There’s a Social Media Summit this weekend that will inject a shot of redemptive light into the Des Moines Social Club.  If you’re in the vicinity – sign up now!

Incubated by dear friend and colleague, Justin Wise, the Summit will be a hive of creative collaboration and a deep drill for Christian leaders who want a clearer understanding of participatory media evolution, new media values, opportunities, challenges and practical helps.

Justin, one of my team members at the Center for Church Communication, has done a masterful job of putting the Summit together and if you’re anywhere near the Des Moines, Iowa area this weekend and want a social media education, come dream with us.  The children of Issachar understood the times and knew what Israel should do.  Let’s do the same.

Recently, I got to skype in with the M2Live guys for a session on social media values and how they impact the church. You can access the archive here: Cynthia Ware on M2Live.  It was great fun and I was sorry it took me the whole summer to finally have time to say yes.

The guys who run M2Live are awesome and their mission is simple – to help the Church benefit from online media in ministry.

After broadcasting out of Atlanta for some time, the M2Live crew are gearing up for a national tour – bringing live training to a city near you.

First stop Chicago – October 8 – 9, 2010 at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary.

And best news yet, if you’re near C-town, I’ve got a registration code that provides a 10% discount to you!

There are only a few more seats left and since we’re in the final 2 1/2 weeks before the tour’s launch; I recommend you hurry.  Here’s your discount code: WARE

And if you attend the Chicago event, please use the M2Live hashtag so I can follow your insights.

Creating products that actually serve the church is not easy, especially when it comes to technology.  The interwebs are littered with Christian ghettos, static dead-end websites and social networking tools that promised they were designed to serve the church but somehow really didn’t.

Why a product or application fails is hard to say.   Some apps end up as walled gardens, others accidentally fell into broadcast mode, offering no community appeal, and so died off, and still others never got over their clunky user interface issues or high bar fees.

Nevertheless, there are those courageous individuals who press forward always straining to develop services that really do foster richer communication opportunities for churches.

Recently, I was asked to check out a start up called SoChurch and I found myself curious….

Here’s what I learned:

SoChurch is being built with the church in mind.

SoChurch is a work in progress, with developers getting plenty of input early on to make sure the product release is stellar.

SoChurch wants to change the way ministries and churches leverage web technology for church communication.

SoChurch is a communication platform for community development both within and beyond the church walls.

SoChurch is going to be scalable, dynamic, and culturally flexible – and I can’t wait to see what that means!

John Saddington, a SoChurch advisor & evangelist said this recently, “Organizations who are weak in terms of communication end up with frustrated programs, initiatives, and burnt out personnel.”  So true!!   So bring it SoChurch, help us communicate.

You can expect to hear a lot more in the near future and follow SoChurch on Twitter to get daily status updates.

Disclaimer: I am on the advisory board for SoChurch.

NAB Expo is right around the corner – from April 12 – 15 2010 in Las Vegas.

The Technologies For Worship Pavilion at NAB will offer comprehensive training for church worship staff and technical volunteers. The pavilion is set up like a virtual worship environment, incorporating video projection, web streaming, moving lights, digital audio console technology, personal monitoring and live worship music.

If you want to plan your Technologies for Worship Pavilion tour you can use this schedule for planning.  You can register for a free floor pass here compliments of TFWM; use code TF01 when prompted.  

And pastors, you should be there – if only just to hear FCC Chairman, Julius Genachowski.  Bet you didn’t know that wireless mic of yours needs a license, huh?

Plus, I got this from Jason Rouse:

The Technologies for Worship Pavilion offers comprehensive training for house of worship staff and technical volunteers and is the focal point for all things related to worship technology at the NAB Show. In addition, you may be interested in Destination Broadband – the newest broadband-centric exhibit at the 2010 NAB Show. It will be featuring technologies like online video platforms, streaming video, mobile video distribution, and much more.

Technologies for Worship Schedule
Destination Broadband

The reason I’m reaching out to you is because I have a special registration code for you to pass along to your readers, giving them access to the show – a $150 value – for FREE. This special pass includes the exhibit floor, the Opening Keynote and State of the Industry Address, Info Sessions, Content Theater, Destination Broadband Theater and Exhibits. All you and your readers need to do is visit http://ow.ly/13TL9 to redeem or register at http://nabshow.com/register with the code A913.

Ed Young gets his rap on…..

By referencing a handful of  well known US pastors in this You Tube video rap experiment, Fellowship Church’s Senior Pastor, Ed Young takes ‘using video clips for ministry purposes’ in an unexpected direction.

Ed names Joel Osteen, Rick Warren, Bill Hybels, Craig Groeschel, John Piper, Andy Stanley, Louie Giglio, TD Jakes, Rob Bell, Dino Rizzo and others, uses simple editing technology & builds a rhyme to distribute his message – U. B. U.

Thoughts?

Exciting news to report from the YouVersion Team.  (thanks @tonysteward)

They’ve just launched 20+ Bible reading plans across their website and their mobile applications.

Although there have been lists and plans out there for while, this is the first time they’ve integrated them into a free Bible platform that offers so many different translations/languages and is on over 3 million mobile devices.

With New Year’s just a day or so away many people are looking to make new commitments and resolutions.  Reading the Bible daily is the single best habit a person can establish.  I’ve been reading the Bible on my phone for 3 years now and love it.

YouVersion Reading Plan Details:

• 20+ plans are available online and on your mobile device, so you can keep up with your reading no matter where you are.
• You can customize each plan to match your schedule by making it shorter or longer.
• Easily track where you are by checking off each day’s reading. We’ll also show you how far along you are with a percentage of completion.
• Your online and mobile accounts will synchronize your information, including your plan and your progress.
• Soon, you’ll be able to build a support system by opting in for accountability emails to you and/or a friend.

Links:
Reading Plan Page: http://www.youversion.com/about/reading-plans
Mobile: http://www.youversion.com/download

If you already read the Bible on your phone or use the You Version app, can you encourage others here?

Marketing gurus Phil Cooke and Brad Abare appeared in a livestream chat this morning on Conversant Life.  These guys are two of the most sought-after consultants in the field of church and religious media communications.

Hearing them talk about Christians / media / church / communication / change / effectiveness is amazing because of the way they compliment each other.  They really spark one another’s ideas and their seasonings & expertise just flows.

I should say that we all serve the Center for Church Communication, the nonprofit parent of Church Marketing Sucks.  But, that’s not why I’m recommending this stream.  It’s simply because the material they have in the archives of their heads is pretty spectacular.  Encouraging us to be who we are uniquely in the body of Christ, accept changing culture rather than resist it, be transparent & tell “your” story, all very interesting stuff.

A couple of key take aways include:

• Culture is more important than vision.  If you develop a unique, inviting, rich, spiritually inviting culture your vision will fly.  If not, no matter how compelling the vision, it will fail.
• Dialog over monologue.  People want to be talked “with” not talked “to” or “at”.  Conversation is valuable.
• Next generation leaders would like the former generation leadership to “carry with” rather than “pass on to” them the truths & principles they’ve learned about the Kingdom of God.

The stream will be archived and if you missed it (starting tomorrow) you can find it at the Conversant Life site.   Well worth your hour.

Since we are still evaluating the reality & potential of church online the question just keeps coming up: “Of course, [virtual church] is possible. But is it biblical?”

The following is a response to me from Douglas Estes, author of SimChurch regarding his reflections on this post by Drew Goodmanson – Is Online Community real community; Questions about the virtual church?

A virtual church is just as biblical as a Baptist church, a house church, a Lutheran church, a megachurch, a Pentecostal church, a contemporary rock church or a traditional American fundamentalist church. Why? Because the Bible doesn’t prescribe one type of culture or ‘format’ for doing church. Period. I know that most Christians—even pastors and church leaders—will grudgingly admit this in public and not believe it in their hearts though it is the biblical viewpoint. Everyone who is passionate about the church views their version of the church to be the best, most right, most biblical, most blessed, and closest-to-the-New-Testament version of church as possible. This is not wrong but it does become a problem when we try to say that other people don’t have biblical churches (with the exception of churches whose theology/practice fall outside of historic orthodoxy). We can group current criticisms of online church into 2 main areas—and the first area, rightfully labeled, is denominationalism. This may seem kind of funny because I don’t mean that online churches are a new denomination; I mean that some people are reacting to them through the same lens (not our way = different = not biblical). Let’s consider the second area in more detail.

One important part of writing SimChurch was my starting point: I did not start with virtual churches. I started with the Bible and church history. A critical part of the research was investigating both with discernment to see if there would be anything to prevent an online church. The answer is no. And this is not an argument from silence (like those folks who say it’s okay to do drugs because they Bible doesn’t directly say we can’t), this is a ‘no’ from a close reading of the Bible and church history. In fact, anyone who has studied church history understands that God moves the church in seemingly radical directions at times. So far, most of the arguments against online church are the same types of arguments as those leveled at every new Christian group that has come along since Jesus left us.

Many of the criticisms I read seem to be written by people who are using the internet circa 1999. They forget that even older technologies such as Skype allow for a great deal of interaction, except fully physical (there is some physical because you can see the other person, wave, make faces, laugh, etc). More specifically, Drew (and others) cite verses in the Bible that deal with community and then argue that this community must be rooted in physical proximity (but not the SecondLife or Skype kind). I don’t want to (mis)characterize Drew’s argument here; and to be fair, Drew listed a few verses in a 200 word post whereas I wrote a whole book on this issue. Still, I need to point out a few serious problems with arguments like Drew and others use. SimChurch goes into much more detail, but let’s briefly look at the issues:

First, Drew lists 27 verses (all from the New Testament) that allude to community, or more specifically, what he calls “one-anothering.” These verses include loving one another (1 John 3:11) and the holy kiss one (1 Peter 5:14). In SimChurch, I defined a church as “a localized assembly of the people of God dwelling in a meaningful community with the task of building up the Kingdom.” Now, some people may tweak this but overall I feel it is a solid definition of church from a biblical and church-historical perspective (within a Protestant tradition such I come from). I think we can agree that church must be both local and a meaningful community. The problem comes in when we try to take the verses Drew cited and decide the physical extension of them. As with most of the Bible, these verses are communicating spiritual truth more so than physical truths. When the Bible tells me to love someone else, hugging is probably included in this but it is not the central meaning of the verse at hand (it is greeting). I can prove this: We don’t literally greet people with a holy kiss (at least I’ve never attended any church anywhere that does) at church. Why? Because we understand that the spiritual reality of greeting and loving another follower of Jesus is so much bigger than the physical expression. This is not to say the physical expression is not important; it’s just to say that certain physical expressions are just one aspect of it. Please note that I am also not trying to over-spiritualize this issue; I’m neither downplaying nor disregarding the physical aspect just pointing that it is only one part of what it means to have community. Again, consider people riding the NY subway to work—if you’ve ever done this, you know you unwittingly touch a lot of people due to the crowdedness of the train, but no one would consider a subway car (real) community!

Truthfully, none of the verses Drew lists speak to whether a church should meet in a building (been there), under a banana tree in a jungle (done that), or in synthetic space over the internet. In fact, as Drew admitted in his post, and any honest Christian will admit, we don’t get the type of community that the Bible describes in some/many/most/all ‘regular’ brick and mortar churches to begin with! But just because no one seems to love each other (or greet each other with a holy kiss) at First Baptist doesn’t mean we should declare it unbiblical or not a church.

Since this is a blogpost not a book, let me wrap up by saying that Drew is correct in his conclusion—we need to focus on creating biblical community. Chapters 2–4 in SimChurch go into great detail (for a non-academic book) on what church and biblical community is and how Western Civilization has so influenced this discussion as to make everything about community be tied to the physical where the Bible (primarily, but not only) ties it to the spiritual. In fact, it is the radically-skeptical Western worldview of Descartes and others that has shaped the definition of community for the average Western Christian far more than the Bible has (protests aside). In fact, we could say that if many of the virtual-church skeptics are correct—that to have real community with someone we must be in close, physical proximity with that person—then we cannot have community with God here on Earth because we can’t touch him either. Biblical community, and true presence, is far more nuanced than our materialistic, Western sensibilities can sometimes grasp.

Douglas Estes

Comments?

I get sent 4 or 5 books a week.  I have form letters both for authors & publishers saying “unfortunately, I cannot review your book because this space is reserved for discussions about the Church & media technologies”.   Sadly, there haven’t been many publications that fit well in this zone.   But recently, Zondervan sent me the book SimChurch by Douglas Estes.  I sped through it marking up every page, and realized how helpful it was to have a new set of observations about online church.   Now there’s a blog tour and a bit further into this post I’ve listed some of the blogs Zondervan invited to review / discuss / celebrate the release of this timely book.

Douglas Estes is a New Testament scholar and teaching pastor and he authored SimChurch to explore the (sometimes controversial) world of online churches.  As people (thus the Church) migrate online, we are forced to review our theology and re-assess some of our postmodern assumptions in light of our digital world.

Today I’m posting pointers to the SimChurch site, a list of the selected bloggers who are evaluating the book and a brief video clip from Douglas.  Tomorrow, I’ll be posting his analysis of a post previously put of by my friend & colleague, Pastor Drew Goodmanson at his site. (see: http://www.goodmanson.com/church-technology/is-online-community-real-community-questions-about-the-virtual-church/).  [Drew & I will be presenting together next week in Chicago at the Story Conference - come join the discussion.]

Here are the SimChurch bloggers:

• Church Relevance
• BibleDude.net
• Returned Sheep
• The Digital Sanctuary
• Lessons from Babel
• Mark D. Roberts
• Tall Skinny Kiwi
• Captain’s Blog

Now here’s a video clip to introduce you to Douglas Estes and SimChurch.  Come back tomorrow for his lengthy response to my “virtual church” question.

Click here to view the embedded video.