Church Video Ideas

I started to title this return blog something like “Resurrection” or “I’m Back”, but I feel “American Idol” is more appropriate. You would not believe all God has been showing me while my laptop was in the shop for over a week.

Here I am, Mr. Church 2.0 and a tech guy and then my laptop crashes. The first couple of days I was mad - really mad, then I started figuring out what God was up to.

Don’t think God had anything to do with my computer crashing? I do and I have a story that I’ll share another day. For now, I’ve used up my “online time” catching up on emails.

This blog is something God has called me to do and something I take very seriously. Don’t worry - I’m not going anywhere, but I will be spending less time in-front of this screen at home. My God, my wife and my kids deserve more time from me. I get that - loud and clear.

More to come soon. Today I’m working on my classes that I’m teaching next week at the Moody Bible Pastors’ Conference in Chicago. I’d like to again thank my sponsor for this conference: EasyWorship.

And yes, there will be a Church 2.0 Local Forum in Chicago - We are officially booked now. Please join me this coming Wednesday from noon to 3pm at Park Community Church. Lunch will be provided for FREE. Spread the word!

Park Community Church
1001 N Crosby
Chicago, IL 60610.

PERSONAL:
Last night I attended my oldest daughter’s PTA meeting - the meeting part of it sucked. Really sucked! But it ended with getting to see my daughter sing and dance and I couldn’t have been more proud.

I’m back in Dallas - got back late and am exhausted, but had a great time. Where do I start? So much was packed into my 3 days there. Today will be a little long, but I’ll just cover Thursday. I’ll blog about Friday and Saturday tomorrow. Here goes…

Day 1 (Thursday): Thursday I arrived at LAX around mid-morning and drove straight from the airport to the Dream Center. I have heard a ton about them, got to catch one of their services once on TV and heard Dr. Phil talk about them last week when I was home sick. After hearing how boldly Dr. Phil endorsed their ministry last week on national TV, I determined I was going to work them into my trip.

Dr. Phil talked about the difference they are making in their community - about how many homeless and hungry they feed EVERY day (hundreds). He went on to talk about how they give people a place to stay, clothes and many other opportunities (medical, physical and spiritual). As I drove up to the church, this was confirmed by the huge line of homeless people I saw stretched around the building and down the street. Each person was waiting to receive a meal and receive from the clothes and hygiene products they give out.

The Dream Center was founded by Tommy Barnett (who I have a great respect for) and his son, Matthew. You may remember Tommy Barnett’s name as the one who is ministering to and leading the restoration process of fallen pastor, Ted Haggard. Tommy also ministered to Jim Bakker.

I met Pastor Matthew Barnett’s personal assistant in the parking lot and she waited for me to park, welcomed me and guided me upstairs to Matthew’s office. He was on a flight and returning that evening for their worship service. She went on to tell me a little of her story - how God had used the Dream Center to change her life and how after graduating from their one year discipleship program she came on staff.

FYI - Everyone I met there was as friendly and hospitable as could be. We found out that one of their daily tours was just beginning so I quickly joined the tour (with a couple from Switzerland). For the next hour, the tour guide took us around their campus, told us stories, would point out different ministries going on and where people (of all ages) were living and introduce us to various staff and people that were in their discipleship program and living there.

After the tour, I went to go take a closer look at their recording studio. On the tour, our tour guide mentioned that they have recording studios where youth can come in off the street and record their music for free. What an outreach! I found my way in and stumbled upon their worship band, which work in the studio and played some of their original music for me. Their worship band, Press Play, just signed a deal with Universal and will be coming to a store near you soon.

As I was hanging out with some of the band, the lead singer of Press Play and head Creative Arts/Worship Pastor, Dave Hanley, walked in and introduced himself. I got to talk with him for a while, catch a little of his heart and vision (I believe he’s been at the Dream Center for 12 years) and hear one of his newest songs.

They invited me to come hang out at their rehearsal for that night’s service, but I had to leave and go meet a friend for college that I hadn’t seen in 11 years. Many people also invited me to their Thursday night worship service, but I had already committed to hang out with some LA friends.

I drove away thanking and praising God for what I had seen with my own eyes - such an amazing ministry. I’ll be mentioning them for sure in my “Church 2.0″ book. If you EVER get to LA, please go and visit the Dream Center. I think all Church leaders should go and spend some time there. I’m looking into going back for a week of ministry with them. To find out more about what God is doing through this amazing ministry watch the promo video below.

Day 1 continued: Thursday went on to include catching up and eating dinner with a friend from college and then meeting Tom Rice ( media producer, writer, filmmaker and Founder of eight20eight) who had invited me to an improv comedy show at the Groundling Theater in Hollywood.

What a night! I had a blast and could honestly go watch them every night. The theater is a cozy and intimate setting and you feel very close to the stage and involved as an audience member. It was kind of like “Whose Line is it Anyway?”, where they would call various actors forward and ask the audience to give them scene ideas.

Besides the amazing Groundling cast, I was wonderfully surprised by their special guests for the night: Kristen Wiig (Saturday Night Live), Michael McDonald (MADtv) and Gary Anthony Williams (Malcolm in the Middle).

That was a full and fun day topped off with a stop at In-N-Out Burger (you know I had to hit it once). It gets better - more details about Friday and Saturday on tomorrow’s blog.

PERSONAL:
To my friends, family and anyone interested - below is a video of yesterday (me baptizing my daughter). Grace was the first person ever to be baptized in our new baptismal pool. Yesterday was a day of mixed emotions, as we also had a baby dedication and surrounded a couple in prayer who are 7 months pregnant with their son, who is expected to die at birth or shortly after.

This morning I fly to LA. I’ll be running some errands and hanging out with some friends today/tonight. Tomorrow we have our first official Church 2.0 Local Forum. If you’re near LA, please join us! Besides the people that RSVP on Facebook, we have some other guests joining that have responded via email. There will be Church leaders there from as far as San Diego and San Francisco!

I’ll be at the Biola Media Conference on Saturday and will return late Saturday night. Sunday is a special day at Bent Tree - we’re baptizing 101 people (including my oldest daughter)!

Yesterday at church, one of our stage managers offered me 2 free tickets to the Texas Rangers baseball game. I gladly accepted and took my 5 year old son, Tommy. This was my first Rangers game and my son’s first baseball game.

I can not the describe the feeling of when we walked into the stadium. We arrived during the first inning. Just as we walked through the chute and out into the open, Milton Bradley hit a homerun and the crowd went crazy. They started playing the song from the movie “The Natural” (I’m not lying) - just as we were walking out of the chute. It was like a Hollywood moment. I’ll never forget it as long as I live.

For the next few hours we watched the worst team in baseball (they really are) play like they were on fire. We got to see 2 more homeruns (experiencing the roar of the crowd, fireworks and the song from “The Natural” each time) and to everyone’s amazement, the Rangers won 10-0. Maybe Tommy brings good luck?

And to top it ALL off - we sat on the 4th row, right behind Nolan Ryan and the Rangers’ owner, Tom Hicks, gave Tommy a game ball. Then after the game, Tommy got to get on the actual field and run around the bases. What a day! What a day!

EXTRA:
Thank God the tickets and parking were free. What a blessing. 2 Cracker Jacks = $7.50, 2 sodas = $9.50, 1 hotdog and chips =$8.25 - the look on Tommy’s face = Priceless.

Check out the pics (forgive the quality - they’re from my cell phone):

Rangers’ star Michael Young on deck — Nolan Ryan in front of us

Tommy running to home plate —— Tommy in his Rangers’ outfit

My mini-vacation last week was great. I didn’t think about or do anything church-related. I just rested, relaxed and had fun. I now feel refueled and ready to serve again. I’m grateful to my church and my boss for allowing me to take all the time I needed to recharge. I was all fresh and ready to return yesterday, but got pink eye and ended up missing. I’ve got eye drops now and should not be contagious anymore.

Now, I’m back in action in many ways. I’m on a new diet and fitness program (that came to me last week - I had a lot of time to think). I’m back in the gym working out and cutting back what I eat. I’m more active and eating less crap - which should make for a good/healthy combo.

I’m also back writing and prepping for some upcoming conferences. One magazine that I’ve never really mentioned, but I write regularly for is LifeWay’s “Let’s Worship” magazine. I encourage you to check it out HERE. Besides writing articles and working on my book, I’m doing some audio projects, too.

This week I’ll be making 3 recordings.

1. Tonight, I’m recording an audio class entitled “Communicating to Those That Listen with Their Eyes” for WorshipMinistryU, which is a great new online seminar tool for those in worship ministry. I’m honored to be among their terrific faculty. I’ll let you know when my class is ready and available.
2. Later this week I will record an interview for the Church Media Podcast. One of the things we’ll discuss is a Media/Tech meet up at NAB on the night of the 15th. They’ll be a group of tech directors, media producers and software company reps that will all gather to hang out and eat. If you’re going to be there, you don’t want to miss this.
3. Also, later this week, we’ll be back in the studio to revive the Creative Synergy Podcast. I know it’s been forever - but we’ll be back in action soon.

EXTRA:
If you haven’t voted for the worship presentation software that your church uses, go HERE. I’d like to get a recent poll before my “Worship Presentation Software” class in April at NAB.

BONUS:
Birthdays - Yesterday, my youngest turned 4. Today is my brother’s birthday.

For the past several months I’ve been telling my family (and especially my wife), “Just let me make it through the first service in our new building” - THEN “Just let me make it through Easter”. No more. I have come to my end and will be straight chilling this week. I’m not going to do anything. No blog. No cell phone. No email. Just me and my family. Pray that God would refresh, renew and restore  me, personally, as well as my relationship with my family. Pray that I can return to my job with a fresh passion, vision and energy. God give me rest!

MORE:
I will have some Good Friday and Easter pictures for you guys soon. Probably some video, too!

Don’t worry: this is a G-rated blog. I was reflecting on what makes me smile these days and what I’ve used as a way to not go insane with all the craziness at church. It’s a special time that I look forward to each night. My wife and I started this months ago. Each night, after the kids go to bed, we pop in a DVD and watch various TV shows or movies together. It sounds simple, but it’s been a great stress reliever and is something we’re able to do together and just enjoy laughing together.

First we watched all 3 seasons of “Arrested Development”. I think that show has one of the greatest and most perfectly cast ensembles ever on television. Then we watched all the “Harry Potter” movies (because my wife had read the books, but never saw the movies). Then we watched all 3 “Lord of the Rings” (because my wife had read the books, but never saw the movies). Then we watched seasons 1-3 of “The Office” (gotta love Dwight!). Now we’ve gone back to Season One of “Lost” and have started working our way through each episode. We’re going to watch every episode of “Lost” and then I’m hoping I can get my wife hooked on my favorite show: “24″. I think if we start with Season One, she’ll get hooked!

The challenge of watching episodes on DVD is knowing when to go to bed. It’s so easy to say, “Let’s just watch one more.” Have you experienced that? I have to make myself stop and go to bed. What shows do you enjoy?

EXTRA:
My Tarheels are back on top. Number 1, baby!

I know several people that are coming to Dallas this week for the C3 Conference at Fellowship Church. I’m planning to meet with a few of them and give them a tour of Bent Tree. If you’re coming to town this week and want to get together, just shoot me an email and let me know: greg@churchvideoideas.com.

EXTRA:
We have a team of leaders from our church in Pune, India training Church leaders for our adopted people group, the Marathas. This past Sunday we spoke with one of our elders live during our Sunday morning worship service. It was about 9pm his time and it was morning for us. It was very cool. We could all hear him clear as a bell and he heard us with no problem. We did it using Skype!

EXTRA, EXTRA:

According to TechCrunch yesterday, a source close to Microsoft says the company will launch a new desktop software called WorldWide Telescope on February 27. Pretty cool. You can read more about it HERE.

BONUS:
I read this in WIRED magazine: You can place a picture of you and/or your family on the moon - that’s right: on the moon. Check out HERE for more info.

Tuesday, I worked 14 hours. Wednesday, I worked 15 hours and yesterday (Thursday), I worked 17 hours. I’m sleeping in today and catching up on some much needed rest.

I want to give God praise for friends and peers in the ministry. I’ve mentioned my “network” before, but I must brag on them again. This week, my Tech Director friends have been a huge support and blessing to me. One local tech director called the other day to say he is getting everything taken care of at his church, so he can be on hand to help out our first Sunday (Feb. 3rd). Another local tech director called me today just to say “hang in there”.

Wednesday, I had the great honor of hanging out with an amazing tech and communications director from Kansas - Kirk Longhofer of the Technopraxis blog. Besides having fun, food and fellowship, I took the opportunity to pick his brain and learn from his years of experience as a technical director and work with television before that. I look forward to hanging out with him again at NRB and NAB and think he’s going to try to come out for another visit the last Sunday in February (which, by the way, my house will be full of guests from Washington DC and Phoenix) to visit one of our services.

Having given a few tours of our campus in the last 2 weeks, it occurred to me that I may have mislead some of you. Many of you have sent me encouraging emails - telling me it’s “almost over”, “hang in until Feb. 3rd”, etc. As I took some peers around our campus, they realized that we’ve only just begun. Friends, we are under construction until May.

First we moved into our new offices, then into our new gym, next is our new worship center - after that we move into our new community space, then start the renovation of our current worship center, our education building, our old offices and our children’s building. When all is said and done, there will be 7 new venues featuring sound, video and lights (our new worship center, plus 6 for kids and youth that are all themed out). It’s going to be a long haul, but when it’s over, our campus will be pretty special and a thing of beauty. If you’re coming to Dallas, you’ve got to swing by and check it out.

PERSONAL:

Some dear friends have asked how my family is doing. I so appreciate their support, accountability and prayers. I neglected to mention that my wife has been bringing our 3 kids by the church during the day, so I can see them - since they are asleep when I get home. It’s not a huge amount of time right now, but it’s just enough to get me through the day.

After being gone for a solid week, I’m glad to be back in Dallas. We had a great visit to South Carolina, but with 3 small children in a van for over 15 hours I’m glad to be going back to work.

I’ll blog tomorrow about the 3 churches I visited this past Sunday.