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Facebook Groups are one of the most under-utilized tools for online ministry. Every church needs a Facebook Group to help build community and communicate. What if I told you, there are three simple secrets that will help you launch (or re-launch) your ministry’s Facebook Group successfully.

Join me for a week-long FREE online workshop hosted on Facebook to help you get started with a Facebook Group for your church. We’ll be starting the week of February 22nd

Click Here to Register

3 Secrets To Launch A Succesful Facebook Group For Your Church

The post Learn How Facebook Groups Can Help You Grow Your Church appeared first on FaithEngineer.

If you are like most church leaders I know, you are exhausted from trying to establish an online ministry. I’ve talked to many pastors and leaders who are discouraged and frustrated, not knowing where to even begin.
For over a decade, I’ve been helping churches develop online ministries to reach their communities, and I want to do something to help even more churches during the pandemic.

I will be offering a free week-long workshop on Facebook to help church leaders develop a Facebook posting strategy that is effective and easy to implement. There are several Facebook secrets that most church leaders don’t know! I’ll guide you through the process, and help you develop a posting plan that is customized for your church. You can use Facebook to create conversations and build relationships with people in your church and in your community. We can do discipleship from a distance!

This workshop will start the week of November 16th, and I will be sharing the lessons I’ve learned about how to schedule posts, how to automate your process, and how to repurpose your teaching and sermon content to reach more people.  If you are interested in learning more, please sign up for the free workshop here.

And I have a big favor to ask. Help share this post with other church leaders who you think this free course would benefit. I really believe this workshop will have the potential to help churches be more effective in making disciples in their own communities.

The post Do You Need a Customized Facebook Posting Strategy for Your Church? appeared first on FaithEngineer.

I’m excited to announce the launch of a new project. I have a passion for helping other churches, and I’ve been crazy busy the past six months helping churches navigate the new world online ministry. I want to help more churches, but I am limited in my time. So I am launching a new website focused on helping smaller and mid-sized churches learn how to do online ministry effectively. As a pastor, I have learned how to take complex issues and explain them in a way that anyone can understand, and with this website, I plan on helping simplify the complexity of online ministry.

I will be sharing blog posts, tools and tips, and even online courses to help you learn how to use your website, social media, and livestreaming to reach your community for Christ and grow your church. I will also be launching a new Facebook Group for online ministry. But first, visit the website and signup to receive your free PDF guide to my favorite tools and tips for online ministry.

https://onlineministrymadesimple.com

The post My Newest Project – Announcing Online Ministry Made Simple appeared first on FaithEngineer.

Davinci Resolve 16 by Blackmagic Design is an excellent choice for editing videos and is quickly becoming a favorite of seasoned video editors. And did I mention that they offer the base version for free for Mac and Windows? Davinci Resolve was a high end Hollywood color grading and correction software that was bought by Blackmagic Design in 2009. They have continued improving it and changed their pricing model so that it is now free. I have been using it now for the last year, and I have been blown away by the power, ease of use, and functionality it offers. In fact, I removed Final Cut Pro from my computer because I prefer Davinci Resolve. I love the multi-cam clips feature for quickly switching between camera angles, and the color correction and audio editing features are excellent.

If you never have used an NLE (non-linear editing system), you may be a little overwhelmed when you first load up the software. The tabs on the bottom of the screen guide you through the editing process. You have tabs for ..

• Media – This is where you import audio, videos, and photos that you will use. You can also organize everything here.
• Cut – This is a quick editing mode that will remind you of iMovie. It lets you quickly put your clips in order. I use it occasionally, but I typically jump right to the next tab.
• Edit – This is where the heavy lifting occurs. You will spend most of your time in this module getting everything edited as you like
• Fusion – This is where you can do advanced compositions. You can compare this to Apple Motion or Adobe After Effects. It has a steeper learning curve, but it is very powerful.
• Color – Davinci Resolve is the industry leader here. You can quickly do color correction and color grading. Again, you may need to watch tutorials to get started, but it’s amazing how you can use tracking and selective color grading.
• Fairlight – Davinci also has an advanced audio editor. This is where you can use audio plugins, mix different sources, and even record voiceover tracks.
• Deliver – This is how you export your final project. Davinci Resolve gives you plenty of presets and walks you through the process.

They do offer a full studio version of the program for $299, but I don’t think most churches would ever need the full version. If you do, then you likely have a media department and technology budget so the cost won’t be a problem. If you are looking for a better video editing platform, then you really need to check out Davinci Resolve 16.

Here is a longer video to show you the latest features. It will give you a glimpse of how powerful the software is.

Real-World Examples

I’ve been using Resolve for sermon recap videos. Here is one I did from our message last week for Facebook and InstagramTV (IGTV). I was able to track my motion using automation, add subtitles, and add background music.

And here is one last example from my son. He has also learned how to use Resolve, and he used it to record and edit his latest music video. He used color grading extensively throughout the video. This really shows you what you can do easily with Resolve.

Finally, click here to access great training videos and a training guide pdf.

The post A Great Free Video Editor for Churches appeared first on FaithEngineer.

I haven’t shared before about the Blackmagic ATEM series of livesteam mixers, but they work great for small to mid-sized churches. Don’t let the name fool you, they offer great equipment at a low cost. There are now three different models to choose from, the ATEM Mini, the ATEM Mini Pro, and the ATEM Mini Pro ISO.

So, you may be wondering, how can I use this in my church. If you want to transition to using multiple cameras, this is a great device to help you livestream. You can connect up to 4 HDMI sources including cameras and/or computer inputs, and then switch between them for your livestream. The Mini Pro gives you the ability to actually stream without a computer, and the Mini Pro ISO adds the ability to record all your different sources and edit them after you are finished. You can even use these with Zoom or any other software that uses a webcam.

The prices start at an affordable level as well. The ATEM Mini retails for $295, the ATEM Mini Pro is $595, and the ATEM Mini Pro ISO is $895.  For me, the ISO features are great, and that is the one I would shoot for, but the Mini Pro is also a great device. They are extremely hard to find right now because the demand is so high. I typically share amazon links, but for these, I wouldn’t trust third-party sellers.

Check out their website to find more information about all three devices.

Simply connect ATEM Mini and you can switch live between 4 high quality video camera inputs for dramatically better quality images. Or connect a computer for PowerPoint slides or gaming consoles. The built in DVE allows exciting picture in picture effects, perfect for commentary! There are loads of video effects too! All ATEM Mini models have USB that works like a webcam so you can use any streaming software while the ATEM Mini Pro model adds live streaming and recording to USB disks.

Here’s a great video review I found today about their newest product.

The streaming bridge is also a great addition. This would work great for churches needing to share the livestream in other parts of their building for overflow rooms or multiple venues. At only $245, it’s a great value.

The post Check out the new Blackmagic ATEM Mini Pro ISO for Livestreaming appeared first on FaithEngineer.

I want to encourage you that your goal is not to be slick and polished and produced, your goal is to communicate effectively. I was reminded of this while watching the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon which was recorded from his phone at home. Don’t compare your livestream to larger churches, but also know that it’s amazing what you can accomplish on a small budget.

1) Option 1 – Livestream using a phone.

This can work fine if you mount the phone on a tripod and keep it close to the person speaking. You can buy a moment telephoto lens for phones, but I don’t think it would work well to mount the phone in the back of the sanctuary for most churches. And, the big key to using a phone for streaming is audio quality. I really recommend getting the audio for the livestream from the soundboard. You can connect the audio from the soundboard into your phone using a trrs to trs adapter, or a device like the iRig Pre, Smartrig, or Tascam iXZ. If you want to use a microphone with your phone, then check out your options from my last post.

2) Option 2 – Use a streaming device like the Mevo camera.

This is a unique little camera that can be controlled from a phone or iPad. It streams directly to Facebook or Youtube without a computer. You can read my review here which shares the pros and cons. It does need to be very close to the front of the church and you do need good wifi in the building. Our church used this when we first started but quit using probably 2 years ago because we wanted better quality. You can hook up the audio from the soundboard to the iPad that is controlling the camera using the same methods as above. It works pretty well, and I know several area churches that are using it with good results.

3) Option 3 Use Switcher Studio.

SwitcherStudio is the program/platform that we now use at our church. Basically, you can use multiple iPhones as cameras, and you can switch between them using an iPad. Like Mevo, you don’t need a separate computer and you can hook up the audio from the soundboard to the iPad controlling everything. We use cheap prepaid iPhones and remove the sim card and use them over the wifi network. We have a low ceiling and poles in our building that work well as mounts. The phones are small enough that they are not too obtrusive. One thing I really like about Switcher is that you can use your worship computer lyrics (Mac or PC) as a camera feed using the Swithercast program. If you have seen any of our recent livestreams, this is what we use. I even use it at home when we have had to cancel services for snow. SwitcherStudio is a little expensive for smaller churches, but I feel it is still a great value for the simplicity it provides. It currently costs around $30 per month, but we got in earlier when it was much cheaper. Here is our latest livestream to show you a few possibilities. To do lower thirds, we cropped the picture-in-picture vertically and moved it to the bottom of the screen.

4) Option 4 – Use a camcorder or DSLR and computer.

This gives you the most flexibility and power, but it also costs the most money. You will need a camcorder with HDMI or SDI output, a capture device to receive the input the video into the computer, and a video mixing application on your computer.

If you can’ place a camera close to the stage, this is your best choice. Here is an excellent video I found earlier this week explaining the basic setup.

You would take the HDMI feed from the camera and input it into a computer using a video capture card like the Elgato Cam Link 4K. There are more advanced capture cards that let you bring in multiple HDMI or SDI inputs. Then you would use a program like OBS (which is free), or Ecamm Live(on mac), or VMix(on windows). These programs let you mix the various feeds live, and you can also add in lower third graphics for lyrics, and incorporate your worship computer graphics. As you can guess, things can get complicated quickly, but you do have a lot of options

There are many more options I haven’t discussed, like using a hardware switcher like the Roland VR-1HD AV or the Blackmagic Design ATEM Television Studio HD Live Production Switcher. With a hardware switcher, you can bypass the mixing software on your computer. I also didn’t mention using a Robotic PTZ camera like the PTZOptics-20X camera. These can be controlled from a joystick, from a mobile device, or even through VMix. These cameras work well for hard to reach mounting areas.

So, that’s a lot of info to research and think about. But for the best quality livestream you will need …

1) a good internet connection. For 720p quality, you will need about a 4Mbps upload speed. You can test using speedtest.net If you have a lower speed, you would probably need to stream at standard definition instead of HD

2) good audio. This is what really makes a livestream go from just ok to amazing. We not only take the audio from our soundboard, but we mix a completely different mix using an aux mix. We do a mix using headphones to customize the sound for our livestream. We have a digital board so we do a few other things like EQ and compression to help the livestream. Here is a great video to help with the livestream audio.

Here are a few products I mentioned in this blog post. Disclaimer, some of the hardware and service links are affiliate links. I only recommend products that I use and like, and the affiliate links help cover the cost of running this blog.

The post How to Start Livestreaming Your Church Service appeared first on FaithEngineer.

Thankfully, you have several options to improve the audio in your videos. I’ve seen many pastors doing either interview style videos or simply sharing information as they look at the camera. For most social media videos, I typically use my iPhone with a microphone connected. The main microphone I use for online videos is the Audio Technica ATR3350. For under $30, you can have a good quality wired lapel microphone that hooks directly into your mobile phone or camera. I also have a Shure MV88 condenser microphone that I use for music and for when I need to record multiple people. There are more expensive options out there, but these work well for live videos on social media. I’ve included a few more options below.

So the next time you want to share a video online, think about improving the audio. It only takes a second to hook up a microphone, and you’ll see a remarkable difference.

Here are a few products I mentioned in the blog post. Disclaimer, some of the hardware and service links are affiliate links. I only recommend products that I use and like, and the affiliate links help cover the cost of running this blog.

The post Better Audio For Your Online Videos appeared first on FaithEngineer.

I’ve still not shared much publicly about what happened, in part because I’m still trying to process everything that happened. Thankfully, it didn’t do any major damage to my heart, and I want to share more about my experience in hopes of helping others. I apologize in advance for the long post, but many of you don’t know the details of what happened.

What Happened

We were moving my daughter into college for her freshman year at Anderson University in Anderson, South Carolina. On the Sunday after move-in, we met early to go to church with her before leaving. It was a hot morning, and we waited outside for a long time. As we were walking towards the auditorium, I started feeling really bad. I broke out in a cold sweat, and I was struggling to catch my breath. I had minor chest pain, but it really wasn’t that bad. Even with all those symptoms, I just thought it was the heat and lack of food on a Sunday morning. I made it through the church service (we sat on the front row), and I still was having minor chest pain. I thought it must be heartburn, and I didn’t think much about it. I was also enjoying the message at chapel that morning by Clayton King. In hindsight, it’s really pretty obvious that I should have gone to the Emergency Room, but at the time, I just rationalized all my symptoms. In fact, I kept feeling rough for a couple more days. Then I was fine. Or so I thought.

About a week later, I woke up in the middle of the night with chest pain again. I was short of breath again as well. This time, I went to a local urgent care later that morning to get checked out, although I was sure it was just heartburn. They did an EKG but didn’t find anything abnormal. Just in case, they took some blood to send off for lab work and then sent me home with instructions to treat my heartburn. After about 8 or 10 hours, I starting feeling better and even went to my son’s cross country meet and ran around the field to cheer him on.

Jennifer and I left for Boone, North Carolina that evening to get away for a few days, and it was there when I received the phone call that I was not expecting. The lab had sent back the results of my bloodwork, and I quickly found out that my troponin levels were elevated and showed that I had a heart attack. The doctor instructed me to go straight to the emergency room and let them know what was happening. At the hospital, they immediately did another blood test, which found my levels were still elevated and they decided to do an immediate cardiac catheterization. Within thirty minutes of arriving at the hospital, I was under anesthesia and having my heart examined. It all happened so fast that I didn’t have time to process what was actually happening. I really was in shock.

They found a complete blockage in my left anterior descending artery, but the location of the occlusion was at the very end of the artery so they were unable to place a stent. If the location of the blockage had been anywhere else in the artery, I probably wouldn’t be here today. That type of heart attack has been termed the widow-maker for a reason.

Why it Happened

That’s the unanswered question. My cardiologists are still not sure why it happened. I did have an unusually low level of “good” HDL cholesterol, so my ratio of LDL to HDL put me at risk for a heart attack. Even though my overall cholesterol was only around 100 at the time of the heart attack, I was still in danger.  I had been running some earlier in the week before my first episode with heart pain. I ran over two miles, but I went back and checked my Apple Watch and found that my heart rate was pushing 200 during the run. However, there is really no way to know what caused it. For now, my focus is on preventing it from happening again.

How My Life Has Changed

I have never taken any medicine. I rarely even take an Advil or Tylenol. But now, I’m on several medications for my heart. Basically, they want to slow my heart down and lower my blood pressure. I’m also on medicine to lower my cholesterol so that my LDL levels stay low. Thankfully, over the past 15 months, my medications have been lowered multiple times. The new normal for my life is focusing on exercise, keeping my heart rate under control, and watching what I eat. Although I ate healthy before, I have been trying to be more careful in what I eat.

The heart attack has given me a new appreciation for my family and church. Jennifer has been amazing through this whole ordeal, and my church has supported me every step of the way. I have cherished the time I have with my children, and I’m enjoying every moment I get to spend with them.

I’m also supposed to lower my stress level. But with my role as pastor, that’s something I’m continuing to work on. The work of a pastor is high stress. Pastors have to deal with conflict in the church, financial struggles, and criticism. Our church has been awesome, but we are not immune to people struggling. I’ve heard that pastors must have tough skin and a soft heart, and I’m still working on both.

What I Want to Share With You

First, don’t take your life for granted. Every breath you take is a gift from God. So use your life to make a difference! God comes first, then your family, and then work. At times in my life, I have let ministry take priority over my family. I’m trying hard to not do that anymore. It’s hard to explain, but I feel my heart attack has brought our family closer together. My wife has been supportive and strong, and has really helped me to keep my focus on Christ throughout this experience.

Second, learn the symptoms of a heart attack and take them seriously. Don’t do what I did and try to explain them away. I thought all heart attacks consisted of acute pain and unmistakable symptoms. I’ve learned that symptoms can be very mild, and they are a warning sign that you need help. I thought I was too healthy to have a heart attack, and it almost cost me dearly.

From the American Heart Association

Don’t wait to get help if you experience any of these heart attack warning signs. Some heart attacks are sudden and intense. But most start slowly, with mild pain or discomfort. Pay attention to your body and call 911 if you experience:

• Chest discomfort. Most heart attacks involve discomfort in the center of the chest that lasts more than a few minutes – or it may go away and then return. It can feel like uncomfortable pressure, squeezing, fullness or pain.
• Discomfort in other areas of the upper body. Symptoms can include pain or discomfort in one or both arms, the back, neck, jaw or stomach.
• Shortness of breath. This can occur with or without chest discomfort.
• Other signs. Other possible signs include breaking out in a cold sweat, nausea or lightheadedness.

I’ll be sharing more about what I’ve learned and the changes I’ve made in my life. Thanks for reading and I appreciate your continued prayers. 

The post Reflections From The Heart appeared first on FaithEngineer.

It has been exciting to see the transformation. However, with the political events and civil unrest of the past year, much of that progress has been lost. This year we saw real hunger in the villages. And we experienced true gratitude for providing medical care and hot food. Unemployment has dramatically increased this year, and the villages are growing as many people return to their village from the city.

That’s why this year’s MannaFest is so important. The hunger and the need continues to grow, and Don and Pam and the BWCM team are faithful to meet that need. Will you consider giving this Christmas season to help provide food to those in need? For only $10, a family of six can be fed for an entire week! Think about that! If our family goes out to eat at a restaurant, it is rarely under $50. For that amount, 30 people can be fed for a week.

You really can make a difference. I have developed so many great friendships with the pastors and leaders in both Honduras and Nicaragua, and I encourage you to help support them in their time of need. Our family will be donating, will you? Go to www.bwcm.org to donate.

James 2:15-17 (ESV)
15 If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? 17 So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.

The post Caring for Nicaragua appeared first on FaithEngineer.

During the past 18 months, my two oldest children have started college. But the biggest surprise was that I had a completely unexpected heart attack. I’ve also continued to serve as a lead pastor. With all the responsibilities I had, I felt like I needed to simplify and that’s why the blog has been silent for a while.

If you are still subscribed and are reading this, I’ve got lots of ideas and posts that I’m wanting to share. Here’s what you can expect

• What I’m learning about new church technology
• What I’m learning about my health and heart
• What I’m learning about the intersection of faith and culture as we navigate through a divided nation
• What I’m learning about audio equipment and In-ear monitors while running sound for my son’s band
• What I’m learning about church websites and hosting, and how churches need to rethink their web strategy
• and lots more!

So … I hope you’ll join me on this journey. This blog was started all the way back in 2006, and it has been an online journal of what I’ve learned along the way. Thanks for being patient as I’ve taken a break.

The post It’s Been A While … appeared first on FaithEngineer.

Saved and Maranatha are both excellent themes with very distinct appearances. I like Maranatha for its smooth appearance and call to action.  I like Saved for its ability to be easily customized.  Saved gives you the ability to add any widget to your homepage. For power users, this really opens up a huge opportunity to customize the homepage.

Saved is an ultra-premium WordPress theme for making an incredible church website. With its bold design and super easy customization, Saved helps you create a website that reflects your church’s personality.

Saved makes building your church website easy too — especially the homepage. Included is a powerful drag-and-drop homepage builder. Simply enter the Customizer then add the widgets of your choice while watching the live preview. No complicated page builder plugin needed. Saved makes web design easy for anybody.

Saved offers the ability to easily add sermons, events, staff listings, locations, and blog updates to your website, and the theme makes everything fit together perfectly. It really is a great looking, high-quality theme.

Here are a few screenshots to give you an overview, but remember that you can easily customize your site’s colors, logos, and fonts.

Churchthemes excels in offering great documentation with their themes, including screenshots and video tutorials. Their guides are great at helping you get started, even if you don’t have much experience with WordPress. They also follow WordPress best practices so that you won’t be stuck with your theme. You can easily switch to any of their themes without losing all your hard work. Their prices are reasonable, although not cheap, you get great support and quality. When it comes to WordPress themes, you really do get what you pay for.

If you are interested in purchasing the theme or reading more about it, check out my affiliate link to find out more.

Click here to learn more about Churchthemes.com

(note: the links to churchthemes.com are my affiliate links, so I will receive a commission for any sales through this link. I only recommend what I use and believe in!)

The post Saved – Another Great WordPress Theme from Churchthemes.com appeared first on FaithEngineer.

The Bible Project also has a downloadable reading plan and they also have several reading plans on YouVersion that use the same videos. Check out the video below for more information about the Read Scripture app.

The post ReadScripture – A Great App to Read and Study Scripture appeared first on FaithEngineer.

Here are the basic steps you will need to follow.

1. Record the audio
2. Upload the audio to your website or podcast provider
3. Create the Podcast feed and submit it to different services

Let’s break it down step by step.

Record the Audio

This is an important step. Many smaller churches have poor audio quality which results in a podcast that is hard to listen to.  You have several options, but I recommend recording the audio directly from the soundboard if possible. On many newer digital boards, you can record directly to a SD card or attached USB external drive. This would work great for sermons. Check out the QSC Touchmix, Presonus Studiolive, or Behringer X32 series for easy to use digital soundboards.

If you have an older analog system, you can use an aux feed or tape out jacks to connect to a digital recorder or CD recorder. Recording directly from the board can eliminate static hum and ambient noise that a handheld recorder or camcorder will capture.

If you want more information on how to record the sermon audio, check out my detailed post about recording audio. I also talk about how to edit and save the file in the correct mp3 format for podcasts.

One final note, if you have static hum, find out what is causing it and fix it. Hum can be removed by many audio editing programs like audacity after you finish recording, but the resulting file can sound robotic. It is much easier to fix the problems at the source. Hum is usually caused by ground loop problems in your sound system. You can use direct boxes with a ground lift setting, or hum eliminators for computers or devices hooked up to sound system.

Upload the Audio

This will require some research. First, you will need to check with your website provider. If you don’t’ have a website, then I suggest you stop right here and pick one that offers podcast support. Many church website providers have built-in podcasting support, so you will need to find out how to upload your audio and create a feed.

I highly recommend doing your own website using WordPress. Using the self-hosted WordPress system, you can easily add a theme from ChurchThemes and end up with a great looking and easy to use church website. You will have the added benefit of being able to sort through your sermons by author, topic, scripture, and series.  ChurchThemes has a great tutorial section on their website sharing how this works.

If you use another website service that doesn’t offer built-in podcasting, you will have to use a third party system to store your audio files. You can look at Buzzsprout, Libsyn, BluBrry, or SoundCloud. These will require a monthly fee, and are a little more complicated to setup and embed on your website, but you can still end up with a great result.

Submit the Podcast Feed

Now comes the fun part. Depending on which system you use, you will have to find the podcast feed that is generated for you. This will be an RSS feed that you will submit to iTunes and the other providers. Each system is different, but a quick google search can help you find the info you need. For WordPress websites using a theme from ChurchThemes, you will find the necessary info on their podcasting guide. For our church WordPress site, I use the Blubrry Powerpress plugin to add additional information to the podcast feed. If you use WordPress, it will work with any theme and create the podcast feed for you.

I recommend submitting the RSS feed to iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, and TuneIn. Here is a great online guide that will help you with the basics of submitting your feed.

Submission Links

• iTunes Podcast Connect
• Stitcher
• Google Play
• TuneIn

Here are a few products I mentioned in the blog post. Disclaimer, some of the hardware and service links are affiliate links. I only recommend services that I use and like, and the affiliate links help cover the cost of running this blog.

[amazon_link asins=’B00KDX7TC6,B01LYR17NK,B008R7F382,B0002E4YI8,B00BARTW3I,B00JYFAWMS,B003QKBVYK’ template=’ProductGrid’ store=’faithe-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’5128bc6c-af53-11e7-b8f5-3d7ba8285f8b’]

The post Sermon Podcasting Tutorial for Small Churches (updated) appeared first on FaithEngineer.

Watch the video below and let me know what you think. I think it would work well for building entire sermon series and doing long-range sermon planning. It works by letting you create your sermon in a modular layout. You can build the sermon block by block, and use resources to help you pull everything together.  Click here to view the Kickstarter campaign.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/justintrapp/sermonary

The post Check out this new app for Pastors on Kickstarter appeared first on FaithEngineer.

A growing problem in many families is learning how to monitor your children’s usage of mobile devices. Between cell phones, tablets, laptops, and gaming systems, it seems like our children are constantly being tempted to spend more and more time online. So as a parent, how can we monitor and protect our children? We need to ask ourselves if we are allowing them to become addicted to technology at the expense of real life relational connections.  As a parent and pastor, I have seen so many examples of children and teenagers who are exposed and even addicted to pornography at a young age. This is a serious issue, and I’m afraid we are underestimating the effects of unlimited and uncontrolled internet access for kids. For several years, we have used free internet filtering by OpenDNS in our home, and that is a good first step, but what if you want more control?

Meet Circle, a relatively new device designed to manage the internet usage in your family. It is a device that works with your router in your home to monitor your family. You can set time limits for individual apps, you can filter unsafe internet sites, and you can even pause the internet during meals or during the night. It allows you to customize the access for each member of your family by age and by device.

After you purchase Circle (here’s my Amazon affiliate link for Circle), it is easy to setup. It then monitors and controls all your devices that are connected to your home network. If your children have mobile phones, I highly recommend that you check out Circle Go. For a subscription fee of $9.99 a month, you can manage up to 10 devices anywhere, whether they are connected to your home network or not.  This is really a great solution to protecting your family.

Meet the new way for families to filter content, set time limits and even pause the internet across all your technology and devices… Meet Circle. It’s a tiny box. A simple phone app. Plus, a little magic.With Circle, you can control all the devices in your home with an easy to use app and keep up with what your kids are doing online.

Here are a few videos to show you how it works.

https://youtu.be/RZWXrqYTgk0

Let me know if you are using it and your thoughts. I think this is really helpful for parents with young children, pre-teens, and teenagers.

[amazon_link asins=’B019RC1EI8′ template=’ProductAd’ store=’faithe-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’6a92d795-2a83-11e7-ac2a-83be1171467e’]

The post Protecting Your Family Online with Circle appeared first on FaithEngineer.

This movie really makes you think about how Christians are called to serve and help those in need. During the Ebola outbreak, it was the Christian relief agencies who stepped in to provide medical care, not the government. When everyone else was running away from the problem, believers rose to the challenge to help. The movie makes us all think about our faith and compassion. Will we choose compassion over fear? Will we be willing to help when others are running away? Will we run into the fire to help?

The movie will only be shown one additional time on April 10th. Go to the website at facingdarknessmovie.com to find a theater near you and buy tickets. This is a movie that will really let you see God at work around the world, and it reminds us that miracles still happen.

As the Ebola pandemic was sweeping across West Africa in the spring of 2014, one organization was willing to step up and fully commit its people and resources to provide comfort, compassion, and care to the hurting people of Africa … all in the Name of Jesus. But when the deadly virus infected its own medical personnel, including Dr. Kent Brantly, the epic crisis truly hit home for Samaritan’s Purse and its leader Franklin Graham. FACING DARKNESS tells the incredible true story of how—with only faith, determination, and prayer—the ministry moved mountains … and God performed a miracle!

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Over the last few years, I’ve recommended and used WordPress as a great solution for websites. WordPress is no longer just for blogs, it’s a great solution for churches and small businesses as well.  You can get started with WordPress.com which is the entry level version that is hosted for you. However, if you really want to explore the power and flexibility of WordPress, you need to try out WordPress.org, which is the self-hosted version. The self-hosted version allows you to use custom themes and plugins to extend the functionality of your website, but you will need to pay for web hosting.

If you want to experiment with WordPress, but if you don’t have your own web hosting, then here is a neat solution for you. The hosting company FlyWheel offers a local development system appropriately called Local.  This turns your own computer into a web hosting system so that you can play around with WordPress and develop sites locally without having to use a web host.

Website designers use systems like these to design new websites. Once the sites are designed, they can be uploaded to a server. A great use for churches is to copy over your existing WordPress site to try out new themes. It’s also a good way to try out updates without affecting your live site.

NOTE: this still takes some skill and experience, but this is the easiest local development system I have ever used. I’ve used MAMP before, but this is really much more simple to use. It’s available on Mac currently, with a Windows version available in BETA. If you want to get involved in website design or learn more about WordPress, here’s your chance.

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A couple of years ago, God gave me an idea to write a book about small town ministry.  I’ve started working on it, and I am now working on a proposal.  I’ve been researching and reading books about ministry in small towns, so I wanted to share a few that I have found helpful.

If you are a small-town pastor, please don’t feel discouraged. The impact that you can have on your community is enormous. Don’t base your success on comparisons to the latest and greatest megachurch, but instead, base your success on your faithfulness to reaching and serving your community.

Small Town Jesus: Taking the gospel mission seriously in seemingly unimportant places

This is a great book that has a lot of practical information to help small town pastors understand how to reach their communities. The first section lays out the Biblical reasons on why we cannot and should not neglect reaching small towns for Jesus, and the second section gives you the practical advice on how you can be more effective. Click here to view on Amazon

Small towns are big mission fields that are almost totally neglected by modern church planters. City ministry has become, for many, the definition of godly ministry. But what about the millions of people around the world who live in small towns?

The Grasshopper Myth: Big Churches, Small Churches and the Small Thinking that Divides Us

If you are struggling with comparing yourself to larger pastors and churches, this is the book for you. Click here to view on Amazon

90% of the churches in the world have less than 200 people. What if that’s not a bad thing? What if smallness is an advantage God wants us to use, not a problem to fix? In The Grasshopper Myth, Karl Vaters takes on some of the unbiblical beliefs we’ve held about church growth, church size and God’s will for the last several decades. Then he offers a game plan for a New Small Church.

Transforming Church in Rural America

This is a great book about how a small church in Arkansas used technology to extend their reach in rural areas. Click here to view on Amazon

Small church buildings dotting the countryside are home to ministries that often struggle with limited attendance, no money, and little expectation that change can revitalize their future. In Transforming Church in Rural America, Pastor Shannon O’Dell shares a powerful vision of relevance, possibility, and excellence for these small churches.

Small Town Mission: A Guide for Mission-Driven Communities

This is another good book, although I would say that it is geared towards lay people more than pastors. It gives good practical advice on how you can reach communities for Christ through relational evangelism. Click here to view on Amazon

Small Town Mission is a practical guide for gospel-centered mission in small towns. If you haven’t noticed, people who live in small towns have limited options for restaurants, shopping, and books about mission. Small towns desperately need normal, everyday people like farmers, factory workers, teachers, secretaries, and small business owners who think and act like missionaries to reach their friends, neighbors, co-workers, and extended families for Christ.

All Amazon links are Amazon Affiliate Links. I receive a small commission on any purchases made which help me to support this site

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When the iPhone 7 was released, I took advantage of a generous trade-in promotion from Verizon to pick up the brand new iPhone 7 Plus.  Now that I’ve had it for a few months, I wanted to share my thoughts about it.

Size

I was really worried about going to the larger plus-sized phone from my iPhone 6. I’ve never had a big phone before, and I was skeptical about the larger size. But the camera on the new Phone really swayed me to the 7 Plus. After a few months, I’m glad I went with the larger phone. It still fits in my pocket, and I’ve adjusted great to the screen. I do a lot of reading on my iPhone using the Kindle app and the Bible app, and the new phone size really works well. In some ways, my iPhone has replaced my iPad and Kindle for most of my reading. I always have it with me and it’s convenient to just use it. Typing is also easier on the big screen, but it is a little tougher to hold it with one hand.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6dsRpVyyWs

Battery Life

One of the advantages of the larger phone is the longer battery life. It’s been nice making through the entire day without having to recharge. Although I’m sure that in two years the battery will lose a lot of its capacity. It seems that I always feel forced to upgrade at 2 years since my battery is almost shot.

Pictures

The biggest reason that I bought the iPhone 7 Plus was the new camera. I was very interested in having the dual camera system. The new bokeh/depth effect was a huge selling point for me. It uses the dual lens system to recreate the bokeh effect that you can get from using a DSLR with a shallow Depth of Field. I really don’t want to carry around another camera with me, so I was hoping this would work great for me and I have not been disappointed. Check out just a few of the pictures I have taken with it. I’m amazed by the quality of the camera, and I use the extra zoom length all the time.

Videos

I also want a phone that does a great job with video. We record a lot of our kid’s activities, so I want something that gives quality results. Again, the iPhone 7 Plus has really impressed me. It can record in 4k, but I typically just record in 1080p. Having the extra lens gives you the ability to zoom in without losing quality. Here’s a short recording of the band that my son plays in. I recorded this on a cheap monopod.  The floor was shaking so you see a little vibration, but the lens stabilization really helps.

Other Features (or lack of)

It’s waterproof, so I don’t have to worry about getting it wet or keeping it out of the rain.  The speakers are also louder than my old phone. One of the biggest complaints the phone has received is the lack of the headphone jack. It’s a little annoying, but it’s not a deal breaker for me since I have bluetooth earbuds. I’ve also put a good Spigen Hybrid Armor Case on the phone with a Spigen Glass Screen Protector.  I also went with the 128 Gig model so I can take plenty of photos and videos. However, with Google Photos backing everything up, I really don’t need all the extra space.

Overall

It’s debatable if we have become too dependent upon our phones, but they have become a huge part of our daily lives. For me, having constant access to YouVersion and the Logos Bible app is a huge time saver. I also can respond to emails without pulling out my laptop. I also use todoist and Google Calendar to keep track of my busy schedule.  I’m definitely wrapped up in the Apple ecosystem with my iPad, Macbook Air, Apple Watch, and now my iPhone 7 Plus, but I love how everything connects together.

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Here’s a quick survey that you can do during church. Ask how many people have a checkbook with them.  In one of our services, only 2 people raised their hand. Then ask how many have a smartphone. You’ll be amazed at the difference. Those 40 and under very rarely carry cash or checks. In fact, I can’t even remember the last time I wrote a check.  If your church depends on cash and checks for the offering, you will struggle to get the younger generation engaged in giving on Sunday mornings.

For a long time, churches have offered online giving through their websites, and that’s a great first step, but it’s not enough. Many online giving solutions are not mobile friendly. You have to go to the website, fill out forms that are designed for computer screens, and hope you followed all the steps correctly.  We are now seeing a shift from just online giving, to mobile focused giving solutions.  Services like Tithe.ly, Mogiv, PushPay (eChurchGiving), and Kindrid are leading the way to make giving through your mobile device easy to use.

What Our Church is Now Using – Tithe.ly

After evaluating and trying out different solutions, Cornerstone is now using Tithe.ly.  We are loving the simplicity of the app, and it offers a few features that set it apart from the other solutions. Here’s what we like about it:

Tithe.ly Provides a Mobile App to Simplify Giving

Download the app from the app store, locate your church, add your debit, credit, or bank account information, and give. It’s simple and it’s fast. You don’t have to remember a website, and you can give from anywhere. Tithe.ly does offer a website link that we use, and it works great. It is mobile friendly, and the design is simple and easy to use. We even integrate the link into our mobile app for our church. Here is a link to our website for online giving to our church. We’ve quickly increased our online giving to around 25% of our total giving at church.

Tithe.ly Offers One Time and Recurring Giving

It’s simple to setup your gift to repeat. Just choose how often you want it to recur, and it handles the rest. You can go to the app or website at any time to see your giving history. Churches can also setup different funds that can be selected for giving.

Tithe.ly Has a Simple Pricing Model

Tithe.ly has no monthly fee and the processing fees are simple.

• Credit & Debit 2.9% + 30¢
• ACH / Bank 1% + 30¢

Tithe.ly Provides an Option for Givers to Cover Processing Fees

This is something we really like. There is a checkbox to increase the amount of the gift to cover the processing fees. We have found most people will do this.

Tithe.ly Offers Text Giving

Finally, they also offer giving by texting for another $19 per month. We aren’t currently using this option, but it may be a good fit for younger churches. I personally feel that giving by text can be a little complicated compared to giving through an app.

So, if you are not offering online giving, why not? For no monthly fee, you can quickly add giving for your church. Here is a great tutorial on setting this up on your church website.

Note: there are no affiliate links in this review. I’m simply recommending tithe.ly because we use it and like it. I hope you find it helpful to your ministry

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When PreSonus first introduced the StudioLive boards, they were an industry changing product. By incorporating easy to use studio quality multi-track recording in a digital board for live mixing, they were able to capture a large part of the market. Their products were also inexpensive, so that really helped them with smaller touring bands and churches. However, to keep the price down, they eliminated motorized faders which are popular on higher end digital boards. For the last couple of years, the Behringer X32 board has become very popular because it took some of the best features of the StudioLive product and added motorized faders, personal mixers, and more, all while keeping the price down. Now it looks like PreSonus has their answer.

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The new StudioLive 32 would be one of my first recommendations for most mid-sized churches. They have finally added motorized faders, a touchscreen control surface, and built-in multi-track recording to SD cards.  Sweetwater has it listed currently at $2699, and I’ve seen it even cheaper at some of the wholesale distributors that sell to churches.  The best way to check it out is to watch a few of the overview videos. I’m definitely adding this to our wish list for church. We could use the additional channels and the new features would help simplify what we are doing.

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