What was that!

One of those days which promised so much on the diary and delivered something completely different when the doorbell rang!

Expected travel and ended up staying at home - a day of encounter nonetheless but it was varied and yet somehow frustrating. Feeling myself to be totally at the hands of other people's folly, forgetfulness and general shortcomings and yet in the dock; the missed targets of others lying at my feet!

There are often two tensions in life. The first is caused by the words of Jesus which call us to treat others as we would have them treat us. The second come from the lips of St Thumper of Bambi in that, "If you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all!" I try to express myself honestly and to .make my yes be yes and my no be no' - Not always a popular move. Try the other tack and say nothing and this is taken as assent, which I don't want to give. I'm happy, at times, to say that I'm not sure but will let it go it life cannot be lived by abstentions; it requires courage, honesty and decision!

So I stand by and see things split so people get to do their own thing - it's not mine and has little to do with me and the proletariat cheer in the streets because they're doing stuff. The rulers of the kingdoms are happy because stuff is getting done. But shouldn't we all be doing it in one name and as one people?

Discipleship calls us to make our way through this world making Jesus, the Christ, known and we do it as family (that is Church). All I have ever sought in Church is unity and dialogue and working for each other to do the stuff and yet my experience has been isolated endeavour with division always a hand's breadth away. I love it when I can celebrate the triumph of others and relish the opportunity to engage with and support what others are doing. But I experience that so rarely - is this my misfortune or am I just getting what so many others are getting?

Church is about people, and I love people. It's about Jesus, and I love Jesus. But it seems we are too busy; wound up in our plans and structures and outcomes and demands to get more in the plate and more bums on the pews.
Is this strangling the Church?

Shouldn't we be a party rather than that which we are making Church?

Where are the people who are passionate and on fire?

Are they missing because we, the clergy, are not setting them alight with a zeal for the Lord?

Have we made Jesus everything He isn't and find ourselves looking for commitment where joy and zeal should be?

Have we stopped looking to see new creations in Christ and born again being something exciting and life-giving?

All these questions to be answered and the fear that the problem might be me - am I doing too much, or too little, or doing it in the the wrong place, or doing the wrong thing? Colleagues tell me to do less, thinking I work hard (am driven) because of some desire to prove myself, and yet the reality is that the tide is rising and the time to get people to the safety of the high ground is short. I think of the words that speak of those in Noah's time partying and getting married and having a good time just a few ticks away from the flood and see us not about to be in the same boat. I look at the cross and the salvation that is at hand and, seeing my life changed, want that for others.

That's the role I've taken. That's the role I was given. All I have is Jesus, in and out of season. I'm a bond slave, chosen to have my ear pierced and to be the property of my master even though I am a free man, and in this become the freest man of all.

I write this journal here so others may dialogue with me should they wish. I do it to,be as privately honest and I am publicly assumed to be. This is not about posturing or looking good, for I fear for many I rarely do - and yet isn't this the 'fool for Christ' bit?

I visit people in their homes, and in the care homes, and communicate them and communicate with them. I cry at their losses (where no one sees lest I usurp their grief) and I celebrate their joys. The richness of this wonderful ministerial life I live.

My over-zealousness, my oft misunderstood attempts at honesty and the hope for dialogue which is so often dashed to the ground, expectations unexpectedly dismissed yet again. Where I find like minds and passionate defence in unapologetic ways I rejoice for we are not out to build our piddling kingdoms but one triumphant Kingdom with the Christ on the throne.

Lord, may I have done that in some small way today. May the things in me that distract become less and the things in me that look and smell like Jesus to the world be made greater.

I am left with the words of Wynne Lewis, amazingly used and confusingly gifted - I'm sure he should shave sold used cars: "Victor, you often look like the world to the righteous people in Church and yet you look and smell like Jesus to the world outside our doors. Never let that gift slip from your hands!"

If that is mine and Christ is with (and within) me,  who or what can stand against me and the Gospel of Christ? I love my life; my Lord, my family, my friends and those who I call brothers and sisters. Help me to serve them as Christ came to serve us.

Church Growth strategies: 'Be IT Savvy: get a website - part one!'

As always we start with a reminder of Hauerwas' comment: 

Church growth strategies are the death rattle of a church that has lost its way.  

Whilst social media is one of the quick and easy ways of getting your church, projects and/or special events noticed where you are (and even further afield), the pinnacle of being 'IT savvy' has to be found in websites. There are a number of ways of getting a 'web presence' (good to learn the language innit?) - but we'll look at three:

A 'traditional' website

Using Wordpress to create a website

A 'content management' website

The traditional model has pages that live on a computer somewhere and can be accessed by anyone who wishes to view them. Generally the site is managed by a 'web master' (who says us techies don't crave power?) and access to change things is very limited.

The Wordpress website is a cost effective and simple way of creating a website, it can have as many pages as you like and authority can be distributed so that people can edit and add information like news and images without having access to the whole (so limiting the ability to burn the thing down when they make a mistake).

A content management site looks like a normal site to those who visit but once the format is done then sections can be owned and edited by others. Some like to keep the main sections controlled by the web master whilst allowing church groups, wardens and  others to change their content as and when the need arises. This is an extremely powerful way of doing stuff when there are many who have sections that need keeping up to date as it pushes the work to those who have the local knowledge. One of the best products for this is Joomla.

So, all you need to do is find the URL (uniform resource locator - the www.name.whatever) you want to use, and you're sorted (the web hosting company will usually be more than happy to sort one for you once you know what you want).

GETTING YOURSELF A ''TRADITIONAL' WEBSITE

There are a number of ways of doing this and regardless of which you choose, here are some things you need to consider:

MANAGED PACKAGES - The easiest option because you find a layout that you like and have it tailored for so it becomes yours and then the same company 'host' it (this means that they keep all the techie bits on one of their computers (we call them servers) for you. This means that they do the backup (very important) and will forward mail to you (equally important because websites have to have ears to listen as well as mouths to proclaim). All you need to do is keep the content up to date.

This is the most expensive route but it is quick and simple and avoids some of the pitfalls that doing it yourself or finding an enthusiast in the church can sometimes present (more about that later).


WEB HOSTING - Here you have someone who designs the web site and then you upload it (put it onto the host company's server) so that it can be published on the internet. 

This is a simple method of getting in to the web business but because it splits design and hosting into two separate element, you will need to get involved with:


WEB DESIGN - A wonderful world of joy and fun when it works and a trip into the darkest places of existence when it all starts to unravel (makes sheol look like a holiday destination in fact). There are three options when it comes to web design:

i. Bring in an expert - someone who might cost you some money but will take the brief and produce something with a 'look and feel' that does what you want and makes you feel you have something to be proud of.

ii. Find an enthusiast in the church and get them to do the design with you. Now I have to say that this works well when it works well BUT there is often the problem with using someone 'in house' that they might take the brief but will often try to impose their own views or preferences and the like and so what if often found is an agreed design rather than a desired design. The second problem is that some of the sites I have had to go and rescue have been left locked when the member leaves or them and the dog collar, council or someone else in the church fall out with them! 

TOP TIP 1: Always get the username, password and any other relevant information that let's you access and control the site and store it behind a 'break glass in case of fire' panel. 

iii. Do it yourself - This is, for me, the most enjoyable bit of the whole thing but that's because I'm a techie type and enjoy 'hacking'* code but there's great pleasure to be found in getting a template and modifying it yourself using one of the proprietary software products out there and then uploading the finished item to your host. The problem here is that if you're the person who issues the brief, fulfils the brief and manages the site it can be something beautiful in your eyes and an abomination to those who come across it!

TOP TIP 2: Always get the opinion of others when it comes to the look and feel of a site, the content and the pages - you only need a few opinions (go for people you can trust) but you do need them!

So there you are, you have a web presence! But what are you going to put on it?

Deciding what you want to have will have an impact on the sort of hosting you require.

Sermons, audio files and other downloads

If you would like people to be able to access and listen too sermons then you will need to ensure that you have sufficient space on the server. If you have other download (like videos, docent and other stuff) this will take up space too. When contracting for a web hosting service it's always a great idea to go a little bigger than you need rather than to go for the smallest and find that you end up crashing because you've run out of space.

Bandwidth

If you think of the connection from the server to the people who want it as being like a road, the larger the road the more traffic can flow along it. If you're going to be a small site then a single track will accommodate those who travel along it, but as you get more visitors and the cars turn into lorries taking sermons and videos away with them, then you'll need more lanes until you need a motorway to allow people to travel at a decent speed/

TOP TIP 3: One of the surveys I read recently told me that people wait no more than three seconds before 'binning' a site. If your site runs on a dirt track then much of the traffic will look elsewhere for an A road or, better still, a motorway! Bandwidth is important.

Images
If you have poor quality images then people will soon tire of your site and you'll find yourself reaching no one and paying (in time and money) for the privilege of not doing so! Try to use your own images wherever possible and where you can't then make sure you use images that are really 'royalty free' because otherwise you can find yourself with a big bill for breaching someone's copyright!

Being current
I went to a diocesan website this morning and found the article I'd been pointed to spoke of an event in 2011. So I snorted and closed the page (probably never to return). If you have a website and you want to put calendars and events on it - make sure someone keeps them current. It's a killer for those who come and a pain for those who maintain the site. Be warned!

There's much more I could write about here, but there is enough to get you thinking about church sites here and so I'll draw stumps and let you think a bit.

_______________________

I'm happy to answer questions and point you in the right direction with this because it's important that we are out there and more important that we are out there with good sites (and in a cost and time efficient manner).

Pax

____________________

* Hacking used to mean writing software using machine code - the term was later hijacked to mean illegally accessing sites and systems - being a 'hacker' meant something very different in the early days of computing (we were people who could hold a conversation, grunted as a form of communication and slept under our desks!).

Church Growth strategies: 'Bringing in the children!'

We are looking to Stanley Hauerwas' for our underlying thought (challenge) as he says that:

'Church growth strategies are the death rattle of a church that has lost its way.'

Continuing to move on we find that today the bus stops at that most challenging of church growth areas: children. It's especially challenging because I find that a number of the people I encounter these days have come to the conclusion that the way to grow the Church is to somehow or other drag the 'next generation' into the church building and then by whatever means are available somehow turn them into Christians -  and there is something true here that begets something, in my opinion, quite awful.

Children have become the Philosopher's stone by which dead and leaden church becomes something golden.

I hear a variety of challenging comments with regard to people's churches and the situation surrounding the average age in them. In fact one place I know has so high an average age that the upper age for Sunday School must now fast approaching thirty! (if only they had anyone that young in the place!) 

Recently whilst in conversation with a bunch of lovely ladies who are members of a church that is looking to recruit a new Vicar. One of them reassured me that all would be well once the new cleric had been appointed (they hadn't actually advertised but I always applaud proactivity). I asked why they held the belief that the new incumbent would lead them into the promised land where numbers grew and the average age was reduced. Another summed it up quite succinctly with these words:

'Our church numbers are falling and there's no children or young people but that will all change once we've got a new Vicar!' 

All of them nodded their agreement for they were convinced that the new cleric, once appointed would arrive (having run past speeding trains and leaping tall buildings on the way) and would 'bring children in to church:'

Seems all they needed was:

I didn't have the heart to burst their balloons and stamp on their dreams and hopes :-(

The problem is that getting children in to Church is important but the problem is that we become so fixated on the issue of children that we lose sight of the scenery that surrounds them. we become so bound up with children as the 'future church' that we forget that they are also, very much, today's Church.

Much of the problem here lies in the fact that children aren't coming because parents aren't bringing them and so the key to 'bringing children in' is to bring in the people who bring children in!

Another part of the problem is that when we do manage to bring children in to church we work hard at stopping them from being engaged and functioning members of the body for rather  than include them in our church services we remove them from them as soon as we can. I wonder how many who read this post are in a church where they lose the children after the first hymn and have them return just before or during the Communion?

We engage in that time honoured travesty of Church that is the 'All-Age' service (or as it's known here : 'All-Age torture'. That ghastly place where we talk down to the children and think we're communicating to everyone present. Worse still are the places where the service has both a 'grown up' sermon and 'something for the children' - two opportunities taken to avoid any meaningful communication with the people groups present!

We need to look at messy Church - but as this has it's own spot I'll merely flag it up here and move on.

The problem is summed up by a colleague who moaned that even though they were working hard at making Church 'relevant, authentic and entertaining' they weren't keeping and of the children and young people who came through the doors.' Of course they weren't because they had to work at being such! The problem is that we need to actually have churches that are relevant, authentic and fun to be in, after all you can try hard and stick a pig in a dress but it's never going to win a beauty prize is it?

So here's the bottom line as I see it:

Stop pretending that your church is 'down with the kids' and stop thinking that we can only minister to the young if we use young people. All this tosh about only have a window of influence and efficacy with those ten years either side of our age is something we need to bin before we even start. Those most influential in my life were tens of years older than me and they were influential because they were truly kind, caring and interested. I wasn't a scalp but a developing friend who would one day, despite our age differences, become a peer (and in some cases their leader).

Stop using children in church as the hope for the Church and realise that it's Jesus, the Christ, who has that role (and label). Stop asking how many young people others have in church (and if you do, stop saying when you hear the answer, 'Oh, aren't you lucky!') and if you feel you really have to ask the question then find out how they came in and how the church relates to them and keeps them - be intelligent, not envious!

We need to realise that the young are smart and can see when you're putting on a show in order to 'win them for Christ' or lower your average age. They value honesty and can see through the faux friendship and the overrated welcome. Integrity and structure are the key factors here I reckons.

Recently I attended a service where there were about seven children in the congregation and the parents, being as bored as their young, were looking around and sighing and the thing progressed. The children were a little less refined and so played games, played up and fidgeted as time progressed. At last we were set free and one of the Wardens turned to me and, assuming the dog collar was a sign of being on the same side I guess, said, 'I hate it when people bring their kids into church, it really spoils the service for others!'

My response was, 'Not to worry, they probably won't come again.' And they Warden smiled and nodded and said, 'I hope not!' Later, whilst chatting to the cleric who had taken the service I looked sympathetically as they told me how they get families in but they rarely came back and moaned about increasing average ages of congregations and falling numbers. 'What we need to do is concentrate on getting children in,' they said, 'They're our only hope!

But the local kids were on the playing fields around the church, I saw them playing rugby and football and being taken out by their otherwise absent parent because it was 'their day for custody'. 

If we want to bring children into church we need to bring parents because they will bring them with them and when they do we need to make a place that's full on fun and full of integrity. A place where the children drag the parents back to rather than vice versa. It's great that grandparents bring their family's young, but that's timestamped and ephemeral - win the young parent who is starting out with the struggle that parenthood presents and be their friend and grow up, and into relationship, with them and their children and realise that Sunday has other challenges and attractions and look for the days and times when Church coming together becomes the main attraction and be it (honestly and openly).

It's not rocket science - it's not even clever! 

Church is the people who meet when they can in a place where they can because they want to meet - or we can tell them it has to be Sunday and our way!