“Why haven’t they replied to the email? I sent it over a week ago.”
—A pastor who shall remain anonymous
That is a true complaint I have heard from another pastor. And I have heard similar remarks from other people. In fact, I am fairly certain I have made a parallel lament at some point myself. I am also willing to bet that the readers of this blog have made it too.
My sixth-grade homeroom teacher stood over my desk.
“Daniel, you didn’t get your agenda signed again.” Sigh. “Minus five points. You know this is worth five percent of your grade, right?” The question of incredulity quickly following the sigh of disappointment.
Of course, what she did not seem to understand was my view. It was worth only five percent of a grade that did not matter. Harvard was not going to be checking my sixth-grade report card to see how I did. So what was the point of filling out the agenda every single day and getting it signed by my parents over the weekend? It was not like there was never enough time to finish assignments in class.
This is not a usual Concordia Technology Solutions blog post. In fact, there will be very little discussion about technology at all. No trends, no flashing doodads, no talk about social media or websites. Nope, this is more of a devotion for church workers and those heavily involved in a congregation’s ministry during Holy Week.
Grace, peace, and mercy to you from God the Father, and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, through the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Peter Frank and I get along pretty well. In fact, if we ever had the chance to meet in person, I am sure we would both be more than happy to get coffee together and talk technology, media, and theology all day long. Peter is pretty insightful on all that and is a great guy to boot. In fact, you should check out his blog post about seven tech trends for churches to watch for in 2018. Well, except for one part of it. You can ignore the first trend, because Peter is wrong about it.
Peace in Christ Jesus! Once again, the calendar flips and it is the season of Lent. This year I am trying to figure out if Ash Wednesday is going to be very romantic, or if Valentine’s Day will be very somber? I will let you all decide in the comments.
Last year I wrote about six ideas for sharing about Lent on social media. This year I am back with some more. So, without further ado, I present to you: Social Media Ideas for Lent, Part 2!
For pastors, Advent and Lent can feel more like survival times than planning times. Midweek services, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Holy Week, Easter. . . . It can be overwhelming. Since we’re in the middle of Advent right now, you might be feeling especially crunched for time. While you’re thinking about Advent and time management, I wanted to suggest some ideas you can implement when you plan for future seasons of Advent and Lent.
I had only been a pastor for a short while at my first congregation. I remember trying to look up families and guessing the ages of their children. I cannot remember if it was for confirmation or something else. The church wanted to send a letter because of an upcoming class. The secretary was walking by and asked me what I was doing. I explained and said that it was hard work. I had been doing it for a couple of days at that point. She started laughing and telling me that all I had to do was ask her. All that information was kept in Shepherd’s Staff, which was our church management software (CMS).
This post is an excerpt from Rev. Daniel Ross's ebook The Beginner's Guide to Communicating Your Brand for Churches.
Let’s do a quick thought experiment. What comes to mind when you think of: Apple; Microsoft; McDonalds; Nike; Coca Cola; Starbucks. Those companies have poured a lot of time and money into building their brands.
Pew Research recently came out with an interesting study. The study in and of itself is not interesting, however, the results are. In the rush to digitize everything and the push towards moving to video one little thing has been overlooked: Millennials prefer to get their news by reading. Overall, Americans want to get their news by watching video compared to reading or even listening to the news (46% : 35% : 17%). However, things look much different when you break down the age groups.
