The Word of Our Testimony via Visual History

There's a company called Kronomy that will enable you to create a timeline of your life complete with descriptions, pictures and video.  Thus, you can share your story by making your life into a flowing visual slideshow via 3D browsing.  Kronomy also features social networking functionality including commenting, sharing, and friends.  Currently in beta, you will need a Kronomy invite to get the full effect.

Also, Guy Kawasaki (source of my beta invite) proposes other creative options for using Kronomy to document, for example, a product's lifecycle.  From initial sketches to prototypes to beta versions, almost any product could benefit from it's own archival history.  Guy proposes someone create a history of the Mac using Kronomy.  Good idea.  And I think there are lots of other possibilities.

As a fan you could document your history of relationship with a favorite band; as a CEO you could document the evolution of your company; as an adoptive parent you could write your adoption journey in pictures as an archive for your child's future.  As a runner, document your marathons.  As a couple, document your anniversaries.  As a pastor, you could create a rich visual history for your church. 

In fact, for Christians, nothing is more powerful than documenting how God has been present in our lives and how He has used us to touch the lives of others.  We often call this 'our testimony'.   Now, our stories can be told with words supported by visual media.

How would you use Kronomy's chronological memory abilities for the Kingdom?

Check out Guy's Kawasaki's life path in action.

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You heard right.

Ingenious, Christian image-sharing site, CreativeMYK.com, is giving away a new iPhone to a winning artist.

To participate, CreativeMYK.com invites artists to submit their original works in the form of images that will be re-digitized and used and distributed through CreativeMYK.com as free or pay-for-use images.  How easy can it get?

Last year, I blogged Innovate '07 podcasts had been put up.  This year, I've been looking forward to Innovate 2008 podcasts.  Since conference goers have to be choosy, podcasts are a vital resource.  And they may become all the more desirable as conferences collide.

Some Christian leaders have a hard decision to make between these two upcoming events being held at the same time.   On Thursday & Friday, September 18 & 19, Oklahoma City will host Ministry COM, a National Church Communications Conference.

"If you're crazy enough to love working in a church, make plans to give yourself a mental break at MinistryCOM. This two-day experience brings together experts and leaders who are balancing the chaos while on the brink of innovation. Their level-headed guidance provides you with realistic solutions. Hands on workshops offer therapeutic interaction. Time away from the office mentally invigorates… and just might keep you from going over the edge."

Keynote Speakers include:

Mike Foster - Founder, XXX Church

Scott Hodge - Senior Pastor, The Orchard

Dawn Nicole Baldwin - Founder, Aspire!One

Jon Acuff - Blogger, Stuffchristianslike.net

Also on Thursday & Friday, September 18 & 19, 2008 in Granger, Indiana, Granger Community Church will host Innovate 2008:

"Nobody wants to be all talk and no action. Jesus certainly wasn’t. But sometimes it’s hard to know where to begin. We think that whether you have a church gathering of 100 or 10,000 you can begin making innovative, strategic moves that will impact your community. Start at Innovate 2008.  You’ll experience a multi-sensory showcase of proven, real-life examples from Granger Community Church and other churches doing innovative ministry around the country. Gain perspective and practical steps to take your capacity as a leader, a practitioner and a church to an unexpected level. Get started. Save the talking for later."

You'll also hear from a combination of innovators outside of Granger.

Here's the complete speaker list.

To prevent conferences from 2009 collisions in your schedule start keeping a list of Church Communication Conferences like this one. 

Or, if you're just interested in a media/tech conference list try this one.  In fact add to these two and I'll re-publish them with updates.  Obviously, 2009 dates will change, but if a conference is good enough, the targeted date usually falls close to the year before.

The denomination I've been part of for the last 23 years, Foursquare, has launched a website designed to help young leaders find training sites across the United States.  Known as the Emerging Leader Network,* it can be accessed directly or via the Foursquare homepage. It's mission is to engage a larger number of Foursquare young adults in "immersion discipleship" and ministry training within the context of local church schools of ministry.

Although the ELN is not specifically related to the use of technology within the Church, the promotion of it is.  In fact, online searches will likely eventually account for a great percentage of ELN inquiries.  Besides the website, you can also find the ELN on facebook.  As an admin for that page, I'll likely refer to it regularly here and provide regular ELN updates.

According to Tim Mossholder, ELN Director, because of the variety of locations, leaders, and specific areas of ministry focus, each ELN school of ministry is unique.  Every program, however, incorporates three life-transforming elements of immersive training: 

Hands on Ministry
This is an in-the-trenches approach to developing ministry skills.  ELN students engage in a variety of ministry assignments, learning what it means to authentically give of themselves for others.  

Focused Academics  
With a straightforward and intentional curriculum, students grow as they are encouraged and equipped to understand God's Word at a new and deeper level.

Mentoring Relationships
In an ELN program, trusted pastors and leaders walk alongside students, holding them accountable and encouraging them, as they are moving to new levels of faith and excellence.  It is through this critical piece of the immersive ELN structure that students form the rock-solid foundation needed to live out God's call in their lives.

The Emerging Leader Network is part of the Foursquare NextGen Ministries, working in conjunction with the Ministry Training Institutes Office. The ELN exists to serve Foursquare leaders as they work to begin and operate these unique ministries.

* The Emerging Leader Network should not be confused with numerous other ELN groups including the Emerging Leaders Network - social network on ning, the Emerging Leaders' Network - Minnesota Department of Health and The Emerging Leaders Network (Americas for the Arts).

I rarely post on Sundays but…. this weekend marks the launch of LifeChurch.tv's One Prayer month and it's significant enough that it's worth breaking a few routines.

If you're reading from outside the U.S. you might not be well-versed in all things LifeChurch.tv.  Let's just say their online reach is substantial.  When they recently featured my blog…. well, it's a good thing I'm hosted on Media Temple or I could have crashed.

Pastored by Criag Groeschel and a team of tech-savvy leadership, this church is so innovative it has basically invented "the bar" when it comes to web-driven ministry endeavors.  They have a global campus (read internet) so you can visit their church from anywhere in the world.

There's so much available information online about the One Prayer project, I won't fill a post with details.  I do recommend that you check out the links included here.

Suffice it to say, One Prayer is considered by many United States pastors, clergy, denominations, and Christian layleaders to be the most innovative and unique project of it's kind anywhere.  Using technological tools to knit diverse churches into an orchestrated, global month of prayer requires a mammoth vision and the digerati resources to pull it off.  Good thing LifeChurch.tv has both!

LifeChurch.tv we celebrate the launch of One Prayer with you.

Now that it's June, the Church 2.0 Local Forum in Orange County is rapidly approaching.

New Song in Irvine (Dave Gibbons, lead pastor) has offered to be the host church for the next Church 2.0 Forum and if you're anywhere in So Cal, you're invited.  I cannot think of a more appropriate location for a collaborative conversation about innovation in the Church.  And it's a great opportunity to visit this multi-site church - unless you'd rather visit them in Bangkok.

It's likely you've noticed Church 2.0 Local Forums popping up across the country.  Host cities have already included Los Angeles and Chicago.  Irvine, CA is next, followed by Santa Cruz, CA and then Taylor, South Carolina. 

The forums are designed to pull pastors, church staff, ministry tech & IT folks, youth leaders, social ministry innovators, authors, Christian business people, etc, together to share ideas, inspirations and stories of successful ministry endeavors.

Forums are open to everyone and always provide conversations from cross-denominational perspectives.  Come and bring your story of innovative ministry and maybe you'll end up in the soon to be published book Church 2.0 by Greg Atkinson (Bent Tree Bible Fellowship / Church Video Ideas).

Here's a facebook sign up page for the Church 2.0 Orange County Forum Thursday, June 26th, 12:30 - 3:30pm.

 

Finally have time to blog my great experience from the Dynamic Church Conference in Dallas recently.  I loved meeting all the Fellowship Technologies staff and was impressed by their mission and strategy to serve churches.  A couple of highlights include hearing the breakout sessions by Terry Storch, Digerati Pastor at LifeChurch.tv and Joe Suh, founder of MyChurch.org. 

Terry spoke on the future of LifeChurch's bleeding edge ministry to the next generation amongst other things which I could hardly wrap my head around. He breezed through pioneer works like internet campuses, metaverse church, YouVersion and OnePrayer and then got into his real passion "what if…"  Absolute inspiration to those of us who envision tomorrow's Church.

And Joe Suh gave an excellent overview of all things social media related.  It was particularly helpful to see the evolution of social media sites and view how rapidly they are establishing new expressions of community.

What a privilege it was for me to speak alongside these experts.  You can get some of our material as PDF downloads at the Dynamic Church Conference site.

And lastly, we got to hear a closing session by Randy Draper whose resources can be found at HeartSpring Media.  Randy is a member of Ed Young's Fellowship Church and is both an excellent story-teller and a passionate communicator.  

Following my time with Fellowship, I got to visit my friends at Bent Tree Bible Fellowship.  But that's another post.

The Whiteboard Sessions - quite affordable. 

But FREE is good too:  Conference Channel @ WiBo. 

Great news if you're looking for the place where media & the Church converge.  COLLIDE Magazine has a brand spankin' new, redesigned website.  It's less than 48 hours old.  

And how can I resist mentioning COLLIDE when several Digital contributors are featured in the magazine's new May/June issue.  Odd happenstance?  I don't think so; it's more like Spirit-led inspiration if you ask me.  

Our Digital contributors in COLLIDE include:

Aaron Linne (Mr. Vimeo himself) His article, Stop Throwing Sheep, explores how we can use Facebook applications to spread the messege.

Cynthia Ware My article, Technology and the Virtual Church, was written to inspire early adopters of new media technologies to forge ahead.

Joe Suh (MyChurch.org founder) Joe's interview explains how social networking can serve local churches and facilitate their members connecting online.

Additionally, there are a lot of other good resources, articles and reviews in the magazine and while you're visiting the new website, it's easy to get a risk-free issue or subscription. 

Congratulations again, Tim Stevens, on Pop Goes the Church making the cover with some amazing graphics by Barton Damer.  And speaking of Barton and his way good digital media skills… you didn't think I was going to forget to show off some of his video maneuvers did you? 

Not when they feature this August's Echo Conference…..

ECHO Full Promo Video from barton Damer on Vimeo.

I finally finished the outline for my breakout session at the Dynamic Church Conference in Dallas which is now just a little over 3 weeks away.  In another week, I'll give it some final updating.  My session is Ten New Media Values Impacting Ministry. 

Because digital media operate differently than traditional media, they change what we value.  For example, the first characteristic I've listed in my outline is Interactivity.  We now value that which we can actively participate in, that which we can interact with.

I wonder if you can identify some of the other values that digital media embody?   What would be on your list?