchcommunitybuilder.com/software
February 2018 | 5
CREATE ADVOCATES FOR YOUR MINISTRY THROUGH
FACEBOOK Who Is Speaking Up for Your Organization?
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hether you’re a private school, a nonprofit or a small business, you need advocates. These are people who are so loyal to your brand or mission that they can’t help but share positive messages and recommendations with everyone around them. Facebook is a powerful tool for creating and empowering advocates, but the goal has to be bigger than getting people to “like” your page. Here are five ways you can use Facebook to create advocates for your organization:
To start using Facebook this way, you’ll need to do a lot of comment monitoring. You’ll need to engage with people in post threads. But as your community grows and people get more involved, the less involved you’ll have to be. In fact, you can eventually deputize someone in the community to monitor engagement for you.
1. POST REGULARLY
3. Be CLEAR ABOUT YOUR ORGANIZATION’S VOICE
There’s a lot of discussion about the appropriate number of times to post. Buffer.com offers some good advice on posting frequency, but no matter how often you decide to share content, there are a few things you want to keep in mind: • Content needs to be frequent and consistent • Content needs to delight and inform your followers • Content needs to be shareable If you’re interested in creating advocates, your content needs to be skewed toward engagement. You’re not just trying to get people to click through to some other site. You want to ramp up interaction and community. The more positive engagement you build, the more positively people will look upon your brand.
While it’s important to create shareable and informative content, it’s just as important to zero in on your brand’s voice and tone. This keeps your messaging consistent and clear. If your messages are serious one day and sarcastic the next, people will struggle to connect with you. You need to understand that the voice you choose dictates how your organization comes across. Is it friendly and playful? Is it authoritative and clinical? What kind of language do you use? Simple? Serious? Jargony? Once you’ve defined how you communicate, make sure you train everyone who handles your social media.
2. ENGAGE WITH PEOPLE People feel in step with a business or organization when they feel heard and appreciated. Facebook makes this easier than ever. 6 | MinistryTech.com
The goal has to be bigger than getting people to ‘like’ your page.
4. RESPOND TO PRIVATE MESSAGES You will inevitably have people who’ll reach out with problems and personal questions via private messages. These should be handled with the kind of care that you’d give to someone who bothered to call you on the phone. Facebook users don’t necessarily expect a response to
every comment they leave, but they do when they message you. You might be wondering how you’ll ever have time for that. Whoever’s in charge of your Facebook page can keep a document full of responses to typical questions and links where their questions can be answered. You want the response to be personal, but you can get a head start by putting together cut-and-paste elements that would otherwise suck up too much time.
5. REWARD PEOPLE WHO INTERACT WITH YOU There are a number of ways that you can reward people who interact with you. The first is to respond to their comments whenever appropriate. But here are some other possible ways you can reward engaged members: • Host Facebook contests • Specifically ask for feedback about ideas or policies • Offer coupons or discounts • Choose trustworthy community members to be page administrators However you choose to do it, it’s important that you find creative ways to make people feel like they benefit from being actively involved with your Facebook page.
CREATING ADVOCATES ISN’T DIFFICULT Half of the battle in using your social media channels to build advocacy is simply making the decision to do so. A lot of organizations and businesses know that it’s important to be on Facebook, but they’re not entirely sure what they’re attempting to get out of it. Choosing to use Facebook as a way to create brand champions (instead of as a tool just to send people to links) will help define how you use it. By putting these tips into practice, you’ll have advocates in no time. And the great thing about creating advocates is that as you get that flywheel to turn over, it creates momentum and your advocates will begin to reproduce! MT February 2018 | 7
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STARTUP
Serves Clients and Its Employees A Different Kind of “Overnight” Success Story by Russ McGuire
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hen I got a hold of Kristian Pettyjohn to talk about his startup PhotoUp, he laughed. He’d forgotten about our call because he was busy working with one of his other startups, a tea factory in Bend, Oregon. Kristian had moved to Bend from the Philippines in 2016 to be close to family. In preparing this article, I tried Googling Kristian’s name and Bend, and instead of finding the tea factory, I found his product company, Vectto - a library of graphic icons for all kinds of design projects, with a twist. Now it was my turn to laugh. What I discovered was so much like this man I met over the phone:
identifying a need and without hesitation jumping on the opportunity to impact lives for the better around the world.
What’s PhotoUp? From the customer’s perspective, PhotoUp is a photo editing service. The initial target market is real estate photographers. Without a service like PhotoUp a photographer can shoot a limited number of houses each day. The rest of her day (and night) must be spent editing the photos to make each home really shine. When she’s done she must find a secure and efficient way to get the photos to her realtor client, who
then shares them with the seller. PhotoUp employs over 250 editors in the Philippines who specialize in making real estate photos look great. Overnight they work wonders and in the morning the photographer can deliver photos to her client via PhotoUp’s secure web platform. From Kristian’s perspective, PhotoUp is a software platform that enables talented individuals in the Philippines with limited creative opportunities to build careers and bless their families. He calls PhotoUp a “not-just-for-profit company” with the mission of helping photographers grow healthy businesses through impact sourcing.
In this article series, we’ve defined a Christian entrepreneur as: a person, driven to glorify God in all he or she does, and ruled by the Word of God, who starts a new venture and is willing to risk a loss in order to achieve the success of the venture. I’ve been introducing you to specific Christian startups and entrepreneurs, some of which may be helpful to your church, ministry, business or family, but my main intent is to encourage and inspire you to think and act entrepreneurially in your ministry and career. Are there Christian startups I should know about? Contact me at russ.mcguire@gmail.com.
February 2018 | 9
STARTUP
You want the freedom to … reach out … minister to people … create fellowship … contribute to your community PowerChurch Plus was created for just that!
Membership
We provide you with the tools to increase administrative efficiency and streamline accounting tasks, freeing you up to perform the work that matters.
Accounting Contributions
Install on your PC or network, or access online. Choose which fits your needs.
Events Calendar Check In Completely Integrated
We provide software tools, freeing you up to fulfill your mission.
www.PowerChurch.com • 800.486.1800 In addition to the photo editors, PhotoUp also employs 40 software developers building the platform that will help all areas of photographers’ businesses. They have already acquired FolioWebsites.com and rebuilt it as a Wix or SquareSpace alternative specifically for photographers. Next, they’re adding business management 10 | MinistryTech.com
tools. For example, they make it easy for small photography businesses to invoice clients and get paid.
The Way to Up The path to PhotoUp wasn’t exactly a straight line. Kristian’s grandfather was a scientist, but a very business-minded one. He must have instilled that
mindset into his grandkids. The Pettyjohn family was very active in their church. In fact, as teens, Kristian manned the church video while his brother Stephen ran audio. (Stephen has similarly pursued his passions through his business Pettyjohn Electronics.) They both attended college in Alaska. While pursuing degrees in Finance and Marketing, Kristian also took on software and web development work. After college, he started his own website business. To meet client needs, he tried outsourcing work to low cost developers in India, England and other countries with very limited success. Finally, he found a reliable quality developer in the Philippines named Godwinh (this is the man’s name: Godwinh) and built a solid working relationship with him. Kristian decided to move to the Philippines and build a business, but more than just a business. As he describes it on the Vectto website, “While call centers, transcription services and so forth were providing jobs in under-developed parts of the world, they presented little room for creative outlet. I’ve met incredibly talented artists of all types, answering phones all night long simply because that was the only reliable work they could find.” At first, Kristian continued to build his web development business, but when a photographer friend described his photo editing challenge, the PhotoUp concept was born. In addition to focusing on helping photographers grow their businesses, the company invests in training and leadership development. More than 30 PhotoUp employees have had their
STARTUP
first management experience with the company. Many team members have gone on from PhotoUp to get even better jobs outside the company—and the whole community celebrates when this happens. These “alumni” are still considered part of the PhotoUp family and often take part in company activities, including ocean and beach cleanup days.
hard to come by in both the U.S. and in the developing world, jobs that pay well and “build up” technical and creative individuals so that they can reach their full God-enabled potential. As Kristian pointed out to me, Jesus did most of his loving ministry outside the walls of the synagogues and temple. As important as it is to gather with our brothers and sisters to worship and serve in the church, we don’t stop serving Him when we leave that building and enter into the world. MT
Russ McGuire is a trusted advisor with proven strategic insights. He has been blessed by God in many ways including serving as a corporate executive, co-founding technology startups and writing a technology/business book. More importantly, he’s a husband and father who cares about people, and he’s a committed Christian who seeks to honor God in all that he does. His newest venture is as Entrepreneur in Residence at Oklahoma Christian University.
Loving Your Brother Although Kristian was raised in the church, when he was in college, he turned away from his faith for about four years. Later, as he built his business, the Lord brought him partners and investors who were strong believers. God used these men to bring Kristian back to Himself. One of Kristian’s early partners in PhotoUp was Chris Palmer, who helped shape the company’s (and Kristian’s) social impact strategy. One of Chris’ favorite sayings is “never underestimate the power of your presence,” which proved true in the strong foundation established for the company with Kristian’s presence with the team in Cebu. Kristian clearly views PhotoUp as not just a business and an employer, but also as an opportunity to love his brothers and sisters. Romans 15:2 tells us to “let each of us please his neighbor for his good, to build him up.” For Kristian and PhotoUp this has meant creating jobs that are
For the scholar, the seeker, the servant. OC is home. ·
Recognized as one of the best universities in the west by U.S. News and World Report and The Princeton Review.
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More than 80 areas of study. More than 40 current National Merit Finalists. Named to the President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll.
www.oc.edu/tech
February 2018 | 11
PROTECTED WITH PURPOSE
THE OTHER SIDE OF
BITCOIN It’s Here to Stay by Steven Sundermeier
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y family was blessed to have been invited on a “Christmas” cruise this past December. It was dubbed “The Ultimate Caribbean Holiday Cruise.” That pretty much summed it up. We wore our ‘Merry Cruisemas’ shirts the day we boarded the massive ship and really embraced celebrating Christ’s birth at sea somewhere in the Caribbean. While there were many great parts of the cruise, the most memorable days were those days spent with my family at the different ports. When the ship docked, we disembarked and got serious about having fun in new locations. We embraced the locals, their culture and all the history surrounding these magnificent cities. Of course, the days off the ship also involved shopping for country-specific souvenirs for our loved ones and us: coffee, chocolate and soccer jerseys. One of the coolest
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aspects of shopping was the realworld/real-time (How much is this? Cuanto cuesta?) and the education we received in the foreign currencies that varied from country to country. My son was quite shocked when the Columbian National soccer jersey he wanted cost an astounding 42,935 Columbian Pesos. Luckily for him this equals about $15.00 U.S. Dollars. A renewed fascination in different currencies is also happening globally, especially here in the United States. However this increased level of interest has nothing to do with paper money but rather digital currency. Digital currency is a type of currency available only in digital form (paperless and no coins). The most popular form of digital money is the Bitcoin, however, there are a number of other forms such as Litecoin (billed as the silver to Bitcoin gold), Zcash and Ripple to name but a few. Like the green paper stuff we call
the $U.S. dollar, digital money is used to buy common goods and services. Its acceptance in the marketplace is becoming more widely accepted even as you read this article. JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs recently announced they were taking the necessary steps to legitimize Bitcoin as an official form of payment. In the past Bitcoin was considered fraudulent and used only by cybercriminals, but it’s quickly moving into a position of legality—and possibly preferred status. Bitcoin first emerged on the currency scene back in January 2009. Bitcoin currency went relatively unnoticed for many years. However, within the dark web, cybercriminals slowly began selecting Bitcoins as their currency of choice due to it being a pseudo-anonymous method of payment. It was not until May 2013 that the world was forced to open its eyes to the world of Bitcoin with the emergence of the CryptoLocker
PROTECTED WITH PURPOSE ransomware and its massive extortion attack, which encrypted files and held them captive until a $400 ransom per computer was paid. The attackers' preferred form of payment? Bitcoin. CryptoLocker was Bitcoin’s grand entrance into daily trade. When the first version of CryptoLocker was released, the cybercriminals demanded 2 Bitcoins (BTC). The value of a Bitcoin at the time had increased to $200. By December 2013, the value of a Bitcoin was as high as $1,250. Even the authors of CryptoLocker took note and updated their ransom notes to a decreased payment— lowering their demands to 0.5 BTC. Unfortunately, total payments made to the CryptoLocker creators to free/ decrypt user files were estimated to have been over $3 million. At the time of this writing, 1 BTC was worth an astounding $14,450! With an initial value of $200/BTC, it is possible that up to 15,000 BTCs were paid in ransom in 2013 for CryptoLocker alone. In today’s dollars, those same 15,000 BTCs would be worth $216,750,000.00! That’s a lot of coin! Still today new ransomware attacks continue the Bitcoin payment trend, as ransomware has turned into a fully functional business. Look no further than the ever-developing Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) phenomenon. Is there any wonder this form of digital money has such a bad reputation? Skyrocketing digital currency will only make matters worse and serve as a huge encouragement for cyber thieves to work that much harder at stealing your hard-earned money. It should be noted that by the end of 2017,
Thirtyseven4 was detecting nearly 30,000 pieces of ransomware daily. (We give our best effort every day to save you a lot of Bitcoin!) I’d love to say the worst is behind us, but I can’t do that. The global acceptance of Bitcoins (and other forms of digital money) as legitimate currency is already leading to new and greater threats. Are you looking for a dire prediction for 2018? Be ready, and
start educating yourself on the term “Cryptojacking.” It refers to the secret mining of cryptocurrency. Hackers participate in cryptojacking when they purposefully exploit and use someone’s browser to harvest cryptocurrency like Bitcoins. Without getting too technical, cryptocurrencies operate through a distributed ledger where computers are used to verify and add to the ledger. It is estimated that a single BTC
February 2018 | 13
PROTECTED WITH PURPOSE Cryptojackers are coming after your systems, your parents' systems and your co-workers' systems to harness the computing power to make more money! transaction (the process involved in cryptojacking) consumes 215 kilowatthours (KWh) of energy. Imagine the performance hit on each system. Bottom line: Each computer exploited/ compromised adds to the ledger. Each addition to the ledger creates more currency. It is possible that publishers would give users an option to opt in or out for allowing their systems to be used for cyptocurrency mining. However, common sense tells us that these scandalous activities are happening without users' consent, making the process malicious. In many cases, cybercriminals are hiding mining code in ads and injecting them on legitimate websites. And with Bitcoin values exploding to unimaginable new heights, cyberthugs are mercilessly attempting to “show me the money.” They’re coming after your systems, your parents' systems and your co-workers' systems to harness the computing power to make more money! My intent is always to educate you as readers, and never to create fear or havoc. It is wild to realize how far technology has come over the years, the decades, the centuries. In many ways for good. On the cruise, we visited some Mayan ruins in Mexico, and we learned that the Mayans used cocoa beans (among other things) as currency. There was value and practicality in cocoa. Now the peso is used in daily transactions there. Learning about these things and the 14 | MinistryTech.com
progression of currency in Mexico was interesting, and I dare say innocent. But our tour guide (who was part Mayan) also shared that part of the progression from cocoa beans to pesos was the conquering of the Mayans by the Spaniards. They eliminated the cocoa bean as currency, but they also eliminated the Mayans along the way. Progress is not positive for all involved. As we see the emergence of a new currency like Bitcoin, we see the seeds of negative and harmful financial ramifications. In any culture, we hope for positive change and development, but there will always be the other side of the coin as well. On a lasting brighter note, please know that there are good guys in this story as well. Here at Thirtyseven4 we are working feverishly and aroundthe-clock in developing proactive countering measures against the bad guys. Per our In-Lab analysis and live observations, we identified that cryptojacking is mainly being performed by attackers in two ways: By compromising legitimate websites and adding link/URL of mining websites into the genuine webpage. In this case, cryptomining is performed whenever the user visits that compromised website. Browsing protection successfully blocks these compromised sites being used to mine cyptocurrency. We are literally updating for thousands upon thousands of compromised sites daily to our Web Filtering system. By adding suspicious chrome extensions containing mining URLs that perform cryptomining each time the browser gets loaded. For this, our ThirtySeven4 Virus Protection (real-time scanner)
1
2
and our Anti-Malware engine successfully detect these malicious chrome extensions (detected as "CRM. CoinHive") and clean them on-the-fly. Bitcoin is the latest form of currency in the world market. Never before have we bartered with a cyber-form of value. But with the progression of society and technology, history proves that this type of evolution was predictable, and so was the exploitation associated with it. From tax collectors in ancient times to investment schemes today, there will always be those that exploit people. Cyberthugs demanding Bitcoin are making this currency infamous. But historically there is also always “the other side of the coin.” There are silver linings, and in this case, levels of protection to keep you safe. Just as we realized afresh after our cruise, there are many peoples, many countries, many currencies, but we all share core foundations, and at the root of it, there is good in all of us. Evil has always tempted, and attempted to choke out Good, and yet by the grace of God we persevere and our methods persevere. Bitcoin has arrived. Its roots are capable of negativity, but Bitcoin also has the possibility of brilliance as well. Let’s watch together to see how its progression unfolds, and if this coin lands on heads or tails. But just to be sure, keep your AV Security up to date! MT Steven Sundermeier is the owner of Thirtyseven4, LLC, a leading provider of antivirus/ security software. With 17 years of experience in the cybersecurity field, he is one of the nation’s leading experts in virus, malware and other threats. Before founding Thirtyseven4 in 2009, Steven worked in a number of roles in the antivirus industry dating back to 1999.
tech check
02.18 Redesign Your Sanctuary’s Acoustics Without New Construction It’s like photoshopping live sound: “active” acoustic systems can change the audio room response to match (or meeting) involved. In the last few years sound engineers have developed systems that give your sound team the ability to reconfigure the room without construction by using microphones and speakers that give you command of how the room responds. Check out YouTube from Meyer Sound or Wenger allow users to digitally reconfigure the room. n
Instant, Secure Collaboration with your whole team You remember the old push-to-talk features from cellular providers? Voxer provides an updated solution for web, Android, and iPhone messaging. Live-stream your voice and deliver thoughts as they occur—to one individual or a whole team. Capture ideas and invite others to comment as well. Another collaborative, app-based tool is Slack. As it says on their cover-page, “When your team needs to kick off a project, hire a new employee, deploy some code, review a sales contract, finalize next year's budget, measure an A/B test, plan your next office opening, and more, Slack has you covered.” (Perhaps the name is a response from Millennials to the Boomers: “You think we’re Slackers?!? Watch this!") But wait! There are plenty of collaborative tools. Check out this recent Top-Ten List from ProjectManager.com. n
The Church Key is Obsolete! How many people need access to your facility? And how many people already have keys to the building? With
EDITOR’S NOTE: Who can possibly keep up with all the tech options available these days? TECH CHECK highlights tech news and new gadgets that save you time, energy, money—and keep you from re-inventing the wheel. Have a hot tech tip or news item? Email rhollenbach@outreach.com.
volunteers coming and going at all hours of the day and night, keyless entry is a quick and easy upgrade to your church. The folks at The Spruce provides seven great solutions for keyless entry. There’s bound to be one solution for your facility among these systems. n
February 2018 | 15
technology
across generations
25 Years of Live Nativity Demonstrate the Tech Gap by Jonathan Smith
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e are in a unique time in terms of technological evolution. While it may be 2018 and we think that technology has permeated everyone and every facet of life, it’s just not true. There are still large gaps in the adoption of technology across society. This creates challenges for churches and ministries. How do you minister to such a broad spectrum? Many think that ministering to Millennials is the key to the future. Millennials are one key group to reach, but there are still several generations before them that should not be forgotten. Each generation requires different methods to reach. Many Millennials are indeed hyperconnected and understand how to use technology well, yet there are others who reject technology. They don’t know how to listen to music in their car via phone-to-Bluetooth
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Do you try to reach everyone or do you leave some out because they lack the technology? because their car doesn’t support that connection. So they just go without. Technology is not their focus. This technology gap affects a lot. Parenting, counseling, teaching, youth ministry, education, preaching, communications, soul care, outreach and more. Think about it. There is no one size fits all approach, even as there is no uniform adoption of technology to each of our lives. Even among college kids today there are some who can’t connect their phone to their car via Bluetooth, There
are also senior citizens who don’t know how to put a CD in their new car (assuming their new car even has a CD player). That’s a diverse generational gap to cover. You may be asking, “What’s with all the car analogies?” Here’s why: Our church does a Living Nativity each year for Christmas. We do it over six nights, in central Indiana, outdoors, in December. Yes, it can be cold, but we present the story of Christmas in 14 scenes, from the fall of man through the second coming. It is a tremendous ministry opportunity. Guests to the Nativity have the option of walking or driving through. If you walk through you stop and listen to each scene’s narration on a boom box. When we started the Nativity in 1991, we had to custom cut our own loop cassette tapes so the narration would repeat over and over again. We then used boom
boxes—which back in those days only had cassette players in them. When CDs became more accessible, we thought we were set; a single CD with a boom box CD player could be set on repeat. It was much easier than custom cutting a loop tape. (Some of you may need to Google what a loop tape is and what it was like to try to make one.) These days finding a CD boom box is getting harder, as CD players are out and media players are in. For the drive-through crowd we used to just hand you a cassette tape and then a sign told you when to push play when you pulled up to the first scene. Then for a period of time, we did both cassette tapes and CDs, using the same method: Put it in and push play at scene 1. Now we find ourselves trying to serve folks in vehicles without any sort of optical drive, they only have Bluetooth. In addition, some folks still drive “older” vehicles that only have a cassette player (really!). We don’t offer cassettes anymore, as we have no mechanism to procure or produce them, so for those folks we have a small MP3 player we hand them with a speaker so they can still listen in their car. We also provide the narration online so you can stream it through your car or cell phone as you drive around, but that requires guests to know how to use that technology. We also have older guests—people who drive brand new Lexus and think a blue tooth is something bad in your mouth. Contrast this with Millennials who might drive older cars with CD players and who have no idea how to use them! In the past 26 years, we’ve gone from cassette tapes, to cassette tapes
and CDs, to CDs only, to CDs and media players. Next will probably be media players only. Our goal is to try to provide narration for everyone, regardless of what they bring to the Nativity scene. The Living Nativity is a great example of how the gap in technology between generations affects all of our ministries. Do you try to reach everyone or do you leave some out because they lack the technology itself, or if they have the technology,
they don’t know how to use it? Think of event signups in your church: Are they only online or do you have an analog method for those who don’t know how to go online? This can be even more profound when it comes to reaching out to folks and using technology to close the back door in our churches. Mass emails alone don’t cut it. Social media posts alone don’t cut it. To connect with folks you will need a variety of options: Some folks want a phone call,
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others want an email, some want a text, and some just want you to like something they’ve posted on social media. And that is just how a ministry communicates with those showing up each week. Outreach can be an even greater challenge. Those who show up each week may think an email or social media post is all that’s needed to reach their community, but other people need a personal invite, or even someone to not just invite them, but to go with them. While our current society may seem pretty high tech, these gaps will be around for a while. I think we have another generation, maybe two, before there isn’t a gap. Even today's Millennials may have learned from their parents or grandparents some non-tech habits. I am a huge proponent of using technology to maximize the impact of the Word, but I don’t believe technology should be a barrier for anyone. As ministers and ministries, we should want to reach everyone, and that may mean providing high-tech and low-tech options to reach our communities. Instead of focusing on when the gap will close, our focus should be loving people where they are today. Are you seeking to effectively minister to folks regardless of their ability to use your hightech offerings? Somewhere in the middle there is a balance, a balance that our generation and the next one will have to carefully strike in order to avoid failing to reach folks because they couldn’t understand our high-tech methods and we didn’t want to bring our message “down” to them. MT Jonathan Smith is the Director of Technology at Faith Ministries in Lafayette, Indiana. You can reach Jonathan at jsmith@faithlafayette.org and follow him on Twitter @JonathanESmith.
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COMMUNICATIONS
Your Checklist for How to Really Care for Your Team
Show The Love – For Real! by Yvon Prehn
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ebruary is the month of Valentine's Day and showing love to those we care about. While flowers and candy are frequently preferred ways of doing this, what follows are some practical ways to show love that will probably mean more to the church communicators and other tech workers in your church.
#1 Review and increase what you pay The expertise of many church communicators and tech workers in the church has quietly increased over the years. The quiet church secretary who in the past put together the church bulletin while juggling dozens of other church tasks now often has creating and updating a website, designing complex graphics, writing and proofing articles, bios and blogs, creating marketing materials for ministries, and interacting on social media channels for the church as part of her (or his) job responsibilities.
Your team’s loyalty to their ministry is commendable, but they shouldn’t be taken advantage of because of it. Has their pay increased along with their workload? Many doing this work could get a job in the secular world that would pay them many times what they are making now, but for various reasons, they choose to stay working for the church. Your team’s loyalty to their ministry is commendable, but they shouldn’t be taken advantage of because of it. To find out what is fair compensation today, check out the web for what the jobs they do pay. Below is one example from the site, Payscale: Graphic designer $42,000, Webmaster $52,914, Video Editor $59,971, Editorial Writer $53,981 Sadly, I’m quite certain that few
churches pay anywhere near these salaries to people who do the combined work of the jobs above, plus many other tasks. At the very least, please consider a modest increase or a regular bonus. Acknowledge the work being done is far more valuable than the compensation for it. Also consider the following ideas to reward them.
#2 Make them part of ministry decision-making Far too often, ministry strategy decisions are made without input from the people who must implement the communication and marketing practicalities of that decision. For example, the church may decide to do a big ministry campaign to get people into small groups without February 2018 | 19
COMMUNICATIONS
To fully fulfill the Great Commission
RESOURCES FOR CHURCH COMMUNICATORS Training Templates Strategy Resources Podcast
www.effectivechurchcom.com considering how to promote it, how various groups need to be researched and how to confirm all the details about them: listed in print, on the website, in materials at the welcome center, promoted in social media, marketed through video and live interviews, PowerPoint slides and reminders, posters and postcards, and constantly updated. All these tasks take time and money
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and need to be coordinated if they are to be done well. If the church staff decides to launch a campaign in two weeks without carefully coordinating with the people who need to do the work to communicate and promote it successfully, the campaign will fail. Church communicators and tech ministry staff must be part of the decision-making meeting, and their
input on schedules, workload realities and costs must be honored if ministry goals are to succeed.
#3 Give them training Every job becomes more efficient with continuous training. Not only is training a great way to compensate workers in addition to salaries, but it is a wise investment for the church because the better trained your communications ministry is, the more effective the overall church mission and ministry will be. Though there are literally thousands of classes on YouTube and scattered individual classes on the web and some software and ministry sites, the links below will give you the most for your time and money. The site Effective Church Communications is totally focused on communication training for the church, including classes in strategy and vision, design, typography, and seasonal communications. Many classes are in both video and audio format, plus PDF handouts are included. The classes can be shared with ministry groups or used to train volunteers. The pricing plan allows for membership at $9.99 a month or $99 for Lifetime Membership. One membership can be shared with all the people in a church, business, or ministry who work on church communications. Lynda.com is my recommended way to learn software and related communications and marketing skills, from the most basic training in programs like MS Word and MS Publisher to the most advanced Adobe products. There’s no churchrelated training at all, but for the
COMMUNICATIONS basics and advanced training in all software, they are excellent. Price: from $19.99 to $29.99 a month PER PERSON (they are very strict about this). They also have additional pricing for groups. Wordpress101.com is one of the best ways to learn WordPress, the premier software that runs most websites. Even if you are using a company that has templates for your church website, most of them run on WordPress, and everyone on the church staff will understand how websites work better after taking some courses in it (I mean everyone: pastors too!). You don’t have to do all the work, but you will make ministry decisions much more wisely if you understand the technology. Price: from $24 to $49 a year.
#4 Pray for them and protect them Church communicators and people doing tech ministry in your church are in some of the most strategic positions possible in the church today. It’s no accident that in any conflict, from historical wars to regional conflicts today, one of the first areas always targeted is communications. This happens because if you can destroy the communication resources of any group, they are dead in the water. Your church communicators and tech ministers are on the front lines of spiritual warfare for your church and they need your prayers and protection. Prayers are needed for wisdom and strength, insight and ideas, to do the tasks they need to do. Protection is needed from time distractions and
sometimes from grumpy people in the congregation who may blame them for results they are not able to control. Church leaders must be proactive to protect their people against misunderstandings in these areas.
Finally If you provide your church communicators and tech workers with the suggestions above, you’ll be showing them love this Valentine's Day and throughout the year. (And, oh yeah: Flowers and chocolate and maybe a Starbucks gift card are nice, too!) MT Yvon Prehn’s ministry to church communicators now has two parts: http://www. effectivechurchcom.com, now a training, template and resource site, and http://www.yvonprehn. com, a church communication blog.
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3 ways to demonstrate god's love in your it ministry
Break Through the Perception That IT Are "The NO Guys" by Nick Nicholaou
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ebruary is the month we celebrate Valentine’s Day— you might say it is the Month of Love! How does that look in church and ministry IT?
The IT Challenge IT is often perceived by those not on the IT team as ‘The NO Guys.” Some have worked hard to earn that title and enjoy it! Most of us in church and ministry IT, however, are often caught by surprise when reminded by other ministry team members that we’re perceived as The NO Guys. There are at least a few reasons why we’re often perceived that way. One is that we try to enforce good IT
Sometimes it’s hard to express love in our professional discipline! policies, and few people outside of our discipline understand the need for some of those policies. A second is that we typically lean towards being introverts. That characteristic has a number of side effects. For example, we don’t often communicate as warmly as others, and we talk in acronyms others don’t know. Third is that we have a difficult time with certain people of the ministry team, and we sometimes use passive/aggressive styles with them that can communicate inflexibility. OK, enough psychological analysis!
Why We Should Try The answers are obvious to us. We’re commanded to love one another, and we’re told that by doing so, observers will know we are Christians. If you’re like me, you find those kinds of verses encouraging, but also a little frustrating. Sometimes it’s hard to express love in our professional discipline! But Jesus is not surprised by technology, and he understands the need for order. So, it’s worth coming up with ways that our non-IT team members will know that we love them, that we love serving them, and that we are their ministry partners.
What Are Some Things We Can Do in February? February is thought of by many as the month of love. In it we celebrate Valentine’s Day—a universal day of love! So, it seems like a good time of the year to ask our fellow ministry team members to ‘be our Valentine’ through our actions, which James tells us is necessary (see James 2:14-17).
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ray for those on your organization’s team, and send them P a handwritten note or email or text saying simply that you prayed for them: for protection from the enemy—for them and their family—and for their effectiveness in ministry. You could even combine the two! Encourage the volunteers helping you clean monitors/displays, mice and keyboards to pray for the team member while at their task, and to leave behind a brief note saying they were prayed for. You may even want to add this to your task list as a recurring task every February! This seems so simple, but even so, it can have a huge impact on how those on the ministry team perceive those in your IT Department. Or you! Maybe it will help get beyond the prevalent misperception that the IT Department is where The NO Guys are. MT
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Here are a few very practical, tactical ways to show your team members that you love them: Clean their monitors/displays, mice and keyboards. After hours, go through the offices and clean the gunk off those devices! If your organization’s team is too large for that to happen, organize some volunteers to help you! There are members of your congregation who would love to join you on this.
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Nick Nicholaou is president of MBS, an IT consulting firm specializing in church and ministry computer networks, VoIP and private cloud hosted services. You can reach Nick at nick@mbsinc.com, and may want to check out his firm’s website, www.mbsinc.com, and his blog at ministry-it.blogspot.com.
February 2018 | 23
THE LAST WORD
His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 2 PETER 1:3