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into the mystic...	...i've been to the future. but i'm here. now.

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Posted by: alexmcmanus Original: 6/2/2005 1:21 AM Views: 7 Comments: 17 eProps: 28 Read Comments Post a Comment Back to Your Xanga Site

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Thursday, June 02, 2005

Welcome back.

One Blogging idea for Pastors/ Church planters:

Because I've gotten several emails asking about this and a request or two in the comment section, I'm going to detour from commenting on BLOG to give an idea or two about how a Pastor might use a blog. This may not be right for everyone or anyone. Remember, we're experimenting here. But it may be right for someone. Here it is...

Invite a new believer or a new member to your home or out to dinner and Interview them for your blog. Post the interview with photos. Make it short, very, very informal, and fun. Photos of laughter work. Through word of mouth ask "friendlies" within your congregation "have you seen the interview?" Ask a leader or two to post prayers or words of encouragement in the comment section of your blog directed at the new believer or member. Remember, ask permission to post an interview and be sure to invite them to check it out.

Do this once a week for the summer and let us know in the fall how it went for you. This could work on so many levels. Any takers?

So here's a possible summer blogging schedule for pastors/ church planters that are new to this. Friday: Post a one sentence summary of your upcoming Sunday message. [Church planters don't have to worry about this, of course.] Tuesday or Wednesday: Post an interview with someone new to your church. There you go.

For other great ideas check out the comment section from yesterday.

What do you think?

Photographs

Young friends, Cliff and Jason
Ev and Liz at our house

Into the Mystic...

Alex McManus © 2005

Posted 6/2/2005 1:21 AM - 7 Views - 28 eProps - 17 comments

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17 Comments

Thanks Alex. Some great ideas, very creative.

Posted 6/2/2005 8:40 AM by hermannd - reply

Great challenge Alex - I will be interested to see how our distinguished group of pastors and planters respond - and to see their interviews. For those of us who are not planting or pastoring - my offshoot idea would be to interview people who do not believe in Christ - like our neighbors, and just see where it goes. I have some really interesting neighbors - I think that is what I am going to do. Blog on... JVD

Posted 6/2/2005 9:12 AM by jvdworak

- reply

I like this idea, Alex. I may try to work it into my regular blogging habit. So, any suggestions about what you'd like to hear in an interview?

Keith

Posted 6/2/2005 9:53 AM by keithmac - reply

I know someone who used the video as an evangelism vehicle - and God honored it.

Oooh, an epiphany.

I remember asking my pastor about the church website (which is pretty archaic) and how invested the "creator" was in ownership of it. Response: "heavily invested." Dead end.

This Saturday I have a perfect opportunity to practice what you have proposed, then post it on my blog and let the church know AND have it printed in the bulletin, AND announced from the front. Rather than competing, they will see it as novel and exciting (pictures and quotes!)!

Nice bait, Alex.

Posted 6/2/2005 11:14 AM by SallySchilling - reply

Keith and all,

A great book with a variety of questions from light & easy to extreme spiritual matters is The Complete Book of Questions:1001 Conversation Starters for Any Occasion.

We use this book to open all of our small group/home church studies each week. It is amazing the things you can pull out of people when you start out the night with questions like "Do you squeeze the toothpaste tube or roll it? What is the advantage of your method?"

There are 10 categories of questions starting with light and easy to the hard hitting questions about beliefs and finally your views on God in your life. I've not come across someone yet who wouldn't give in to my request to answer some of these questions. All my friends know this is my preferred game at "game night" too!

If you want to get a taste of the questions you can check out my blog. This week I started posting some of the questions for fellow bloggers to answer to better get to know eachother. Come by and see what you think.

Posted 6/2/2005 11:28 AM by obahsomah - reply

Wow, I haven't had time to read Alex's blog for a few days and I jump on this morning only to find the journey progressing very quickly. this is truly something amazing.

As someone apart of a Church plant team, I have tried to figure out how blogging helps, or how it will do anything worthwhile other than give me a place to write. But it has been cool to read people's ideas in thier posts and in thier own blogs.

At this point I am still unsure of how blogging will impact the current church situation that I am in. I have begun to use it as more or less a public(even though no one reads it) journal of my journey. I don't make it there to write every day but I am getting better. What I really hope is that at some point in the churches journey we can use either what I have written or what I continue to write.

An interesting conversation happend yesterday between me and a friend. We talked about our church website and how we could make it better. We through out options like having and public website and then a website for the people in our community, a sort of "unlisted" website. And I felt the Holy Spirit speak within me saying, "be careful not to give yourself an excuse". I my experience growing up in a christian home I was in an insulated environment where there were good excuses why we didn't move on mission with Christ, either it was dangerous, or not sheltered enough or whatever. This created in me the easy access to excuses. As an adult, I find myself wrapped up in the details of planting a church and losing sight of the heartbeat of God, the lost. So in an effort to point the finger at myself, don't let blogging be another excuse. Move with the voice of God, with no time elapsing between the speaking and the movement.

This may just be me ranting... and if so please just pass this post by. Blogging is a growing movement that has untapped resources for the Kingdom. Let us keep learning to use it.

Thanks for all the ideas!!!

T.J.

Posted 6/2/2005 12:53 PM by tjsherrill - reply

I've lurked long enough!
Thank you Alex for introducing me to this world of blogging. Unfortunately for me, I had always associated this practice with junior high girls who talk about the boys they like and what they did over the weekend...no offense of course. You, however, have opened me up to an idea that I feel I can harness to help me impact the community I lead. I began blogging a few weeks ago (right after I found your blog)...but with little discipline. The more I realize the power my words can have in reaching people and helping strengthen community, the more stoked I get about the whole idea.
These ideas of what leaders can do through their blogs to reach their community are awesome. I look forward to this journey, and hey, if I get the fall barbarian internship, I might be blogging from your living room table one day :)

Posted 6/2/2005 2:26 PM by ryankendrick - reply

http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=Spartan305

creativity is the outflow of Spirituality,I like it, I'm going to take you up on it.

Posted 6/2/2005 5:24 PM by Spartan305 - reply

http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=Spartan305

alex as a newbie to the blogoshpere, i have been experimenting with it as a tool.I have been e mailing it to church contact list. the result has been positive, have had several ask to have it e mailed to their friends, also several have become inspired to blog.naturally i am promoting imosaic as their soon to be portal of choice.

through the portal and into the mystic

kevin s

Posted 6/2/2005 5:33 PM by Spartan305 - reply

This is a GREAT idea. I'm going to try it. My first read through I thought you wrote "a non-beleiver" and while that was a good idea I see the potential in interview a NEW believer.

So I'm committing, I'm going to try it.

Posted 6/3/2005 12:42 AM by ericsweiven - reply

Alex, just got the imosaic e-mail, really looking for to 9-10th discussion

james

Posted 6/3/2005 2:30 AM by JamesPetticrew

- reply

I will try & be a part of the 9th-10th, but the 9th is when we are traveling down to LA :) So, I hope to be able to get on the in AM if I have all my stuff packed ;)

From a non-pastor (yet church staff) point of view, I've always wanted to have a blog to share with other churches ideas that work ( and don't work) in the communication (graphics, video, web & marketing) realm. Shortcuts, problems we face, and testimonies of life change. There are a few marketing & web-focused blogs I participate on, but not nearly enough of them out there. I think we would let it be open for our communications staff to post on there in their areas of experitise (one girl does printed work, children's design, youth design, we have a few guys that do web programming, etc.) so people can get to know a "team" rather than just an "individual," and hopefully that will also help our team grow closer and learn to begin to share and equip others.

Just a few thoughts!

Posted 6/3/2005 8:30 AM by flowerdust - reply

I have been trying to get the pastors I know to blog and I think the two hardest things for them is knowing how to start and what to say. This is a great idea to solve both problems.

Posted 6/3/2005 12:10 PM by kellyirish - reply

General question for everyone about blogging by church leaders... sorry if this has already been discussed... If a pastor wants to start blogging and to invite his congregation into the discussion, how does he cope with fears about whether some people might comment back with ideas contrary to his? I had an experience once of having a pretty strong counter-point to a blog entry my pastor made on his blog. It wasn't a mission-critical opposition but something I felt strong about. I posted my comment but I was worried with what that would look like to other congregation members who read that blog.

How do you have an open and honest blog conversation and avoid opening a can of worms if the comment string turns sour? My church is in major tranistion from a traditional southern baptist church to be at this point fairly "barbaric". However, there are still those people who (given the opportunity in a blog) could try to make their case for a safer, more comfortable church.

Does that make sense? Maybe I'm just to worried about what people think... Maybe the open discussion via blog would bring things to the surface and allow people to come to faster clarity about what our mission really is... Maybe there's a rule like "if you wouldn't say it out loud to a room of people who read the blog, don't say it!" - though some would break that rule...

Related questions: Would you recommend hosting the blog right on your church website... or is it better to disconnect a bit and have a pastor's blog offsite... like on xanga? Is it best to invite the whole congregation into the discussion (maybe via a weekly email to the whole church) or should a smaller subset of the church be the ones you really advertise the blog to?

I'd appreciate anyone's comment and counsel on this...

Thanks.

Posted 6/3/2005 4:35 PM by allentexas - reply

On the case of having an honest blog conversation, I think you answered your own question. :)

Posted 6/3/2005 5:03 PM by flowerdust - reply

allentexas,

Good questions. Let me take a stab at some of them...

I think a blog might be the safest place for someone to express a contrary view. I'd rather have them share it in an open forum where the pastor can think through the response than in the corridors of church or in a group of disenfranchised malcontents plotting to slow things down.

I don't think effective leadership is squashing all opposition. Believe me, I'm all for squashing opposition. ;) But sometimes opposition can be a tool that keeps us focused on the mission. And it's unlikely our wise words and passionate pleas will change everyone. As leaders, we have to learn to navigate our people through those mine fields to the other side.

On this blog, I've watched Alex and others deftly move conversation along when it starts to get stale.

This type of forum (blogs) is a new dynamic but as the author I think you have several tools.
1) Change the subject. Move onto another area.
2) Address the subject. Leave room for the different opinion but state where you are.
3) Bury the subject. If comments won't quit on a given topic, multiple new blog entries will bury it pages deep.

Church webpage or not?
Depends on the focus. Is it extension of church ministry? Just about church ministry? Might make sense on the church page. If it's an attempt to interact with other people, especially unchurched, they may not come looking on the church site.

Tell everybody or not?
If someone is not in the habit of writing daily, my opinion would be to get some momentum. Try it for a few weeks or a month to make sure you're going to stay with it. If it's heavily advertised and then nothing is written except every few weeks, no one will come to look. The key to Internet content is keeping it current and fresh.

IMHO,
breathe fire.

Posted 6/3/2005 5:49 PM by breathe_fire - reply

I was mentally making notes of what I wanted to contribute to the discussion, then breathefire said them all, plus more. Good stuff, I totally agree (that goes for JVD, Obasomah, and flowerdust too).

Actually, I have two cents left to throw into the pot: particularly in light of Keith and Allentexas' posts:
1. I also struggled with writers' block (er, bloggers' block?) at first, staring at my first blank blog page. It really helped to come up with a metaphor around which to organize my blog; it gave me a title, slogan, graphics motif, and a lens or filter— better, a firm place to stand— which ties together all my posts, however loosely, and helps spark my thinking. I chose "Diary of an Urban House", and created a tension between oikoumene (my address/physical neighborhood) and oikos (my family, relationships, community). Works for me. I am confident that I will get years of relevance out of this metaphor before it grows stale in my heart. (other folks might get tired of it before then, but they can just click along to your blogs, at that point) Find your own metaphor. Perhaps it's your church vision or mission, but it might be something else that flows out of your church's values, or something peculiar about your own life or family or personality (that was my case).
2. Spellcheck. Spelling and grammar errors are no big deal now and then, especially in the relaxed atmosphere of blogs, but silly or repeated errors will distract readers from your content. Holly Miller (editor of Saturday Evening Post and amazing freelance writer) calls it "quiet writing", a style that doesn't call attention to itself, lets the reader hear the meaning of the words, not their sound or appearance. Making your blog text readable is also part of this: simple font, decent size, uncomplicated background.
3. Using the "protected post" feature of xanga (other blogware will have similar features) can be useful, especially if you have a large leadership team. This allows you to have two levels of conversation going on simultaneously on one blog site: one for all the world to see, and a second one just with your leadership team. Might eliminate the frequency or necessary length of meetings, and that's always a wonderful thing.
4. About worrisome postings from roadblockers/malcontents in the church (Ditto again to everything breathefire said): If determined opposition is out there, it is ALWAYS better to have them come right out and oppose the pastor's idea or vision or values, rather than stay behind the scenes whispering.
In fact, the WORSE the post, the better for you. Other readers are turned off by its obnoxiousness, and the opposition shoots itself in the foot, publicly.
On the other hand, the BETTER the post that's contrary to/distracting from the leadership's vision, the better it can be for you: it creates real discussion where you can affirm the value of that other position, while making it very clear that though the Kingdom needs others to pursue that path X, Jesus is leading OUR church in Y direction instead... that sets you up to ask, gosh, does the objector feel called to set off in X direction? If so, how could the church be a springboard to send him on his way?

If not, join us in Direction Y, because that's where this ship is headed.

As long as your calling and values are clear, any blog post/comment that disagrees with or criticizes those can (genuinely, smoothly, responsibly) play right into your hands. It may challenge and sharpen you, but it need never threaten you. Honest dialogue favors the godly barbarian.

Posted 6/5/2005 2:10 AM by NicolasNelson

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