Church Video Ideas

Today’s blog is simple: I’d like for you to get your FREE copy of “Facebook for Pastors” and read it. I wrote the Foreward for this book and think it’s a good read. Check it out HERE.

Lately, I’ve been giving lots of tours to friends from other churches. One thing that they notice and I’m proud of is our extra chairs located beside each tech position. There is a stool beside our FOH audio engineer, there’s an extra chair beside our Service Director, there’s an extra chair beside our lighting tech, there’s an extra chair beside our video director and video engineer/shader and an extra chair beside our graphics operator.

Hear me friends: this is something I do VERY intentionally. When I’m a little sad is when that “extra chair” is an “empty chair”. We almost always have someone in training/learning at every position. If there’s a week when I see an empty chair, I look to my leaders and ask, “Do we not have someone training this week?” I (and my volunteer leaders) work hard and again, very intentionally, to see that the extra chair is not left empty. As I’ve said countless times on this blog, you must continually be recruiting and training… recruiting and training… recruiting and training. It never ends.

PERSONAL:
Why do I write with passion? Why do I travel away from my family to go speak at a conference? Why do I consult with other churches? Because for what ever reason, God has given me a heart that bleeds for His Church. I love Christ. I love the Gospel message. I love my church home and place of service (Bent Tree) and I want to be a good steward of the knowledge, experiences, education and tough lessons learned that God has given me and my church.

What’s my pet peeve and drives me crazy? When a thriving or successful church, especially a larger church, keeps secrets. You ask him how they got to where they are and they don’t share. There’s nothing Kingdom-minded about that. If you’ve ever interacted with me at a conference, you know that I pass on everything I can think of - the good, the bad, the ugly. I share ideas, thoughts, philosophies and challenges with anyone that will listen. This is what a “Church 2.0 leader” does (more on that in my upcoming book).

Do I think I know it all? Hah! Not even close. That’s why I’m constantly meeting with peers and picking their brain. I ask a lot of questions and try to learn from their lessons, philosophies and experiences. I, and my church, am an open book. Come, visit, share, ask, learn. We’ve had tech directors from around the country visit our church to attend a service and see behind-the-scenes. I welcome each of them with open arms. Usually, I feed them, too (just look at me). I’m a big boy.

Sorry for the little rant. I just had this on my mind and heart and wanted to express it publicly. I love you. I love hearing about what God is up to in your church, ministry and community. I want to be a friend and help to you and your ministry in any way I can. We’re in this together, friends. Put away any spirit of competition - that’s not of God. Let’s share our resources, our ideas, our struggles - that’s the Body of Christ!

ON ANOTHER PERSONAL NOTE:
We will miss you Brett Favre!

Sorry for disappearing. This week has flown by - let me catch you up. Wednesday, I worked a long day with the highlight being taking my Visual Arts Coordinator and my Audio Coordinator over to another local church to meet with their tech team and see what they do that’s unique.

We went to my friends, Russ and Camron Ware’s church: Irving Bible Church. Russ wasn’t there, but we had gone to meet with Camron and let him show us what he’s been up to lately. I had been hearing a buzz from many people about what they were doing with lighting and effect projectors. Camron has a side ministry now, where he helps other churches do what he did at IBC (see picture above). I highly recommend you check him out - they’re doing some very cool stuff that inspired us and gave us some great ideas.

The rest of the day was full of meetings and new building stuff. After work, I wanted to get away from it all for a much needed break. To have fun and spend time with a friend, I took my video intern to a Dallas Mavericks game. They were playing the Detroit Pistons and it was just what the doctor ordered. The Mavs spanked the Pistons and a great time was had by all - plus I got a coupon for a free taco since they won - Woo Hoo! We stopped to eat and get coffee after the game, had a good talk and didn’t get in until very late and I went straight to sleep (so there was no blog on Thursday).

Thursday was a day of a hundred projects (literally). I had teams of people working on different things all over the building. The highlight of Thursday was our weekly rehearsal where we were training people on our new monitor console and also hosting 2 tech guys from another local church: Lovers Lane UMC. They are looking at purchasing the Yamaha LS9, which we’ve been using until we get into our new building. I invited them to come out and see it in action. It was great to see my audio team interacting with them and trying to be of help to them. It was a beautiful sight.

After rehearsal, it was back to finishing projects. I got home from the church at 2am and hit the sack. That’s why this blog is coming late today. Okay - we should be all caught up now. I’m off today and plan on having fun and not thinking about church.

Tomorrow evening, I’m taking my tech team to Lake Pointe Church in Rockwall, TX. They are a great church and do things very well technically. We’ll hang out with my new friend, Jason Cole - AV Director there, who will give my team a tour of the behind-the-scenes. I’m looking forward to the fellowship and just hanging out with my tech team (we’re going together in the church bus).

In closing, I just want to reiterate what I often live and preach: GET TO KNOW CHURCHES IN YOUR AREA. It’s all about the Kingdom. We have so much we can learn from each other. From us visiting Irving Bible and Lake Pointe to hosting Lovers Lane to us gathering together on Sunday morning to watch LifeChurch.tv and Seacoast via the internet - there is so much we can offer to and gain from other churches. That’s “Church 2.0” - sharing and being a resource to other churches. Learning from one another. More of that to come in my book. I’ll step down off my soapbox now.

By the way, HELLO to all of you who took me up on my offer in my last blog post to connect with me on Facebook. I’m glad we’re Facebook friends now!

EXTRA:
Don’t forget, as a reader of this blog, you have until January 31st to take 30% off at Crossroads Creative.

BONUS:
Check out this FREE new video from SermonSpice and this FREE worship countdown from WorshipHouse Media.

Each year I make “New Year Resolutions”. Of course I’m doing the standard: spend more time with God, spend more time with my family, lose weight, etc. I take all those seriously and plan to do all three, but I wanted to blog about a more specific list of ministry goals for 2008. Here they are:

• Lead, empower and develop my Tech Arts Leadership Team
• Lead a smooth transition into our new worship center and the remaining projects and renovations
• See our team double in size
• See our team become closer and share more social time together
• Develop and lead well those that I oversee
• Have a better process for assimilation for newcomers to the team
• See that our team and each volunteer does what they do better
• Video and catalog special moments throughout the year for a highlight video at the end of the year
• Raise the bar for excellence and quality in our corporate worship
• Offer more training for our Tech Arts team
• Help train and develop other tech teams and leaders for children and youth
• Improve upon and expand my knowledge of Final Cut Pro
• Go on a mission trip
• Read several more books (ministry, business and leadership)
• Continue writing for several magazines
• Complete at least 2 of my 3 book projects before the year ends
• Add some new classes and information to the conferences that I teach at
• Work with more churches to help them grow in their worship and technical ministry

EXTRA:
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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.

It’s good to be back blogging. I got back Tuesday night from Atlanta. We had a great trip and great meeting with Clark ProMedia. I came home to find out that our home internet was down and so wasn’t able to blog Wed. and Thurs. (I didn’t have time to go somewhere else with my laptop).

I was swamped all day Wed. and Thursday, then left Friday morning to go to Phoenix, AZ. I had a great visit with Christ Life Church in Tempe, AZ. Above is a picture of me in the middle and Jeremy (their worship pastor) on the left and Tim (their media minister) on the right. They are great guys and serve at a church with a ton of potential. I look forward to continuing to work with them. Below (besides seeing Beowulf) was the highlight of my trip. That’s right… they have In-N-Out Burger in Phoenix, too!

I came home late Saturday night, got up early Sunday and we had a great day of worship at my church on Sunday. I left the best for last - the ultimate highlight of my week was my oldest daughter praying to receive Christ on Wednesday night. Yesterday we celebrated that at my church with a rose on the platform! We took a picture of her with her rose that I’ll post in the near future.

Now it’s back to work with a short week. What are you doing for Thanksgiving? We’re staying in town and have family coming to us.

Today I left at 5am for Atlanta. I’ll be in one long meeting all day and fly home late tonight. Pray for strength. I thought I’d link you to THIS article on “Saying Thanks” - as the Thanksgiving season quickly approaches.

If you don’t read WIRED magazine, I highly suggest you check it out. This past month’s issue came with a cool supplement called their “Geekipedia” - “149 people, places, ideas and trends you need to know now”. It’s pretty cool. I’ve asked this before, but I like getting updates. What magazines do you read? How many of you have checked out the new Collide Magazine? On my “Charter Sponsors” page, you can see some other magazines that I subscribe to and recommend. One final question: Do you have a favorite magazine? If so, what is it?

Thursdays are tough days. We start at 9am with a Production Meeting and go until at least 9pm (we have rehearsal on Thursday nights). It’s just a long and very full day. Yesterday was tough for a number of reasons. Tough/draining meetings. Tough, but needed conversations. Stage setup for rehearsal. And many other things that I’ve blanked out of my memory.

On a positive note, we had 2 new audio guys training at rehearsal last night. One guy was on his 3rd week of training and will be running monitors on his own this Sunday morning. The other guy came out for the first time and still needs a few more training sessions before he can go “solo”. We also have a Video Director shadowing our best Video Director this coming Sunday, so I’m pretty excited about that. We’ve also assimilated a few others on camera, lights and graphics in September, so all in all, it’s been a great month. Lots of new faces, which is great as we gear up for the move to our new worship center (which now looks like it will be January).

I’m curious, though - every church is different, yet we have much in common. What are your struggles? What frustrates you in your role? What would you like to see change in your tech ministry?

I’m working on a book called “Church 2.0″ (at least that’s the title for now). It’s a collaborative conversation with several great Church leaders and thinkers. You can check out the book’s Facebook group HERE and join the conversation. I’ll be posting more info in the near future.

Speaking of collaboration: How many of you have checked out YouVersion?

EXTRA:

How ’bout them Cowboys? Watch out!