Modern Devotion

I wrote a blog entry for www.livetwentyten.com. Live2010 is a campaign that we are doing at Red Mountain Christian Center to help people spend 20 minutes in prayer a day and ten minutes reading their bible to read through the whole bible in 2010.

Here is a portion of that blog entry:

2010 (MMX) is a common year that started on a Friday and is the current year. In the Gregorian calendar, it is the 2010th year of the Common Era or of Anno Domini; the 10th year of the 3rd millennium and of the 21st century; and the 1st of the 2010s decade. There are a lot of interesting things happening this year, like Chevrolet releasing the Volt, a new electric car, or even greater things such as the Space Shuttle program will be retiring NASA and replacing it with Project Constellation (go read some of more 2010 changes here).

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The first three numbers; 0’s, 1’s and 2’s. Simple numbers that almost all 2 year-olds know. This idea of 20 minutes reading and 10 minutes praying brings a few thoughts to my mind, neither of which are trying to figure out whether the proper pronunciation is twenty ten or two thousand and ten. Although I think twenty ten is correct .

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We live in a day of technology. An ingenious software called YouVersion is celebrating their users collectively reading 1 billion minutes on their iPhones, iPods, Blackberrys, cellphones, the mobile web and the internet atwww.youversion.com with 41 translation and 22 languages, again that is 1 BILLION minutes, or 16.7 million hours, or check this out, 19 CENTURIES. What about listening to the bible in audio format in your car or on your iPod. To give you an idea I read from Genesis through Deuteronomy in as little as a few weeks listening to the bible while driving to and from work in about 15 minutes each way. People also use all kinds of bible software like Logos that Pastor Jeff, myself and others use that allows about three hours of Bible study/research in as little as a few minutes...

Go read the rest here!

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Social Networking and The Need to Know

The idea that your friends are my friends and my friends are your friends is sometimes a very interesting concept. How many people (person B) on Twitter or Facebook randomly show up on another friends network (person A) friend list and you KNOW they probably have zero connections? Maybe there are connections through the need to know. Here are my thoughts on some possible possibilities: 1. My friend 'A' came on my network and began seeing who is my influencers and found friend 'B'. Or friend 'B' came on my network and found friend 'A'. Or the 3rd reason, and I think more unlikely would be the randomness of me and friend 'A' stumbling on the same person. Now granted some leaders show up on ALL the networks because of their pull and popularity. Some however are in the shadows and for me a random blog led to an interesting article that linked to a poll that led to a Twitter that linked to a Youtube where a comment talked about a website that had a guest speaker who used an illustration that mentioned friend 'B'.

Now what is the point of this? To bash on people 'A' that they went through someones network and clicked and added all their friends? Clearly not. There are enough friends to go around! It is more the psyche of OUR need to KNOW! Social Networking has put complete strangers in each others own living rooms that may live hundreds or thousands of miles away. Social Networking has made our walls in our minds become a glass house so that random people can see in. Social Networking has made people of different economic classes sit down at the same table in a coffee shop for inspiration. Now of course none of these may have happened literally, but they happen ideologically, I can hear your heart, thoughts, opinions, hates, likes, tastes, etc as if we sat for a Vente (as if that really means anything other than a marketing tool) at a little table in a quaint coffee shop preferably not $tarbux (I don't like drinking muddy water & spend $6)!

When you look at tribal behavior in history, life lessons were taught by taking a young boy out and he had to kill a large threatening big game animal and live on his own in the land for 3 days then he entered manhood and learned what it 'took' to be a man. As time has gone on, writing and language was developed and then written down. Then electronics and video screens and computers. Now here we are where we have computers with social networks with complete profiles that give more information than our own friends know. Just last night I saw a young teen girl who sent out a message for all her friends to text her and gave out her cell phone publicly. I must interject myself and say this, be careful, be safe. Know your audience, there are people that don't deserve to live in society that are preying on people's Social Networks. Back to topic, because of this technology it has allowed the stories and life lessons to be shared with multitudes. Our need to know drives us to the place to know. Networking is the easiest 'place'. So if I want to get deep in a subject I will find friends who are there and see what are they sharing and who do they know who they get their information. This comes down to an internal argument whether we take it personal or take it as a compliment or even indifferent. I have chosen the indifference approach, it works well.

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OMG, Is He Really Wearing a Twikini?!?

So do you got Twitter and want a better way to use it on your phone but your not one of the little rich kids that owns an iPhone (fine I admit it, I am jealous)? Are you like me and you have to settle for a lame Windows Mobile phone (the worst OS for phones, it's almost as effective as smoke signals, except you can't take pictures with smoke signals). There is a great solution to bring the power of Twitter to your WinMo OS phone. So I was told about about this snazzy little app called Twikini by my buddy @natefellman, the name is the funniest part, so is how they got it (video below). Here are some of the features that I loved!

• It is FAST!
  

• Simple, uncluttered, and customizable user interface.

• Post tweets using a full screen editor. Optionally, set your location (either manually, using GPS coordinates, or geocoding) along with your status updates. (Screenshot)

• Send and receive Direct Messages.

• Twitpic integration to post photos with your status updates. Select existing photos or click new ones from your device's camera. When reading tweets, view Twitpics inline (without having to open a separate browser). (Screenshot)

• Read status updates just like browsing a web page. Quickly reply, retweet, favorite, or email other people's tweets. (Screenshot 1, Screenshot 2)

• Windows Media Player integration. Automatically tweet the song and artist you're listening to. See a realtime feed of other people using it on Twitter.

• URL shortening services including Bit.ly, TinyURL and Digg.

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The Generational Crisis

Check this out, nearly a third of younger employees would consider quitting their job if Facebook was banned in the workplace. The way many boomers respond to this is that they say they are a bunch of immature kids that need to grow up. But not forgetting the Millennials, they say, "Hey listen, if we are so immature then why are we the most educated generation in the history of mankind. The Millennial could be best described as adaptive, collaborative, updative, and integrated. Their ability to work together and dream a creative perspective of life is the driving force of the future!

Why else would Google, the largest most used search engine, be hit with a lawsuit about age discrimination? Google says that their company emphasizes "youth and energy." The strategy has led to a work force with an average age of under 30 and with less than 2 percent of employees over 40, according to the claim. Google employed just more than 1,600 people in 2003. 1600 new highers and only 2 percent are over 40. If you are not "Googling" Google to see what all they are doing then you need to start! As a leader/pastor/specialist this an interesting lesson learned.

So what is the problem? The disconnect! What is the disconnect? We have the most prolific generation we have ever seen. Watch the video below and see where we are headed but first read this:

Titus 2:1-8

1 Your job is to speak out on things that make for solid doctrine. 2 Guide older men into lives of temperance, dignity, and wisdom, into healthy faith, love, and endurance. 3 Guide older women into lives of reverence so they end up as neither gossips nor drunks, but models of goodness. 4 By looking at them, the younger women will know how to love their husbands and children, 5 be virtuous and pure, keep a good house, be good wives. We don’t want anyone looking down on God’s Message because of their behavior. 6 Also, guide the young men to live disciplined lives. 7 But mostly, show them all this by doing it yourself, incorruptible in your teaching, 8 your words solid and sane. Then anyone who is dead set against us, when he finds nothing weird or misguided, might eventually come around.

We have lost the generational bridge. The problem is that the bridge has crumpled from each side. Boomers don't see Millennials as focused, determined, respectful. All the while Millennials see Boomers as disassociated and unable to relate. They see all their issues as if they are the only humans to ever go through this problem.

So what does this all mean? Here is Ryan Adams attempt to address the larger issue:

• To the Boomers: seek to understand before you judge. Second guess your assumptions. Address the core issues, not the peripherals. Yes, some millennials are unproductive punks. Facebook may or may not have anything to do with it. Learn more about the tool first. And listen, really listen to a millennial when he tells you about it. Judge them by the output, not the methods.

• To the millennials: why so cocky? It makes enemies out of potential friends. We've got to learn to address other generations with a more respect and a less swagger. Use gentle persuasion techniques. Seek to inform, but only with humility. We do become punks when we become arrogant. You'll never influence a person by showing them how wrong they are. Be wise enough to recognize how wrong your ideas often turn out to be. That'll help keep you humble. (These are notes to myself...)

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Tech Stuff

Let me introduce you to Delicious Library 2. If you have any sort of library of books or a pile of toys and tools, music, software, electronics or movies this is for you. Ever have people borrow things and forget who has what? Want an easy way of checking stuff out to people, knowing who has what and when it's due that also automatically puts it in your calendar for it's due date? Want a simple way to look at everything you own on a nice bookshelf on your computer screen (Mac only!)? How about a way to input it all by scanning your items by it's UPC with your digital camera, video camera, laser barcode reader, or the best, through your iSight camera. Ever want to be able to see the library of others in your office and what they have soyou can borow? What about a program that will take your library and export it as a website that anyone can see, here's mine that I was messing with.

From their website:

When we demo Delicious Library to people, about ⅔ of them instantly say this:

“Wait, I just hold a CD or DVD or video game or book or whatever up to my webcam, and it magically reads the UPC and downloads that item’s cover and all pertinent information about it, and displays all my stuff on photorealistic shelves? I’ll take it! Right now! This is why I bought a computer in the first place! ”

This is a must checkout, it is awesome! The free version allows for 25 books, $40 gets you an unlimited library. Let me know what you think when you try it out.

CLICK on the picture above to go to their site!

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Tech Stuff

Sometimes I question the purpose of this blog, is it meant to inspire, be about leadership, show a window into my crazy mind, look into technology and show ways to truly help you, the leader/ pastor/creative/etc? Well I think because I do not force any of you to read this (even in that comment there is hilarity because I have this pseudo-high that there actually readers, silly me), than I can have it to be whatever I want it to be about.


Well here is the newest tool that is shocking me right now at it's abilities and plus, it is free. Check it out, it can be very useful. Here is a link to a blog about it over at Youth Ministry Geek. The program is at http://www.evernote.com/. I urge you to read the blog first, it does a better job explaining the program than the website. Best of all, it's also good for PC, Mac, iPhone, and Windows Mobile!

...read more on "Tech Stuff"!

Digital Breathe - Living Simply Complicated

Wife's text response: "You could pick your bible and read it."

My thoughts: "How?!? The internet is down, so therefore crosswalk is not available, nor youversion, or any others, so how do I read the bible, dang it!"

I realize in life how digital I have become when even reading the bible or popular book becomes online reading or listening to an audio mp3. I grew up on a PC and now have been on a Mac for about 2 years and am quite the aficionado. I have always had this deep desire to learn as much as I can when it comes to technology. I would take apart my parents VCR just to see it then put it back together as a child, a slight affection towards tech stuff. Made magazines are a techies dream escape.

When it comes to ministry and technology and the digital life we as leaders/pastors/creatives strategize our efforts. The truth is things are a changin'. Therefore our strategies must change and adapt. I have realized that so much of my world is concentrated around the use of technology. If I got away from my alarm that sits on my nightstand and used my cell phone to wake me up then my entire world could be classified as mobile. Music, I got my old school 30gb iPod with as much movies as I do music and a few seasons of The Office. For calls, texts, tweets, light email and internet I got my Moto Q9C. For the rest of my brain I got my Macbook Pro, this helps me with EVERYTHING, literally my world is inside that or online. Here are a couple things I use:

• My calendar syncs from iCal to Google Calendars to Plaxo. It automatically updates all birthdays and anniversaries from Facebook and Plaxo updates to my iCal.
• All my contacts sync from my Address Book to phone to Google contacts to Plaxo to Linkedin, etc, etc.
• Every sermon I have every wrote over the last 8 years, every thought, two books in progress, and teaching, leadership lesson, etc are on my 120gb Macbook Pro that syncs to all my files on my work computer and many files synced to Google Documents.

I could keep going... my simply complicated life is wired! The internet and phone is down and I found myself sitting there dazed and confused. I would attempt to say most people, at least leaders/pastors/creatives are overly encompassed by their need of their tethered electronic world.

One thing to keep in mind is the people around us, your audience, the world around us is moving to a technologically attached mainframe. Many churches are looking at going to an internet campus. and looking at the internet as a viable asset to their churches.

The Denver Post wrote a great article on the role of technology in the church. Here is one important thought from the article that was very important:

“Church is not the Internet or a building — it’s people.” If the notion that a virtual community can be as real as a physical one seems crazy, you may be showing your age.

Thanks to online shopping, online dating, online social networking and online darn-near-everything-else, many young Americans don’t distinguish between their friends from school and those fromFacebook.

These youngsters just see them all as friends, said David Kinnaman, president of the Barna Group, a consulting firm that conducts survey research for churches and other religious groups.

In fact, Kinnaman’s firm predicts that by 2010, 10 percent of Americans will rely exclusively on the Internet for their religious experience.

10 percent! This is a moment that we must engage ourselves into our changing culture, we must ride the tide instead of chase the wave. That wave is understanding the language of the culture. A good friend of mine, Travis Clark defined culture in his blog as...

"...the "language" that people are currently speaking. And for us as leaders we must learn that "language" in order to engage the people."

If we do not begin to speak the language of our culture we become ignorant because we don't have the capacity to make intelligent conversation. The lanuguage is becoming more digital day by day.

Rhett Smith points out that the “front door” of churches is no longer a “physical” door:

Do we even realize that the physical building isn’t the front door anymore, but that the online world is the front door? If you don’t have a strong [online] presence, or aren’t telling a good story online, which is the front door–will you be able to bring people from the online world, to the physical front door of the church?

For the moment that we had no internet I realized that my "online" and "offline" are one in the same. As a matter of fact when it happend that for almost a whole day I was "offline" my life felt wierd. I belive for many that line will begin to blur more as more generations rise up with a connected lifestyle. Online and offline is simply becoming 'life', simple and functional.

As Justin Wise says, "If you (and your church) don’t begin to understand and learn to speak the language of this younger generation, no amount of catch-up and “digital cramming” will help in as little as five years."

One thing I have been thinking about and not really heard much buzz around it but guarantee if I searched hard enough over at churchmarketingsucks.com or beyondrelevance.com I could find a post on the topic of the difference between consumers that come to you/your church website versus the future of the consumer that is wanting you to feed them your information. We need to rethink how we are getting information to people, feeders and aggregates are the futures muscle for getting people information. Every person pretty much carries a cell phone, they are your mobile consumers, get them the information they want in their hands which is convenient. We need to begin to think smarter not harder.

So are you able to engage your culture in a whole new way? Does the digital language something you are willing to tackle? Are you willing to translate the previous language to the digital language?

So let me ask you, are these patterns happening in your local church? Does the ends justify the means?

...read more on "Digital Breathe - Living Simply Complicated"!

Twitteranked and Self-Branding

"Twitteranked? Sweet now I can see how good I am really doing. 14.47, what a loser!

(click on the picture to read the full story)

Notice how I got twitteranked 17 hours ago then low and behold my great friend, God, updated me 10 minutes ago that I was scammed! It coulda been worse than it really was, I guess that's why God was 16 hours and 50 minutes late, the guy likes teaching me lessons.

It is amazing how Twitter or Facebook or Myspace or any other aggregate feeds and social networks create such a desire of self-branding. I will rabbit trail for a moment on 3 studs of professional self-branders, for the simple point for you to realize that...

"Anyone doing anything better than you is providing you the resources, strategies, and ideas for you to be better than you already are." - Me

• Seth Godin, who is a business genius and has an amazing ability to see what many others don't. He made famous the idea of permission marketing, which is as simple as it sounds. He has three elements that is seen in most of his writings. First, he realizes that advertisers can't command the attention of anyone they choose (great thought for church leaders in a post-modern world, that is basically post-modern marketing). Second, consumers are gaining more power, which means more respect, truthfulness and less bias on the marketers (more here for the church leader, are we slow to teach and explain theology in a philosophical way, why are so many Christian college students leaving? They lack the ability to argue theology philosophically). And third, the only way a product or idea will be spread, is that it has earned a buzz by being remarkable. (church leaders please re-read that then repeat two more times. Are we making a buzz in our culture, making a buzz in our community, neighborhood?!?)
  
• Josh Spear, is a youth specialist, trendsetter who saw the blog-phenomenon as a major thread in credible form of media. He, via his blog, has set out to be a "source of inspiration for marketers, brand managers, advertising executives, and a wide range of everyday people from around the world who love to stay ahead of the curve." (What could the church leader be looking into as the next main thread of getting into people's minds and hearts? Are you looking or are you doing tomorrow what you did yesterday?)
  
• Brian Shaler, this guy is one of my favorites, he's a jumper! He's a web developer, marketer, writer, speaker and photographer. He banks the term self-brander, probably one of the best in the field.

Now back to the original post before the rabbit grabbed my attention. In our personal seeking to be self-promoters which by all means we should be. Every human has something to market. The professional business person, themselves, their resume, their accolades, their education. The homeless, their loss, their story, their history. The Christian, their purpose, their life, their hope, their calling.

Our postmodern world leads us to be self-marketers, people want to know you, what you think and what you identify with. What is your brand? Your brand highly dictates your audience, your audience highly dictates your success. Many people get in the wrong arenas and begin to self-promote and fail because they had the wrong audience. You must sell your GENIUS, the Geenie-in-us. What is it in you that is special, that is magical, that sets you apart. Make your story and begin to sell it. Every person has an audience, a circle of people that are influenced by you. One general question I ask is who is your mentor and who are you mentoring?

Your audience was created because of your brand, now learn to market to that audience to hear the best message they have ever heard. For you Christians, be real, authentic, take off the mask regardless how ugly it is beneath the whitewash, then allow your audience to hear the best spoken message God has given voice to. Be an eikon, be the representation of God into your world not just in word but in action and deed too.

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TechKrunch

Two big moves have began to revolutionize my tech blood. Those of you who haven't realized it, we all have tech blood, the blood that pumps for technology and finding new ways to network and build relationships and see the computer age as a tool. Of course a lot of this centered around the social networking aspect. The two areas that has my blood pumping are Twitter, now this is not new, I have been using Twitter faithfully for well over a year. The newest one is Utterz, not like the utters on a cow that I had assumed it meant, more like the sayings we utter. I seem to explain to many people regularly what Twitter is and try to get them to understand the micro-blog craze. To be honest this type of blog, true blogging, is the most difficult for me, I seem to underestimate the commitment it takes to keep up with my desires for blogging. Welcome Twitter, the world of micro-blogging. Now that I have unlimited texting it makes this service great. One can send micro-blogs such as, "Hanging with the family" or "Going to see The Incredible Hulk" and anyone who is following you can get your updates as well as you can receive anybodys updates via texts for whoever you are following.

Ministry related, our youth ministry, eikon student ministries has it's own Twitter and at the beginning of our services I have students follow us and we send out 'tweets' to all the students who are following us. My philosophy is instead of fighting the war of phones and texting in services we have decided to fight fire with fire. Unbelievably, unexpected satisfaction is all I can say as a result. Currently as of this post we have 136 followers following us. This is just students who have shuffled through our services or some parents as well. We know students are forwarding texts as well so hopefully our tweets are getting forwarded too. Another big use for this is the ability to send updates for events and reminders to students. I believe this is one of those tools if you do not get in now you will be regretting it later.

Now on to Utterz, a social aggregate. The Utterz website allows you to send in pictures, text messages and audio or video recordings via your cell phone then it has it's own mico-blog on it's website. Now what some of you are thinking, just another site to keep up and manage... not true. It's all how you use it, because it's and aggregater it shoots it to a host of other blog/micro-blogs. So if I send in a photo on my phone it sends it to utter.com then Utterz posts it to my Twitter and this blog as well, all on it's own. Another powerful well thought out tool of utterz is the ability to send in a photo then it gives you ten minutes to send in voice recording, text messages, or video and it automatically attaches it to that post.

P.S. Ok I decided to throw in another HOT tool on the net. Pinger, amongst the best tools available. Pinger allows you the ability to upload all your contacts then build groups if you need to then you call a specific number that Pinger provides and you speak the name of the person or group then at the tone leave a voice mail. That voice mail is then delivered to that person/group as a text message that they click on to listen to. There is even an option to get text replies once the recpient/group listened to the VM. The receiver also can hit reply and send you a message back. This is amazing if you want to send 15 people a message and don't have the 15-20 minutes to talk. This is a lifesaver and yet still personal. Voice is always more personal then a text, heres a mixture of both.

All around us are tools that are coming onto the scene. We must always be looking at ways for networking and finding new ways to be a part of our world. The truth is we are moving into a highly social networking enviroment that we can try to be on the front line of and ride the waves. I don't feel it will let up as soon as some speculate. This wave will have lasting affects just like the iPod changed how we listened to music the social network will change how we interlink in our world. If you have any tools that would be useful comment on this blog and share. I would love to hear your thoughts on the direction for the future of social networking. I have a lot of input and some really great ideas. If you are a programmer leaver feedback, maybe we can get in touch and share some ideas that I ahve that could change a lot of our culture.

www.twitter.com/shaunmayfield
www.twitter.com/eikonlive
www.utterz.com/pastorshaun
www.twittervision.com for fun.

...read more on "TechKrunch"!

Slashdot | Microsoft Says Firefox Not a Threat to IE

Microsoft never ceases to amaze me at there stupidty of brilliance. Once again M$ makes public fools of themselves...
Slashdot | Microsoft Says Firefox Not a Threat to IE: "'A CNET article claims that 'just days after the launch of open-source browser Firefox 1.0, Microsoft executives defended Internet Explorer, saying it is no less secure than any other browser and doesn't lack any important features.' It's also interesting to note that these statements made by Steve Vamos, Microsoft Australia's managing director, come with no knowledge of what Firefox has to offer as he admits not even installing or using Firefox.'"

Only pure brilliance would say diss something without trying it, nah, don't think so.

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