Christian Computing Magazine

Founder & Editor-in-Chief Steve Hewitt - steve@ccmag.com Managing Editor Kevin Cross - kevin@ccmag.com

Applying Tomorrow’s Technology to Today’s Ministry Volume 25

October 2013

No. 10

4 cover story

Contributing Editors Yvon Prehn Nick Nicholaou Kevin A. Purcell Russ McGuire Michael L White

CCMag’s 2013 ChMS Overview! By Steve Hewitt

Copy Editors Gina Hewitt Magen Cross

3 Editorial

A New Tradition Our November Issue Will Be Our Support Services Overview! Steve Hewitt - steve@CDPublishers.com

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How Technology Helps or Hurts the Process of Recruiting Volunteers in Your Church Yvon Prehn - yvon@effectivechurchcom.com

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October 2013

editorial

A New Tradition

Our November Issue Will Be Our Support Services Overview! Steve Hewitt - steve@CDPublishers.com

This is our 25th year of publishing Christian Computing Magazine, and frankly I don’t remember when we first started designating our October issue as our ChMS Overview, but I love to read through and see what all of the ChMS companies have added to their services, and appreciate those that give us a look at what is coming down the road. We are now going to do something similar in our November issue each year! Starting next month, we are going to ask all of our other sponsors in CCMag to provide us an update of what’s going on with their company/services/programs! This means next month companies like OneCallNow, NCS Services, ThirtySeven4, American Church, Liturgical Publications, StreamingChurch, Solomon and others, will get a chance to drop us a note to update us on what they have been doing, and what they are working on. I think it is something we can all benefit from reading. I know that most sponsors in our magazine merit a review, but with technology Christian Computing® Magazine

today, things don’t stand still long. By providing a yearly overview, we will all have a better chance of keeping up on what’s happening, especially with the companies that are seeking to provide software and support for the church market! In January 2014, we will have completed 25 years of publishing Christian Computing Magazine. In that issue, we will be announcing something very special. It will be an ongoing theme for the entire year! Technology always changes, evolves and adapts, and we seek to do the same here at CCMag! Together We Serve Him,

Steve Hewitt steve@cdpublihsers.com

October 2013

cover story

CCMag’s 2013 ChMS Overview! By Steve Hewitt

t’s that time again! Each year we dedicate our October issue to allow ChMS companies the opportunity to let our readers know what they have been doing, as well as what they are working on for the future. I specifically ask them not to simply include a list of features, since this is accomplished in our live ChMS Feature Chart http://www.ccmag.com/cms/index.php?chartid=1. What we did ask them to share was a little about what they have accomplished this last year in adding new features, services, or support. We asked them to share with you what makes them a bit unique from their competition, and we asked them to share what they might have coming in the near future. I hope you will learn more about what ChMS can do for your church by having this information from so many ChMS companies, all in one article. Enjoy! ACS Technologies Jesus gave us a mission: “Go and make disciples.” But in a changing, fast-paced, always-on world, how does the church fulfill this unchanging call to action? Traditionally, church management software (ChMS) helped staff manage the “going” of the church. But traditional ChMS is dying. Today’s church understands that we don’t just go to church, we must also go and be the Christian Computing® Magazine

church, doing ministry all day, every day, and everywhere. Like the mission Jesus gave us, church is no longer restricted to Sundays…it’s a 24/7 calling. Here at ACS Technologies, we know that this requires new and better tools to help you “go.” Imagine a tool set that equips your whole church to go and love God and others in real time, all the time. Where people don’t just attend church but are the church every day of the week. A vibrant community where everyone is connected throughout the week. Where vital information October 2013

about finances, members, groups, and ministries can be accessed on any device, and available at a moment’s notice – always accurate, always updated, and always in real time. Does this sound like your church? It can be. We’re building seamless, shared data to make a complete management and engagement tool set that will empower your whole church for ministry. These tools, working together, will mobilize your people with the power of a unified, smart ministry management solution that both connects and informs your whole church. For over 35 years, ACS Technologies has led the way in ministry management solutions. With over 50,000 clients, we understand that each church is in a different stage. Whatever that stage is, we have a tool set that can help you. ACS: Trusted by thousands of churches nationwide, ACS is the #1 church management software solution in the US helping you keep all your church’s details organized. With ACS OnDemand, you get cloud benefits and you can use your Mac or PC. Access ACS: Building on the foundation of ACS, Access ACS opens your congregation to online tools to support ministry in groups, volunteers, or events. Online Giving: Encourage your church members to be good stewards of their resources with ACS online giving and contributions. PDS: PDS (Parish Data System) is the top software choice for Catholic parishes, dioceses, and schools. With PDS OnDemand, you can use PDS software anytime, anywhere with an internet connection. HeadMaster: Specifically designed for private schools, daycares, and childcare facilities, Christian Computing® Magazine

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October 2013

HeadMaster software manages all of your administrative details and communication needs in one integrated database. The City: The City is our ministry management tool to help churches connect members and visitors in today’s world. The City is a robust engagement solution now available for all churches. Realm: Realm is our next generation whole church ministry management solution that informs and connects the church in today’s world, built on the belief that everyone on your staff and in your congregation should be empowered, any time, all the time, and anywhere with the most up-to-date information. This uniquely powerful combination gives you complete management and complete engagement for the whole church in one web-based, totally mobile cloud solution. While different churches are in different stages, everyone has the same goal in mind: to go and make disciples. You’re called to go. We’re here to help. Learn how you can mobilize your ministry today.

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ACTIVE Faith What’s New with ACTIVE Faith’s Fellowship One ChMS? In the past two years, the company that brought Fellowship One to the foreground of the ChMS industry has evolved in a number of ways, always with the goal of better supporting churches in the work they do for the kingdom. 2013 growth continues to push our 9+ year old organization to new frontiers. New Leadership ACTIVE Faith recently announced that a new General Manager has taken the helm. Kingsley Allen, the former director of development, has been with the company almost since its beginning. Kingsley has over 20 years of business and technology experience in a wide mix of industries. He was instrumental in bringing modern software development processes to Fellowship One (Agile/Scrum) and recently became a Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO). As a product company, having a leader with a long history of

October 2013

building software can only enhance our ability to serve the church market with superior technology. New Features, New Dev Allocations Fellowship One (F1), an enterprise level system, is a leader in the ChMS industry in part because it is 100% cloud-based, providing anytime, anywhere access to data for exceptional member care. F1 contains self-serve tools for attendees, small group leaders and volunteers, online giving, secure check-in, volunteer management, comprehensive reporting and much more. We also offer four single-point best-in-class solutions through the ServiceU product: Giving, Scheduling, Ticketing and Green. Our new activities management feature is almost ready for release in Fellowship One. Rolling out in phases, churches will see a much-improved user experience with simplified navigation and setup, rich user guidance, and a dashboard providing high-level view of congregational activity, attendance trends, and more. New Learning Opportunities This year, we unveiled our new online Learning Center, a comprehensive, intuitive and customized learning path developed to help users master F1 and discover practical ways to streamline processes and administration. Our Education Team has created a guided ministry administration growth track to accelerate churches toward the maximum benefit of F1. New Conversations A basic purpose of church management software is to make ministry a lot more manageable. Unfortunately, the world of church management software itself has gotten complicated. Visions of the mythical perfect solution (a.k.a. the “silver bullet”) can complicate sorting through real world software options. No one wants to make the wrong choice and end up with unpleasant surprises that are worse than no solution at all. We hear that story a lot. We hope churches will purchase our software, but even more so, we want Fellowship One and ServiceU to provide the best solutions for their needs. We believe there should be no surprises. In the interest of changing the tone of church management software conversations, we’re pulling back the curtain on practices, terminology, Christian Computing® Magazine

and general software limitations with a new No Surprises Series. It’s a set of topical checklists related to church management software that help you know what questions to ask every ChMS vendor in order to break through the “applesto-oranges” comparison problem. That’s it. Just questions. No slamming other vendors. No promoting ourselves. Imagine a level playing field to make your technology decisions easier. It’s a move ACTIVE Faith hopes means one less headache for ministry leaders. To get you started on the series, we’re offering the No Surprises: Data Security checklist here. As ACTIVE Faith grows into its new environment, we believe Fellowship One is the ChMS to watch. For more information, visit our website at: www.fellowshipone.com BVCMS BVCMS is a ministry-focused, web-based church management system, born inside a megachurch and is now available to all churches as an open-source software product. BVCMS is church sponsored and directed. Using an agile development process, we are able to quickly and continually meet the changing and diverse needs of ministry. We publish updates and new features weekly. BVCMS not only empowers church staff, but lay leaders as well, allowing them to manage their own discipleship groups with powerful tools to aid in the process of assimilating prospects into church members and members into ministry. Over the past year, we added integrations with Twilio (for texting), Protect My Ministry, Quickbooks, and MinistrEspace. We completed a volunteer management system allowing volunteers to schedule and request their own substitutes. We are close to completing a 14 month project to redesign the user interface of BVCMS, giving it not only a fresh new look, but also adding more user-friendly features. During this same year, our BVCMS churches sent out over 3 million emails and registered 150,000 event participants online. With our automated check-in system, churches recorded over 150,000 attendances and added 20,000 guests using the same check-in software. Having such timely and complete information means that churches are able to make ministry October 2013

visits and record results in BVCMS the same day a guest visits. Next year, we plan to focus even more on ministry with even better tools. This includes rewriting our mobile apps, adding a small group finder, mission trip fund-raising management and even more prospect management tools. We are a small company serving big and small churches with big ideas for ministry. We want to empower them with what God has already provided - our talents and resources and the fruits of our past success. Without corporate shareholders demanding profits, churches are our partners in ministry. Our code is free because it is already paid for by our church sponsors, consequently we don’t charge license fees. Churches with skilled developers can contribute to the open source project. Regardless of their size, all of our churches access the entire system with no limitations; there are no separate modules to pay for. Our fees are only for hosting and support and are scaled according to the size of the church’s ministry so that even the smallest church can afford our service. See www.bvcms.com for more information.

CDM+ (Suran)

Attendees at the 16th Annual CDM+ Users Conference in Nashville, TN got a first look at the next upgrade of CDM+ on September 24, 2013. CDM+ 9.2 will be available in November 2013 and free via download to all users enrolled in the annual CDM+ Premier Support program at the time of download. In addition to changes to CDM+ itself, this upgrade will support some new and exciting developments for the CDM+ Mobile and Web Ministry Tool solutions. These include a version of CDM+ Mobile for Android™ devices and the addition of a Monthly Calendar View tool to the Basic Web Ministry Toolkit to complement the Single Event Listing tool. Both will be released soon after CDM+ 9.2 is available. One of the important elements of the 9.2 upgrade is our enhancements to and support of our payroll software. We are pleased to announce a partnership with Aatrix, a third party provider of payroll forms and services. With CDM+ 9.2, users will be able to print and e-file federal and state payroll forms. Version 9.2 will also auto-update any federal or state tax table changes. These changes to CDM+ Payroll will ensure that payroll produced Make the move… in CDM+ is always calculated from Church Management Software… with the right tax liabilities and filed with the correct forms. to Church Ministry Software Two other key features in CDM+ 9.2 were showcased at the Built by the Church, for the Church annual users conference. Other Information sets can be categorized ▪ Open Source (the code is free) and an enable lock set feature will ▪ Web-based allow users to create forms of data ▪ Church Sponsored “BTW, each day I am more to be filled in for specific needs thankful that we are using ▪ Ministry Focused and ministries. Event Registration BVCMS. The rate you are Activities can now be grouped adding features and improving for easy access and CDM+ nothe database blows my mind and tices will be fully implemented in I really appreciate all you do.” Event Registration reports, as they - Jared Coe are in Membership, Attendance, Contributions, etc. Other exciting features in CDM+ 9.2 include the addition of a third address line throughout, World Class Hosting and Support ▪ 220+ Churches ▪ Active Development a rich text editor on Contribution Receipts, new Contribution analywww.bvcms.com for more information and pricing sis reports, an updated Contribu-

Christian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

tions search interface, expanded Memorial Giving reports, support for a check image scanner on Mac OS®, Pastoral and Visitation tabs on Membership Address and Individual records, flagging of cancelled Event Registration entries, enhanced logging of software updates and faster more reliable updating. All CDM+ users will have access to our PDF report generator and notices which were previously available in Pro-level programs only. To see more information about the 9.2 upgrade, please visit www.cdmplus.com/9.2. Suran Systems, Inc. celebrates 25 years of business in 2013. It has been providing quality church information systems over these years and was the first company to provide a Windows solution. Its cross-platform technology has positioned the company to be a leader in this marketplace, keeping pace with the ever changing demands of technology. Our mission is to be a partner in ministry, helping our users take full advantage of technology to further their work for the Kingdom of God. Church Community Builder You are called to equip people as they fulfill the mission of the local church. Church Community Builder is called to offer you a better how — through practical coaching, software, and ‘tribe’based learning — that supports good process and empowers everyone in your church. Technology alone is incapable of supporting ministry objectives. You must first have people and processes working together in harmony. You must then identify technology which aligns with and empowers those people and processes. Finally, you must constantChristian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

ly evaluate, adjust, and learn from others as you adapt to change and new challenges along the way. Church Community Builder is equipped to guide churches through all three of these disciplines. When we encounter needs which fall outside of our core competency, we can point to a variety of thought leaders who excel at providing the inspirational understanding of ‘what’ is possible and the ‘why’ behind it. We then bring the ‘what’ and ‘why’ full circle by helping church leaders implement the ‘how’. Our inspiration is “the pastors and teachers. Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do His work and build up the church, the body of Christ” (Eph. 4:11b–12). We believe church leadership and structure is necessary and a good thing, so we encourage leadership-driven processes and systems. We also believe that community between church leaders and congregants is vital, so we provide highly distributive church management software to facilitate connectedness, communication, and insight. For more information, visit churchcommunitybuilder.com

At Church Windows, we pride ourselves in eliminating support call nightmares. The phrase “User Friendly, Friendly Support” has meant Church Windows to our customers for over 15 years, and we continue to live up to our motto in 2013. While our customers appreciate the flexibility, power, and ease-of-use Church Windows offers, what we hear they appreciate most is our support. Our Church Windows support team has an average of 7 years of experience as a Church Windows support technicians. We are all here in North America,

The Church is people!

Computer Helper (Church Windows) Church Windows - What Makes for Good Software Support? Perhaps one way to answer this question is to list the frustrations customers experience when it comes to support: • Foreign country technicians with poor English skills • Novice techs who don’t know the program • Being shuffled from one tech to another • No direct access to my computer to “log in” and fix an issue • Voice Mail mazes Christian Computing® Magazine

You’ve been called to minister to the people of your church. Let Church Windows manage the information so you can minister to your people.

CHURCH WINDOWS DESKTOP & WEB contain integrated: .FNCFSTIJQ t 4DIFEVMFS t %POBUJPOT "DDPVOUJOH t "DDPVOUT 3FDFJWBCMF t 1BZSPMM

October 2013

we all enjoy hearing from our customers, and none of us read off of scripts of any sort. We are here for our customers, and offer individual attention as part of our Church Windows family. We also have the capability to log into the customerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s computer to better see and help with an issue that is occurring. And we do it with a smile! An exciting new option we have available for our customers this year is the creation of free user group webinars! About three or four times a month, we hold free hour-long webinars for our customers, each on a specific topic within the program. Current topics include designing custom giving statements in Donations, preparing to open a new year in Accounting, the many options available in the Membership Find grid, and more. We are always looking for suggestions for future user group webinars as well. These free webinars have been very well-received, and attendee numbers increase with each webinar. A favorite feature of these webinars is the option to ask questions over the course of the webinar as well. While we do offer weekly demo webinars for those who are considering the purchase of Church Windows, we welcome anyone at our user group webinars who might wish to attend. You can see the schedules and register for these free webinars on our website at www.churchwindows.com. These webinars provide that little boost of knowledge that makes using Church Windows a joy. Within the past year, we have released upgrades to Church Windows that include many customerrequested new features. Our Payroll program is always up-to-date with the latest in tax tables and IRS requirements that apply to our church customers. The Church Windows Accounting module continues to provide the ease and flexibility you require in tracking income, expenses, and payments, wrapped up in an ironclad audit trail for your protection. The Donations module makes recording weekly giving a snap, links with many online giving companies for quick entry of those EFT and credit card gifts, and enables you to create customized giving statements to print or email to donors. Coming soon, Membership reporting will be given a whole new look, with much more flexibility in the options available! Christian ComputingÂŽ Magazine

Having a good piece of software to use is really important for any church office to function efficiently. But knowing that a smiling, knowledgable, helpful person is just a phone call or email away is the icing on the cake. You can relax knowing that you are not alone in your endeavors. For more information visit: www.churchwindows.com/learnmore Donarius Church management software is a tool that should make your life easier,helping you get tasks done faster. Since you are reading this, you are probably considering a new product that will do more for your church. You also want a company that will be there to help you. And, of course, you want this at a reasonable cost. Donarius has all these elements: functionality, support and pricing. Donaris has the functionality best suited to a small or medium sized church. It keeps track of your members, contributions and pledges. Donarius now has individual and family pictures of each member and prints a photo directory. It will interface with a check scanner to speed up data entry. Donarius can help develop connections between members by sending personalized emails and text messages, which usually leads to church growth. You can even access your data from different locations using a service such as Dropbox. When it comes to support, you are covered for one year. Importing data from your existing software, is included at no extra cost. We will even modify the software for you, if necessary. Finally, Donarius is priced so you pay only for the features you need. There is a base version for member/contribution tracking and reporting. Optional modules are available for additional tasks,

October 2013

such as tracking pledges, automatically entering ACH transactions or for sending personalized emails and text messages. We are working on Mac, iPad and Android versions for 2014. Find out more at www.donarius.com or call 1-888-479-4636. Elexio As we reflect on what’s changed and what’s been accomplished over the last year, it’s always astounding to actually grasp the extent of the improvements and updates that we’ve packed into a year. Elexio is a ChMS provider, but so much more. With the integration of a proprietary check-in solution, website CMS, and mobile apps, Elexio continues to differentiate itself from the pack. This differentiation comes in the form of native integration. Not the API-type or export/ import solutions, but real synergy of data from one application to the others. This year’s biggest changes come in the form of Event Management and texting, with many other solutions on the cusp of being rolled out. The impact of these advancements on our current and prospective church partners is game changing. The Event Management feature alone allows churches to schedule events, recruit volunteers, manage facility resources, promote through all relevant communication channels, and take online registration and payments. This comprehensive feature gives churches the ability to stay within the same application to initiate, promote, and manage events. It eliminates the necessity of third-party volunteer- and resourcemanagement platforms, while bringing promotion alongside the planning process. Volunteer manChristian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

agement combines your assessed knowledge of the giftedness and availability of your folks—already existing in the ChMS—with the communication tools of the event manager to provide seamless engagement and efficient recruitment. Promotion and event registration carry significant impact when you consider the list building, export/import, attendee tracking, payment collection, and day-of sign-in features. Elexio’s ChMS and check-in services consolidate these activities into a single platform with self-service check-in capabilities. With fewer volunteers needed for manual processes, you have more time to build relationships and meet your true ministry objectives. Another major addition to the Elexio toolbox is Texting. This is the communication platform of today, and we’ve brought this tool to our administrative, small group, event, and children’s ministries. No longer are you relegated to snail mail, email, or even purely social channels; this communication is direct, targeted, and socially relevant with today’s culture. And with access to parents’ and guardians’ mobile numbers, notification of children’s ministry issues is a few keystrokes away. Social Sign-in has become the norm for today’s culture, as we use our Facebook and Google+ logins to access many shared accounts. Your online portal for regular attenders and members should be no different. Reducing the number of required user names and passwords is directly proportional to the amount of engagement that people will have with your church software solutions. As we look ahead, a few of the features that are receiving attention are centered on our mobile and people-engagement solutions. Mobile will get several upgrades in the near future, affecting media playback capabilities and check-in. Along with our mobile enhancements, we’ll be launching integrated information and giving kiosks that will provide opportunities for volunteers, ministry involvement, prayer requests, directory information updates, and card-swipe giving. This kiosk solution will be tablet-based and housed in an attractive, affordable, and portable solution from our partner, Armodilo. Many other areas of Elexio software suite received touch-ups and improved functionality to a lesser degree than the major roll-outs mentioned above. However, the Elexio ChMS is already packed full of the necessary features to equip a church of any size or configuration in a way that connects their people. Here are just a few of the Christian Computing® Magazine

ways that Elexio accomplishes these connections: Automated follow-ups to first-time visitors; multicampus setup, ensuring each location has an identity while feeling part of the greater whole; easy report builder and preformatted reports to make the data usable; status tracking to ensure that your people on a discipleship track, and so much more. We’re thrilled to have served church partners for several decades now, and we’ll continue to evolve to assist them with our collective mission of expanding the Kingdom. Find out more here. Faithful Steward Faithful Steward is Easy and Affordable For nineteen years Faithful Steward by Diakonia Software has been helping churches with simple, easy to use record-keeping, saving its customers hours of time each week. Providing both desktop and web-based versions, Faithful Steward manages membership, groups, attendance, donations, and pledges, with fund accounting being added later this year. 100% Browser-based or Desktop Unlike other “web” soluManaging Church tions which Membership & Donations simply run Starting at desktop soft$20 monthly ware remotely using web networking, in 2011 Faithful Steward created a 100% browser-based web version of its membership and donation software (starting at Easy teamwork with staff $20 monthly). at different locations Accessible by Windows and FreeWeb or Desktop Trial Macintosh computers, as FaithfulSteward.com well as mobile Simply handling devices such church information as tablets and 800-325-6642 smartphones October 2013

from any location, this version allows treasurers at home, accountants in one office, and secretaries at a separate office work together easily and securely using the online technology trusted by banks. The software walks users step by step through their tasks, increasing productivity and the ease of training new staff. Current desktop users can easily migrate to the web version of Faithful Steward, bringing their data with them and enjoying the many new features that have been added to the web version. For more information: www.faithfulsteward.com.

Introducing Fund Accounting In the last quarter of 2013 Faithful Steward is introducing a new web-based fund accounting solution thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s simple for non-accountants to use and integrates with their existing web-based membership and donation software. Free Demo Try out any Faithful Steward products at http:// www.church-software.com Email info@faithfulsteward.com or call 314256-9073 with any questions. Diakonia looks forward to serving your church! FreshVine At Fresh Vine we help your leaders understand how people are involved in your community, and foster participation in your community. With a better understanding of what is happening in your church or ministry you can make better decisions on focusing groups and events to strengthen involvement. We help you foster strong participation with tools that make it easy for you to find people with specific characteristics and interests, to identify and follow up with visitors, and to identify people who may be falling out. Target your message through email and social media. Record giving in total or by service with easy to use templates, and keep track of what is occurring at each of your weekly services. Use our check-in application to safely and securely check your children in and out of classes. And our intuitive design makes it easy for staff and volunteers to use. Volunteer group leaders use the power of our small group facility to foster participation in your community. They use our roster mapping to find members and visitors that live nearby, and

Christian ComputingÂŽ Magazine

October 2013

can search the church roster to find people with similar backgrounds and interests. They announce their events with email and social media and can record attendance and identify group members that may be falling out. They also keep notes online for future event planning. And because we are online, they can do all of this from the comfort of their home. Every year we upgrade Fresh Vine with new functions and features. This year we upgraded our user experience with the latest technology to be very responsive to display size, including smart phones, tablets, etc. We are about to release a member environment that will let people view and update their own profiles and will let the church publish a customizable church directory. We also plan to release a major upgrade to our giving functionality before year end. We also continue to grow our partner program. We have multiple partners for online giving, background search, facilities management and label printing. Our partners have committed to working with us to create online integration with their software and Fresh Vine. We also give back to the church community. One example is the MissioGui.de, a site developed with church planters all over the world to help them intentionally lead missional communities into spiritual practices. Another example is the Grapevine, our monthly electronic newsletter that highlights creative ideas for church leadership, technology, communication, marketing and more. The Grapevine gets great reviews from pastors, administrators and volunteer leaders. Click here to get the Grapevine! Our customers and prospects all tell us that Fresh Vine is remarkably intuitive and easy to use. Check us out at freshvine.co. Christian Computing® Magazine

Icon Systems “Solid system, well integrated, excellent customer support/service, programmers that listen to customer suggestions – what’s not to like?” Chris, Suber Road Baptist Church Chris is one of thousands of clients who have turned to IconCMO and found the power to effectively manage their ministries. IconCMO – our completely cloud-based system – gives our clients

October 2013

the tools they need to manage their people, communicate, and track their finances, all with ease and accuracy. The product is very affordable and includes our outstanding customer support. Are you tired of paying extra for each church management module? With IconCMO, you get member management, communication tools, contribution tracking and statements, and full fund accounting – all in one affordable and integrated package that puts you within a few clicks of achieving all your administrative tasks. Mailing (or emailing) contribution statements, sending updates to groups or the entire congregation, generating clear, IRS-compliant accounting reports, and many other important and often difficult tasks are made easy with the power IconCMO puts at your fingertips. Because IconCMO is cloud-based, church staff have the freedom to do church management and accounting anywhere, anytime; all they need is an internet connection. No need for downloads or upgrades. Our passion is to find out what our clients need and provide it for them. It’s part of our deep,

rich Icon tradition built from over 20 years of serving churches here and abroad. Our sales and support staff work closely with new clients to help them learn how to best use the system to meet each church’s needs. And our developers work continually to add and improve features that give clients more power, flexibility and ease of use. We’ve listened closely to our clients and made several major enhancements in the past several months. • We boosted the performance of our email features by integrating a separate system of servers to handle email blasts. • In our accounting section, we’ve added more flexibility for changing the account assignments of transactions, and now there are more format options for our accounting reports. • We’ve added a lot of power to our new custom reports window, so that now users can create their own reports with their own parameters, see the results of their selections instantly, save the reports for later recall, and generate them in different formats. • We’ve completely overhauled IconCMO’s security for a major future enhancement to come, so stay tuned!

ONE staff, many needs.

Powerful features, ease of use, outstanding client support, and accessibility from anywhere. It’s all part of our commitment to give you a great product so that you can focus on what really matters – people. For more information visit our website. Logos ChMS

logoscms.com/tour Christian Computing® Magazine

LOGOS continues to power thousands of ministries across the country with LOGOS II Church Management Software (ChMS) and the fully webOctober 2013

based ConnectNow Accounting for churches. In 2013, Ministry Connection—a powerful add-on for LOGOS II—received a huge addition to its already robust platform with the introduction of Online Registration. Online Registration was developed through an integration with Wufoo, an industry leader in online form building. Now, with Online Registration, Ministry Connection allows users to register and pay for events online. This is an addition that allows members, attendees, and friends of the church the ability to give online, and update their own family or individual profiles. It also empowers pastors and church staff with mobile capability for member information. Online Registration minimizes the lines at church to sign up for events and eliminates errors that can occur with cash handling. Supporting the Local Church As always, supporting the local church is what powers the staff at LOGOS. To this end, we’ve created more video tutorials and guides and added them to the self-help library for church staff and volunteers. Plus we’ve added Live Answer support! Up to 60% of support calls are being answered live and we expect that number to only increase. Yet, our products have remained at current, competitve prices. We’ve been talking to our users. Many conversations with churches have affirmed that LOGOS is helping them complete their ministry objectives. “We’re going paperless!” says Administrative and Family Pastor Chris Cate of Ridgedale Baptist Church who uses the whole suite of LOGOS products. Specifically, he attributes Ridgedale Baptist’s paperless system to Ministry Connection and PeopleFlow, the LOGOS software that manages volunteer and staff background checks, employee paperwork, and provides an electronic document storage system. Anytime, Anywhere LOGOS has responded to the steady increase of churches wanting their software in the cloud with its fully browser-based accounting software, ConnectNow Church Accounting, designed to meet the specific needs of churches. The ability to “go hosted” with the LOGOS II software delivers churches the convenience they are looking for in accessing LOGOS II from a home office or café. In the coming years, you can expect to see more Christian Computing® Magazine

“anytime, anywhere” secure products show up in the fully browser-based ConnectNow line as LOGOS continues to utilize thirty years of expertise in church software to develop and bring you the very best modern solutions. For more information on LOGOS II, Ministry Connection, PeopleFlow, or ConnectNow Accounting, go to http://logoscms.com. Power Church PowerChurch Plus is one of the top selling church management software packages available today. It has been under continual development for nearly 30 years, adding features that are important to our users. The program development staff at PowerChurch Software have an open door policy. User suggestions are the biggest source of new features developed in PowerChurch Plus. With over 35,000 churches and nonprofit organizations using the software, we understand the importance of providing our users the tools necessary to be as productive as possible. One of our users reported recently, “I have reduced my hours from 40 to 30 because of all the amazing upgrades and shortcuts that PowerChurch has. I am a CPA, so I have worked with various accounting software programs. I am extremely impressed with how easy and accurate PowerChurch is.” We spend a lot of time in the development process trying to make the most functional and intuitive products that we can, keeping in mind that users’ satisfaction is first priority. In recent years, PowerChurch Plus has received two highly regarded Campbell Awards for User Satisfaction. PowerChurch Plus is installed locally on your computer or shared across your local network. For those who prefer cloud computing, or don’t have a centralized church office, PowerChurch Online offers access to PowerChurch Plus from virtually any computer with high speed internet. Traditional online access is available for Windows PC, Mac, and Linux computers. There is also mobile web access, giving users access to Membership data from any web-enabled device, be it a smart phone, tablet, or traditional notebook or desktop computer. PowerChurch Plus and PowerChurch Online now interact with more compatible products and services than ever before. Our users have now October 2013

You want the freedom to … reach out … minister to people … create fellowship … contribute to your community PowerChurch Plus was created for just that!

Over sixteen hours of training videos were added earlier this year in a complete redesign of our online training system. There you will also find many Knowledge Base articles, quarterly newsletters, a user support forum, and how to videos available at no charge. For more information and free demos of PowerChurch Plus and PowerChurch Online, visit www.powerchurch.com or give us a call at (800) 486-1800. RDS Advantage

Thirty years ago RDS dedicated itself to Matthew 28:1920, The Great Commission. To Membership We provide you with the tools to be faithful to this commitment increase administrative efficiency in our church management and streamline accounting tasks, Accounting systems we work to incorporate freeing you up to perform the work tools that enable churches to be that matters. more effective in spreading the Contributions Good News of Christ. Emphasis is to place in the hands of Install on your PC or network, or access online. Events churches applications that make Choose which fi ts your needs. Calendar it easy to conduct outreach ministries, communicate, and to track and follow-up with the Check In participation or lack of participation of individuals and families. Completely This year new tools have We provide software tools, Integrated been implemented to use mobile freeing you up to fulfill your mission. devices on-the-go. Attendance at activities and worship can be www.PowerChurch.com • 800.486.1800 recorded using tablets. Leaders been sending e-mail via Constant Contact, accept- can enroll, 3&6 &KXUFK([HFXWLYHB [ LQGG $0 record attendance and communicate ing online giving and processing direct deposit with those in their groups using mobile devices. Payroll through Vanco Services, and requesting Cloud-hosting of the RDS Connect system is background checks through Protect My Minisgrowing as more churches take advantage of its try for a number of years now. Integration with benefits. Hosted on a Tier III Data Center with OneBody, an online church directory and social international redundancy and 256 bit SSL encrypnetworking site, gives your members a private and tion, give RDS an ‘SASS’ (software as a secure secure place to interact and fellowship. We have service) rating, one of the few in the industry with also recently added state and federal e-filing of this level of security and up-time. W2 , 941, and 1099-MISC forms. More than 200 new features and enhancements Our web site at www.powerchurch.com conare completed each year. tains many new training and support resources. RDS continues its policy to include all feaChristian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

Christian Computing速 Magazine

October 2013

tures and applications at no additional cost. There is no charge for additional modules. We function as a ministry team. We are servants to those who entrust their data processing to us. For more information visit: http://www.rdsadvantage.com

nologies available for churches. We have worked hard to provide these new technologies as affordable, easy to use, stable, and secure solutions. Servant Keeper has been a leader in church management software for the last 20 years because it is easy to use and powerful. We continue to move forward with exciting new features while keeping these two things in mind. Servant PC Resources Optional cloud technology makes Servant Keeper even more accessible. Church staff and This is a big year for Servant Keeper. Our volunteers can work from any location with inmission has always been to make emerging tech- ternet access. In addition we are rolling out web and mobile apps, starting first with an app designed to simplify pastoral care while “on the go”. Cloud solutions with Servant Keeper are the most affordget your free demo able on the market, and defies www.servantpc.com/ccmag the “cloud based = expensive” trend. We are even making it 800-773-7570 possible for in-house developers to write apps for their own church. Manage your ministry with Servant Keeper is now even faster and allows for more integration with other software programs. All in all there are Track donations, Email Statements, over two hundred new features Manage: Small Groups, Classes, Attendance, have been added resulting in an Visitor follow-up, Outreach and MORE! improved user experience. The new design introduces various color themes along with the ability to change font sizes and types to suit the user’s Keep children safe with needs. Changes and deletions are now tracked in a history file and can be easily restored. Easy check-in, secure check-out, Increased privacy and sharing Syncs with Servant Keeper, abilities make data even more Name badges w/ allergies, notes, alerts, class info. secure and confidential while Claim tickets for parents/guardians, run background checks helping ministry team members work together more effectively. A new Reminder Tool will also keep staff on the same page, while making sure ministers Plan worship effortlessly with and volunteers don’t miss things like appointments, birthdays, or important events. Keeps your song library at your fingertips, Servant Keeper’s new built Quickly plan and schedule services and teams in email client frees people Easily track song usage and do reports from having to use expensive or

SOFTWARE FOR MINISTRY ou: y e r A

Tracking Members/Donors?

Servant Keeper®!

ou: y e r A Caring for Children?

SK Check-In®!

ou: y e r A Leading Worship?

Worship Keeper®!

Christian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

clunky emailing programs. The result is faster, easier emailing to groups of people from anywhere. The unique Groups Keeper® has been made even more powerful. Information can easily be merged with personalized letters and emails. Individual groups also sync with the SK Notify mobile app for sending group messages, alerts, texts, and voice messages. More “international friendly” features have also been added such as formatting that accepts various types of addresses and phone numbers and the ability to use foreign language characters. SK Online Giving integrates seamlessly with Servant Keeper® allowing financial secretaries the ease of updating the donor database with one click. Donors can give by text, kiosks, or the church website and can even register and pay for events. Visit us at www.servantpc.com to keep up to date with all the great new changes and features as we continue to serve churches and help them accomplish their mission. Shelby Systems Shelby has had a very exciting 2013 so far! We have released major updates to our current product lines, as well as launched a brand our newest product, Shelby Financials Online. This web-hosted software is the new alternative to Shelby Systems’ existing v.5 Financials software. The Financials Online Base Package includes: General Ledger, Accounts Payable, and Bank Account Management. At this time, Payroll is available as an additional application in Shelby FiChristian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

nancials Online and Accounts Receivable, Fixed Assets, and Purchase Order are in development and will be released in coming months. Shelby Financials Online is integrated with Shelby Systems’ membership software, Shelby Arena, giving customers a single solution for church management. The v.5 financials software that is currently available by Shelby Systems is not being replaced by Shelby Financials Online and will continue to be available. The new Shelby Financials Online is an additional product with more contemporary features and will be hosted on Shelby’s secure servers for access any time and from any location. With Shelby’s private cloud, data is protected virtually by powerful firewalls, intrusion detection, and physical security devices. Shelby Financials Online is modular, allowing customers a wide array of combinations. Data migration from existing Shelby products will be included in the upgrade process. For more information on SFO and to view free video demos of the product, visit our website at www.shelbysystems.com/financialsonline.

Christian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

protected with purpose

Simple Yet Sage Advice

By: Steven Sundermeier

ome sayings/proverbs are taught to us as youngsters, and can keep us in check our whole lives. “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.” (I know 4 year olds that can benefit from this as well as 64 year olds!) “Treat others as you would like to be treated.” And how about (one of my personal favorites): “Don’t open an email unless it’s from a trusted source.” And even then be careful of what you’re opening or clicking on! This little saying is something I’ve been preaching since the infamous Loveletter Internet worm took the world by storm by infecting tens of millions of users back in 2010. It holds true when we introduce computers and emailing to small children, and it needs to be repeated to teens and adults. So simple (the advice of not opening emails unless you know the sender), and yet so difficult (for many to follow this advice as it relates to them and their personal inboxes). We will revisit this simple yet sage advice this month because it is so easily forgotten, or dismissed, or not taken seriously. But emails opened from illegitimate sources can have can have embarrassing, negative, and painful (financial and emotional) effects. Christian Computing® Magazine

About a month or so ago, Thirtyseven4 began intercepting a fake CNN Breaking News email containing the subject line, “Obama speech to urge ‘refocus’ on economy”. The unsolicited email contained a forged email address appearing to be sent directly from CNN, and the body of the email was html-based with a message containing embedded links that if clicked upon would direct unknowing users to malicious websites. Shortly after receiving a couple dozen October 2013

Christian Computing速 Magazine

October 2013

samples, we easily determined that this email run was circulating “in-the-wild”, meaning that systems outside a virus lab were being actively infected. As with many of these malicious mass mailings, the first thought that crosses my mind is “Why are people opening these emails? Don’t they realize what they may be exposing themselves to?” So what exactly are people exposing themselves to, and how dangerous can an email be from someone we don’t know? Upon analysis of the embedded links within this particular CNN/Obama email, our Thirtyseven4 labs determined that by clicking the links, a user will be directed to a website displaying a fake Adobe Flash update. Upon downloading and installing the fake Adobe Flash update, the user will have successfully infected their system with malware associated with the Trojan Zeus family. (Trojan-Who? I know it’s getting techy, but stick with me because these decisions to open “hot-topic” emails affect and burn users everyday.) The Zeus family of malware is well-known for its ability to steal personal and banking information. (You read that correctly, and stolen banking and personal information is a scary reality that none of us want to get mixed up with. I again reiterate: “Do not open an email unless it’s from a trusted source!”) This particular variation of Zeus will conceal itself until the user browses to their financial or banking website in which case it awakens to retrieve and relay the account credentials to a connected server controlled by the attacker. If this sounds bad, it pales in comparison to CryptoLocker, a malware under the ransomware category. CrypChristian Computing® Magazine

toLocker has been the talk of the month so far, and it too has been infecting users, businesses and schools in great number. It springs into action after someone decides to view an unsolicited email and open its attachment. (Didn’t they listen to our sage yet simple advice?) So, what exactly does CryptoLocker do? Its’ functionality is very similar to the notorious FBI MoneyPak virus. It is ransomware, and once installed, it holds your files hostage (encrypted) until the desired ransom is paid. Understanding the technical’s behind CryptoLocker is complicated but hang with me because maybe (just

October 2013

maybe) this may wake-up a user or two to the seriousness of emails, attachments, etc. CryptoLocker uses the RSA algorithm with a 2048 bit key. It communicates with servers at random whose names are generated using the Domain Name Generation (DGA) algorithm. Once communication is successful, the server generates a pair of public and private keys for the machine of the targeted user. The private key is kept on the server for the next 72 hours. The public key is sent to the malware running on the user’s machine using a secure communication, stored under a registry key. Next, the malware will begin looking for files with high interest to the user. It chooses its extensions with the intention of creating the most disruption/havoc to the user, including Microsoft Office extensions, Adobe PDF files, and graphic file extensions. Think about how upset you would be if your pictures were “hijacked”. How about if your banking information was infiltrated? We would want those areas to be restored immediately, and that is what cybercriminals are banking on, and they are taking us Christian Computing® Magazine

to the bank with it. This embodies why these viruses are called “ransomware”: the authors will put a ransom on the corrupted files/information, and we cannot regain it until we pay in some way. All of the located files with these selected file extensions will be encrypted, and the list of infected documents is also kept in the registry. This is a procedure to prevent multiple encryptions of the same file. Once the files have been encrypted, CryptoLocker provides three ways of making payment (via MoneyPak, Ukash and Bitcoin). The amount required is equivalent to $300 USD, and the amount can be paid in 15 different currencies. Unfortunately, for the user it is extremely difficult to recover encrypted files once they are encrypted with the RSA algorithm, as the malware author holds the private key. Making matters worse, I have observed that even if the ransom is paid, the malware author will usually only send the key to unlock certain files and not all of them, and often will request additional ransoms! A terrible situation to be sure. The Internet produces a façade that makes us feel safe, private, and alone in our writing/work/ postings. But the reality is that there are people with ill-intent just waiting for us to “take the bait” and open an email that often looks suspicious anyway. You can gird yourself for battle with the basics of Internet safety as armor: 1. Utilize a trusted antivirus product for your computer/network 2. Keep your operating system and all your software up-to-date and patched with the latest updates 3. Keep files “backed-up” online or to an external hard drive so that they can be quickly recovered So many things in life today have become very complicated. I encourage you to keep emails simple, and follow the sage advice “Don’t open an email unless it’s from a trusted source.” I can guarantee you won’t miss much (if it is a legit email), and you will be spared much if it is a compromised email. Keep it simple!

October 2013

the browser

Three Reasons to Use the Bible Study App by Olive Tree By: Susan Codone

n a previous column, I described useful mobile apps to enhance Bible study experience. Recently I downloaded the Olive Tree Bible Study app on my iPhone and the desktop version on my laptop. After using the app, I quickly identified three key reasons why everyone should download it for personal Bible study.

First, the app is visually well-designed and very easy on the eyes. The desktop version (PC) divides the screen into three columns, with the center containing the main reference material while the left contains Bibles, Favorites, and Downloads. On the right, useful links to tools and resources are provided, and navigation between all three panes is easy. The mobile app (iOS) offers a split screen option for references Christian Computing速 Magazine

along with the ability to customize the fonts and appearance, creating a pleasant reading experience. Second, the app offers wonderful free resources. Right now, over 130 free books are offered via the Download tab. These free books include multiple versions of the Bible, commentaries, devotionals, maps, sermons, hymns, biographies, foreign language translations of the Bible, and even October 2013

George Washington’s prayer journal. Such great resources, all for free! In addition, the Olive Tree store offers over 450 resources for purchase to round out your study and reference needs. Third, the app offers superior note taking functionality. The notes feature in the desktop version of the Bible Study app is impressive, offering a horizontal split-screen, easy to read and type simultaneously experience, and a vertical split-screen note taking option in the iOS version. Perhaps most important to me, the app offers the ability to sync the notes I take in the Bible Study app with Evernote, my favorite notetaking application. Though users can also use the app to sync across devices, I appreciate the ability to sync with Evernote as well. I use Evernote to make lists, record thoughts, and take notes for study and while listening. For iOS users, Olive Tree provides an option called ‘External Sync’ that allows users to sync notes with Evernote. Then, inside Evernote, users can then edit, store, or email the notes created in the Bible Study app, using all the great features of Evernote and the resources of the Bible Study app to create useful documentation. So, let me encourage you to download the Bible Study app from Olive Tree (http:// www.olivetree.com/). While there are other apps offering useful features for personal or group Bible study, this app offers rich functionality for users both on the big and small screens and combines Scripture with great references to make your Bible Study experience both effiChristian Computing® Magazine

cient and rewarding. Happy browsing! Susan is an associate professor at Mercer University. In Mercer’s Technical Communication undergraduate degree, students can specialize in Ministry Media & Technology. Contact Susan anytime for more information at codone_s@mercer.edu.

October 2013

ministry leadership

The City By: Linda McKeirnan

os Angles, New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Orlando, Dallas and Washington D.C. are all recognizable cities, but, unless your church is ministering in one of these towns, they have nothing to do with The City. The City is a connection, communication, engagement and social networking tool offered by ACS Technologies. It is designed to work within the group model that most churches have–entire congregations, separate campuses (if needed), neighborhoods, and smaller groups, whether those are home groups, Sunday School, or interest groups. Each of these groups is under the Church Umbrella of The City, but only members of a group can see its posts. In 2011, Mill Creek staff decided they needed to begin doing some things differently. They were a church of 550-600 in Sunday attendance and approximately 1000 people that they considered active in our ACS database. MCCC had a website, a church Facebook, a Twitter account; several small groups had their own closed Facebook groups, a Worship bulletin, mass emails, and announcement slides on Sunday. They struggled with what communication went where or if it belonged in all of the communication streams. Of course every person/group wanted their event in all of the communication streams. As they looked at what they could do differently they wanted to accomplish the following: Christian Computing® Magazine

• • • • • •

Improve and Simplify Communication Increase Lay Leadership Involvement Increase Volunteerism Increase Personal Discipleship Increase Engagement of Membership Not have another separate database to maintain

In evaluating how to implement effective change, they recognized that whether they liked it or not, in recent years communication had changed in our society. Email overload impacted members and staff, text and social networking had impacted communication, and a written letter may never make it out of the October 2013

envelope to be read. Most people had personal cell phones and didn’t always answer or return every phone call. Mill Creek added The City to their software in July 2011. It was launched to the entire church in November at a church wide banquet that was already on the calendar. Prior to the main launch, there were several “soft” launches, first to staff, next to elders, then small group leaders and the people in those groups. Each of these soft launches involved group and some one-on-one training. One of the early blessings of The City happened as they transitioned prayer requests to The City only. In the email days, an administrative assistant sent out prayer requests, and if someone who received that request hit reply, the church saw the response, not the person requesting prayer. With The City, staff post prayer requests in our church-wide group, but suddenly members began to reply with personal comments, I am lifting you before the Lord, I am praying for you, etc. Even though they don’t all attend the same campus or service, these were expressions of being one body and a tangible way to express care for one another. The City allows Mill Creek to efficiently engage people for service opportunities. City users can check their skills on a list which can be searched. Communication can be sent to just the people who have the skills to fill a need. People feel free to respond if it’s something they have the time and ability to participate in, and no one feels they have to say “yes” to the person calling. Additional communication can generally be handled within that same thread, so multiple back and forth communication is avoided. Shortly after I left employment at Mill Creek, a funeral meal had to be planned. This was one of my responsibilities that we forgot to transition. There is a service group for meals that had been set up for members who are not part of a small groups but need meals. A post was made with specific lists of dishes and the number of helpers needed. By the next day, all the needs were filled. This was accomplished without hours of phone calls by the organizer—a busy mom of three young children. This was a win/win for those serving and for the first-time leader with this responsibility. Christian Computing® Magazine

LifeGroups (Mill Creek’s small groups) that use The City report how effective it is in communicating with each other. Small Groups can easily communicate and meet needs within their membership without lots of phone calls. Small groups use The City to communicate with one another when there are unexpected childcare needs, to share personal prayer and praise requests, and encourage one another during the week. The ability to quickly see areas that people live in has resulted in four new LifeGroups being formed based on people living near one another. Part of why Mill Creek chose The City was that they knew member information in The City and ACS would sync allowing Mill Creek to transition their online giving to The City. They expect the number of online donations will increase because online donors are checking in on The City regularly. Mill Creek believes sharing life together face-to-face is the best way to make disciples of Jesus Christ. In our busy world, The City has given options to the busy family, the homebound member, and even the business person traveling abroad to stay connected with the church and small groups throughout the week. This all happens most times without any staff involvement. The City has definitely become an effective ministry tool at Mill Creek Community Church. To learn more about how The City works and how it can help grow the day-to-day ministry impact of your church, please register for an upcoming Discover The City event. Or download Building Disciples Through Engagement to learn to connect and inform staff, pastors, volunteers and members by giving them real time access to vital information online with safe and secure access to each other. Linda McKeirnan was on Mill Creek Community Church staff for 17 years, 12 of them as the church Business Administrator. In 2012, she became a certified trainer for ACS Technologies.

October 2013

church windows software

CHURCH WINDOWS SOFTWARE

Some Reliable Online Giving Companies By: Craig Chadwell

ith fewer people every year picking up a pen to write a check, it has become nearly imperative for churches to hop aboard the proverbial “online giving train.” Let’s face it, most of us don’t even carry as much cash as we used to. Debit cards have reduced the inconvenience and risk of carrying cash to where people carry less and less as time goes on. So when council decides it’s OK to look into electronic giving and move forward, who can you trust? We can’t say that they are the only reliable electronic donation processing companies, but Church Windows Software has partnered with six companies so far. As a result, after a period of giving, the electronic giving company emails a file of donor information and amounts. This data is then directly imported into Church Windows without the need for manual rekeying. It’s a great, time-saving convenience that also reduces the chance for errors (not that any of us ever makes mistakes, right?) In no particular order, we suggest that you consider investigating Vanco Services, Ardent Giving Solutions, Clover Donations, EFTPlus, eGiving, or Authorize.net. Here’s a little snippet and some contact information for each: • Vanco Services (www.vancoservices.com or www.ElectronicDonations.com) provides online giving, mobile giving and other Christian Computing® Magazine

convenient services to more than 12,000 churches, schools and nonprofit organizations. Vanco is a PCI Level 1 Compliant Service Provider offering the highest level of data security across all services. • Ardent Giving Solutions (www.ardentgivingsolutions.com) strives to provide lowcost, reliable online giving transactions. This award-winning, Michigan-based company has a simplified pricing structure with many additional benefits. • Clover Donations (www.cloverdonations. com) is a West Coast company who boasts a flat, no hidden fees 1% per transaction fee that lends itself well to their “Pay a little, get a lot” slogan. • EFTPlus (www.eftplus.com) hails from the Pacific Northwest and has been providOctober 2013

ing electronic transaction programs since 1999. They understand that ministries are different than business and strive to customize options to best suit your needs. • eGiving (www.egiving.com) has a motto of “Building effective electronic stewardship” and their founders have been involved with EFT transactions since the mid-1980s. Like many of the other providers, their website contains many tips for amplifying electronic giving within your congregation. • Authorize.net (www.authorize.net) is the largest of the Church Windows electronic processing partners. With merchant and nonprofit clients in a number of different arenas, they are definitely well-capable of handling both small and large church electronic giving. If you happen to be a church who uses Church Windows Software for your office management solution, and if you use an e-services provider other than those listed above, please let us know. We can likely add the company you use! As with with our software, it may be likely that the software you use also allows a more generic text or spreadsheet-type of import process.

Christian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

higher power with kevin

Accordance 10 for Windows and Mac

Kevin A. Purcell - kevin@kevinpurcell.org

ccordance Bible Software announced a while back that they’d publish their great Bible software application, Accordance 10, on the Windows platform. They published a beta and now the final version hit their site and we’re quite impressed with the results. Accordance did a better job moving from Mac to Windows than other software companies did when moving from Windows to Mac. Like Olive Tree (www.olivetree.com), Accordance chose to make a version that runs natively on both platforms instead of creating a version that runs in an emulator. Laridian will soon launch a Mac version (http://blog.laridian.com/?p=1954) after their Kickstarter campaign successfully got funded. We look forward to seeing them do it the right way as well. Christian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

Mac and Windows with Same Interface Accordance for Mac and Windows mirror one another in all of the important ways. We get a typical Windows style menu instead of the Mac style, but that’s the main difference. See the Mac version above and the Windows version below running on Windows 7. We’ve already published a review of Accordance for Christian Computing Magazine back in September 2011, so we won’t regurgitate all of that content.

Stability of First Windows Version Accordance for Windows is a powerful, elegant and stable Bible study tool! Usually, when a new application comes out we can expect a lot of bugs and crashes. Accordance for Windows breaks that trend with a version that never crashed and performed as expected. I’m sure a few bugs will surface and the program might crash on occasion. We can’t guarantee it won’t, but in our experience the last beta and preview release, which we tested for this review, worked great. The final gold release will work like the Mac version, which means it will be stable and mostly error free. Users of both versions will feel comfortable.

as big a library as WORDsearch or Logos, but it offers a great library. We get access to some world-class original language books and tools. They offer incredible commentaries, including a sale on NICOT and NICNT. Users can get one of the best commentary series for a big discount on the regular price. I only wish I would’ve bought it at this price. We really like the multimedia features like maps in their Atlas and the timeline feature. They recently added interlinear support (http://bit.ly/ H6gYI3). We get all the tools one expects from Bible software including : • powerful and simple search • translation comparison • book reader for many kinds of resources • custom layouts and the ability to save those layouts for future use • custom modules made by users • the powerful Amplify feature (see image below) that shows info with a triple click that opens the default dictionary/lexicon • hover over words to show details about a word that’s tagged with links to such content

Features of Accordance for Windows Accordance doesn’t offer Christian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

This is just a sample of what users get with Accordance 10. All of it works as expected in the Windows version. Frustration of Multiple Bible Software Tools Owning more than one Bible software tool can frustrate Bible students because they find that they own different books or features in different programs. How do we remember them? Some try to fix this by working with other software, like Bibleworks’ connections to outside tools like WORDsearch books. This helps, but doesn’t solve the problem. Because I own such a large library in a couple of other Bible software tools, I don’t find myself going to Accordance that often, even though I love the program. This isn’t the fault of Accordance, but a result of the Bible software publishing industry in the post-STEP era. Accordance offers one service that helps. Call their customer service number and prove that you own some resources and they will give buyers a discount. Sadly, the customer still must repurchase the books, but at least they can get them at a discount. We did this with a few books and may do it again soon to gain access to books we use in other programs. Accordance might be worth the cost for people who own lesser programs. If you own Logos, WORDsearch or Bibleworks, I don’t think Accordance offers enough to pay the price of switching, unless you don’t own many books yet. Owners of other Windows Bible software apps may want to consider the new Windows version, however. Take a look and see if it meets your needs.

helps a lot. Here’s one about getting a “quick start” using Accordance. http://www.accordancebible.com/resources/multimedia/details/?id=153561 For people interested in buying Accordance, the best way to get started is to buy a collection from their store (http://www.accordancebible.com/ Store). Check out Accordance for Windows and see if it meets your needs. We think it will help serious Bible students enjoy learning more about God’s word on Windows. Nice Updates for Mac Too The Mac got some love in Accordance 10.3, with a new highlighting symbols feature. Many of us are visual people and an image says a thousand words quickly. So now we can add tiny icons to the page in order to show topics or future Bible study passages. A cross might highlight all passages about sacrifice or a dove could symbolize subjects about the Holy Spirit. Be sure to check your updates and get these new features on both Mac and Windows.

Sources of Learning I attended a free live training session a couple of years ago and learned a lot. Visit their support page which includes links to the training sessions page as well as other support links like the user forums where people can get help from other users and staff. Also, viewing their blog and videos Christian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

the power and the danger

3D Printers

By Russ McGuire - russ.mcguire@gmail.com

D printers are moving into the mainstream. Over the past few months, Office Depot and Staples have started stocking the devices. While the products sold by these retailers are priced at over $1000, others are selling 3D printers for as little as $300. This all sounds cool, but how should we think about 3D printing from a Christian perspective?

What is 3D Printing? While the most common 3D printers use a mechanism very similar to ink jet printers, 3D printers aren’t really printers at all. Like a printer, a 3D printer takes a digital file on the computer and creates output that you can hold and take with you, away from the computer. Unlike a printer, a 3D printer isn’t very good at reproducing words and precise images. Its output isn’t a sheet of paper. Instead, what it produces is a physical object – a reproduction of something real or imagined. Today, consumer grade 3D printers cost anywhere from a few hundred dollars up to a couple thousand dollars. These printers produce plastic objects. Industrial grade 3D printers can cost up to half Christian Computing® Magazine

a million dollars and can produce objects made of metal, ceramic, or even glass. Knowing the budgets of most ministries (and those in ministry), I’m only going to focus on the consumer grade products in this article. In very basic terms, a 3D printer works by laying down layer upon layer of melted plastic. There are two elements of the printer actively involved in this process – the extruder (like the traditional print head) and the platform. This isn’t so different from “2D” printers, where the “platform” was a piece of paper. In the 2D printers that we’re used to, the “platform” (paper) may move in the y-axis direction (top to bottom of the page), while the print head moves in the x-axis direction (left to right across the page) layOctober 2013

standard across printers there’s a competitive market keeping prices down. A few models, including those sold at Office Depot and Staples, require proprietary plastic cartridges (like printers) which are more expensive for the same plastic volume than spools. Most consumer 3D printers only support a single spool with a single color of plastic, so the objects you produce will be in one color (similar to black and white printers). More expensive printers can have multiple colors of plastic that are being laid down by the extruder to create a multi-color object. If you haven’t seen it, the process of producing a 3D object is fascinating. There are many clips on YouTube that you can watch. However, it is not a fast process. 2D printers today are rated in pages per minute, while it can take hours to produce even relatively simple 3D objects. Once you have a printer, the real question is – what are you going to print? The printer requires a set of instructions that it can follow to lay down layer upon layer of melted plastic. Printers generally come with the software for your computer to produce those instructions. There are generally two steps in the process. The first is the creation of a 3D representation of the object to be created (this is an STL file). The second is the slicing up of that creation into the layers and producing the instructions for the printer. Since different printers have different resolutions, the slicing will be unique to your printer model. I quickly skipped over the step of creating a 3D representation of an object. Obviously, this is a major undertaking requiring something like 3D CAD software, lots of skill, perhaps some creativity, and often significant experience before pleasing results can be produced. Thankfully, there’s a growing collection of available 3D designs available for free or a reasonable price from sites like 3DLT.com and thingiverse.com. These designs can be downloaded to your computer in STL file format, ready for slicing.

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http://cxfriends.com ing down ink where appropriate to create the desired output. In a 3D printer, between the two of them the platform and the extruder will move in three dimensions (x, y, and z – up and down in height). Different printer models work differently in terms of which directions the platform and extruder move. As they move, the extruder is laying down melted plastic where appropriate to create the desired output. Different printers have different “resolutions” – the thickness of each layer of plastic. Just as in 2D printing, higher resolution (thinner layers) creates a more realistic end product and printers with higher resolution generally cost more. Consumer 3D printers generally use either ABS or PLA plastic. ABS melts at a higher temperature (464 degrees F) than PLA (365 degrees F), so ABS is more appropriate for creating objects that will be used in high temperature environments, but ABS printing requires very good ventilation and the end product will smell more like melted plastic. In general, any given 3D printer model will either work with PLA or ABS, not both, so you’ll need to consider your applications before buying the printer. In most cases, the plastic comes as a spool of a long thin strand of plastic. Since these spools are Christian Computing® Magazine

How can ministries use 3D printing? My greatest reservation with writing this article was that, at least at this point, the applicability of 3D October 2013

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printing to ministry is likely limited – or perhaps it’s my vision that is limited! When I mentioned this concern to my wife, who teaches children’s Sunday school, she immediately started thinking of all the cool props she could create to help teach her lessons. I’m sure as 3D printing becomes mainstream, we will find many more uses, just as we have managed to create reams of printed pages to support our ministries. What is dangerous about 3D printing? The physical characteristics of 3D printing can produce some dangers – very hot components, noxious odors, noise in the printing process – but all of these are manageable. There has also been a fair amount of press about 3D printing used to produce dangerous items (e.g. “printed” functioning guns). We must also guard ourselves against sinning in the use of 3D printers – such as reproducing items with patent, trademark, or copyright protection without the intellectual property owner’s permission. But in general, 3D printing is simply a new extension on our computing capabilities. Perhaps the greatest risk right now is in being good stewards of our funds and time. These devices aren’t cheap and will require constantly buying plastic. However, the material costs are less expensive than I expected for moderately sized objects (often less than a dollar), so the hours spent producing 3D printed items may be your greatest ongoing cost. Remember Paul’s warning: “Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.” (Ephesians 5:15-17) It is my hope and prayer that these articles on the power and danger of technology will encourage you in your daily walk with Christ. Whether it is the printing press, radio, television, personal computers, the Internet, the Cloud, smartphones, or 3D printers, new technologies continue to advance our ability to know God and to serve Him, wherever we go.

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Russ McGuire is an executive for a Fortune 100 company and the founder/co-founder of three technology start-ups. His latest entrepreneurial venture is CXfriends (https://cxfriends.com), a social network for Christian families which is being built and run by four homeschooled students under Russ’ direction.

Christian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

digital evangelism

Digital Evangelism with e-Sword (Part 4) Michael L White - mlwhite@parsonplace.com

n the August issue of CCMAG, I discussed the value of using e-Sword’s Dictionaries and Commentaries components for expanding your weekly Sunday School or Bible Study lessons. If you missed it, you can read the archived issue at community.ccmag.com in the “Digital Evangelism Community” at your leisure, although you’ll need to be a subscriber to the community, of course. Don’t worry; it’s free! In this final installment, I’ll discuss the value of using e-Sword’s Reference Library component for sermons, Sunday School lessons, Bible Studies, and practically any other kind of Bible instruction preparation, not to mention just plain old personal spiritual development. You can download any of these from the Download menu in e-Sword. I recommend you get them all so that you’ll have them for handy reference when you need them. If you’re astute enough, you can even write your own Reference Books and share them with others! Hang on, though; I’m saving that one for last! Christian Computing® Magazine

The first thing you’ll need to do (assuming you have already installed e-Sword) is download and install each of the reference books you desire by choosing “Reference Books…” from the Download menu and then (once the “e-Sword Module Downloader” dialog appears) clicking on the title(s) you wish to download. When you click on the title, the module downloader automatically places it in the cue for downloading and displays it in the bottom status pane. After you have selected all of the reference book titles you wish to download, choose “Start” from the Download menu on October 2013

the module downloader dialog and wait for the downloading to complete. Once each download completes, the title will disappear from the status pane’s list and change the status in the upper pane from “Download” to “Installed.” After you have downloaded all the titles you wish, close the module downloader dialog and return to e-Sword’s main window. As the module downloader closes, you will be prompted to restart e-Sword so that the newly-installed titles will appear in the Reference Library. After you have restarted e-Sword, choose “Reference Library…” from the Tools menu and the “e-Sword Reference Library” window will open apart from e-Sword’s main window. Use the drop-down menu bar near the top of the screen to see the complete list of installed reference book titles in e-Sword. Select the one you wish to read and it will display the contents list in the pane at the left of the screen. Once you have selected a chapter or section title from the left pane, click your mouse pointer anywhere in the right pane and you can then use the Page Up, Page Down, and directional arrow keys to navigate through the textual content. When you have finished reading a chapter or section, click on the next chapter or section in the Contents pane to read it. Among some of the classical reference books in e-Sword are the works of Josephus, Fox’s Book of Martyrs, and The Ante-Nicene Fathers, though I must hasten to add that I have not personally read all of these works in their entirety. Rather, I have skimmed only small parts for reference and research purposes, and I must truly emphasize the phrase, “only small parts,” lest you think me more studious than I am! Of course, there are several other academic works which likely will prove helpful to you in your Biblical and historical research as well, such as History of the Christian Church by Philip Schaff, The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah by Alfred Edersheim, and The Temple – Its Ministry and Service, also by Alfred Edersheim. Additionally, you can obtain other more contemporary works made freely available to e-Sword users, such as The Christian Faith by Dallas M. Roark and Tortured for Christ by Pastor Richard Wurmbrand, founder of The Voice of the Martyrs organization. Again, by way of full disclosure, I must add the disclaimer that, of all these works, I have read only Tortured for Christ thus far. In fact, you Christian Computing® Magazine

can contact The Voice of the Martyrs organization directly to request a free print edition of Tortured for Christ, which I did a few years ago when I first read it. This book is a very powerful story of persecution of Christians, including Pastor Richard Wurmbrand, and it is one I highly recommend. I also recommend you subscribe to their email list to receive periodic updates to the VOM ministry and opportunities to pray for our brothers and sisters around the world who suffer daily for their faith in Christ. Just go to http://www.persecution.com to sign up and/or make a donation. Besides downloading and installing all of these terrific resources, you can even create your own reference books for e-Sword from your personal studies, such as your lifetime collection of sermons or Bible Studies or Sunday School Lessons. I told you I would save that discussion for last, so here goes. In order to convert ordinary textual content contained in Microsoft Word documents, HTML Web pages, rich text and plain text files into eSword reference books, all you have to do is switch to the Editors workspace in e-Sword by using the Ctrl+F5 keyboard combo and then hold down the Control key and click your right mouse button to display a pop-up menu. From this menu, you can choose one of the following options: 1. Create a New Journal, Study, or Topic Notes file 2. Open an existing Journal, Study or Topic Notes file 3. Import content from one of the aforementioned file formats above (e.g., Word, Rich Text, etc.) 4. Export current content in a Journal, Study, or Topic Notes file into one of the abovementioned file formats, as well as PDF, or 5. Convert current content in a Journal, Study, or Topic Notes file into either a reference book file for e-Sword or a reference book file for iOS. Once you decide which of the above methods you wish to use in generating your reference book file, e-Sword does the rest. For instance, once you’ve imported your content from a Word document or other file format into a Journal, Study, or Topic Notes file, you can Ctrl+Right-click your mouse again within the editors workspace and October 2013

choose “Convert to Reference Book…” from the pop-up menu. After naming the file on the “Save” dialog, click the “Save” button and wait for eSword to complete the conversion process. Before you click the “Save” button, however, it is crucial for you to insure that the reference book file will be saved to your e-Sword installation directory, which is found at C:\Program Files (x86)\e-Sword\ on your computer’s primary hard drive, unless you changed it during the installation process. If you changed the installation folder, you will need to select the folder where you installed e-Sword before your newly-created reference book file will be viewable by e-Sword. After you save the reference book file to your e-Sword directory, you will be prompted to restart e-Sword in order to view your newly created reference book file. Next, just follow the steps outlined earlier by choosing “Reference Library…” from the Tools menu in order to choose your new reference book from the drop-down menu. That’s all there is to it! Now, not only can you read classic and contemporary works from within e-Sword’s Reference Library, but you can create your own reference books to install there, too. You can collect all of your sermon manuscripts or outlines (as I have begun to do on my Web site at www.parsonplace.com/mysermons.html)or you can collect all of your lesson files from Sunday School and/or Bible Study classes you’ve taught over the years or you can even write your own books and share them with friends and colleagues in ministry. The possibilities are numerous. Of course, there are lots of other features in e-Sword that I won’t take time to delineate now, but I am sure you will be able to figure them out with regular use. If you run into any difficulty with finding or using any aspect of e-Sword, just use the Help menu to choose from several methods of instruction for making the most of e-Sword and its many features. There you’ll find the “Contents” to the Help File listed first (which you can also access quickly by pressing the F1 function key). Additionally, there is an option for using “Training Demos,” a link to online “Technical Support,” and a link to the e-Sword “User Group…” at www. biblesupport.com, among others. You will really want to investigate the “User Group…” option, since there are loads of other downloads plus a community forum for asking questions, discussing e-Sword’s capabilities, and offering help to others. Christian Computing® Magazine

I have thoroughly enjoyed writing these review articles about e-Sword for these past few months, and I hope you have benefited from reading them, too. If you didn’t know about e-Sword before, I hope you have taken advantage of its free availability and begun to use it extensively now in your own study of God’s Word. I especially want to thank Rick Meyers, both for making this amazing software freely available to the world and for helping me by fact-checking behind me in the last three articles in this series. His input definitely made these articles more accurate and informative. Now, let’s start doing digital evangelism with eSword, “the Sword of the Lord with an electronic edge”! Michael L. White is the founder and Managing Editor of Parson Place Press, an independent Christian publishing house in Mobile, Alabama. His book Digital Evangelism: You Can Do It, Too! (Parson Place Press, 2011) is available wherever books are sold. Visit his Website at books.parsonplace.com for a list of his other books and articles.

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How Technology Helps or Hurts the Process of Recruiting Volunteers in Your Church Yvon Prehn - yvon@effectivechurchcom.com

ot only does your church need to recruit volunteers to get all the work done that needs to be done in the church, but it’s the Biblical model where the leaders “equip the saints to do the work of the ministry” (Eph. 4:1113). Leaders are to equip and encourage. Congregations are to practice their spiritual gifts; they become the volunteers who get ministry work done. The work is shared, no one burns out and everyone grows in spiritual maturity as they practice servanthood and their spiritual gifts. In this process, technology can help, but it can also hurt. Read more to find out how.

How technology helps

After the list of the information you need, will be a caution on how technology can hurt your volunteer program if you aren’t careful.

Later in this article is a list of the information you need to gather from the various ministries in your church. Technology is helpful here in that one of the best ways to get Information needed for every volunteer job in the this kind of information is to email people and have them fill it out online. In the past the work to interview volunteer church • Job title, e.g. Sunday School Teacher, Youth leaders, record and transcribe what they said kept many Volunteer, etc. - Don’t use church jargon titles churches from complete volunteer programs. that potential volunteers might not understand. Then once you get all the information needed (detailed For example, write something like “Grade School below) and get it organized, you can put this information on Age Sunday School Teacher”, not “Promiseland a Volunteer Central location on your website. You can then servant/helper.” use your social media to point to the material and various • Description of EXACTLY what the job involves. groups can use it to create their own recruitment materials. Christian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

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Christian Computing® Magazine

Again, in teaching Sunday school in some churches all the curriculum and craft information is provided, in others volunteers are expected to create their own. What are your expectations? Clearly explaining what a job involves is vitally important, especially in churches that are growing and have many members who become believers as adults. People who did not grow up in church have no idea what churches do in tasks that seem obvious to those who did grow up in the church. Remember that what is obvious to you is not obvious to many of your new members and potential volunteers. What are the requirements to be a volunteer? Many churches are very strict on who can work with children and who cannot, as they should be. In some communities, children’s workers must be fingerprinted and backgrounds check done. Let people know up front if those things are required. In some churches you must be a member to volunteer in certain jobs. Let people know. There is nothing worse than an excited new believer wanting to do a certain job and to then be told, “Oh, I’m sorry, that position is only for church members… or only men can fill this position….or whatever.” Any standards that are important to your particular church are OK, but let people know what they are before you ask them to volunteer. How long is the commitment for? One month? Every other month? A summer? Or is it a life sentence? Many churches are finding that more people volunteer if they know they are volunteering for a brief, clearly stated time. If the volunteer job is a good fit, they can sign up again. Who will train them and what does the training consist of? Is it a position they can simply show up for and do, or do they need to work with someone for an extended time to learn a job? Do they need to take a class, watch a video, read a book? Who is in charge of their volunteer area? Each position needs to have a contact person who is available to answer questions, both overall and when they are serving. Who, if anyone do they report to? If they can’t come, who do they contact? Do they need to find a replacement? If they have a problem with a fellow volunteer, who do they talk to? It is difficult to emphasize the importance of each of these areas of information. There will always be questions, but with this key information October 2013

recorded in a central place on your website, you have something to refer to. How technology can hurt your volunteer program at church A question that is often forgotten when recruiting volunteers is: What, if any, are the technology requirements of the job? Will they need to know how to use video equipment? Or any other multimedia tool? Does the person doing the job have to know how to use computers? What programs? Can someone teach them if they don’t know? An even more important area is a more recent one: If you are using a computer/web-based system to organize and schedule your volunteers, do they have to use it to volunteer? Do they need a smart phone to access notifications and schedules? What if someone isn’t comfortable doing that? This is not a small issue and though these programs can be a wonderful tool for the church office, they may keep many people from volunteering. Again, this is an area where the staff cannot take anything for granted. What is a great time-saver for you on organizing, getting out notifications, and keeping a calendar filled might be what keeps a retired person with lots of time and skills from volunteering. Be sure that you take time to personally ask people about this—so that your technology will be the servant that makes your volunteer programs at church more inclusive and not a barrier to willing and able volunteers. For more information on church communications, go to http://www. effectivechurchcom.com

Christian Computing® Magazine

October 2013

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The Latest in Evangelistic Trends: International Arms Trafficking! Nick Nicholaou - nick@mbsinc.com

ome time ago an article caught my eye about folks going to jail because they took computers outside of the U.S. The problem was that, because of computer processor capabilities and the built-in cryptographic capabilities of common off-the-shelf software, doing so violated Export Administration Regulations. The article went on to describe the maximum fines and penalties associated with the export of these items: $1,000,000 plus 10 years in jail for each criminal violation, or $500,000 plus a 3-year export ban for each civil violation. A few days later a colleague who works for an international ministry told me he had just sent software updates to their overseas field offices. Click— the light went on. I told him about the article I had just read which applied to the software technology he just sent overseas. We were both shocked as we discussed the impact these regulations could have on similar international ministries and computer donations. Historical Context The original regulations, called International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), about such exports were issued decades ago to keep advanced intelligence technology built in the U.S. from those who could use it to harm us and/or our interests. Since that Christian Computing® Magazine

time, the oversight of computer technology exports has been transferred to the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security. Yet these laws are broken every day by those who are unaware of their application to today’s computers and software. While some argue that they’re outdated, there are many who have been fined and many who are sitting in jail today for their willful― even though unintentional― violation. Export Limits The Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) has that most countries cannot receive certain computers based on their technology. The list includes Afghanistan, Canada, France, Russia, and many others that October 2013

one wouldn’t expect to see on the list. (Visit http://beta-www.bis.doc.gov/index.php/ policy-guidance/lists-of-parties-of-concern/entity-list to see the list.) It’s All About Encryption & Communication The concern centers around hardware processing and software encryption/decryption capabilities and communication capabilities. This sounds like it could keep many from helping missionaries and ministries from doing their work around the world. Don’t give up! There’s an easy way to know if what you want to do is legal. Keep reading. Contact Your Missionaries Many churches and ministries have given computers to overseas missionaries and pastors unaware that doing so may have violated U.S. Export Administration Regulations! Ask those missionaries and pastors whom you have blessed with computers and software to send you a list of exactly what hardware and software they have. Do the same for any overseas offices your ministry has. Have them include the version/model numbers and serial numbers.

There May Be An Easy Fix! According to officials at the Bureau of Industry and Security, answers may be just a phone call away. All you need to do is call 202-482-4811 between 9am and 5pm EST to determine if the software and/ or hardware is a concern. They may be able to give you the good news that what you’re wanting to do requires no license! Sounds easy, doesn’t it? It is. In The Future... Call the Bureau of Industry and Security to obtain the necessary license to export before sending that encryption-capable software and/or hardware overseas. According to BIS officials, they would rather see compliance sought, than to have to investigate and enforce it after the fact. This law may seem bothersome. Perhaps it is, but it is the law, and in light of 9/11, it may make a major difference in our safety. As Christians we should model righteousness to this dark world around us. Whether there are potential fines or not, if the law doesn’t violate a scriptural principal, we should obey it.

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October 2013