Church Marketing

This post is for those who are a little more technologically minded....

I would like to hear people's thoughts on this one. It's a pretty interesting article (every article I post about it fascinating of course) because it challenges my own beliefs on worship. Growing up involved in a youth service at my home church in Winnipeg, the discussion about "being a show" often arose. Our "competitors" were often condemned for having smoke, lights, and multimedia wonders because it was too showy. Technology within the church is something that is really going to become a big issue within the next few years. This debate has occupied my mind for years, battling my view back and forth, but for this post I'll stay on the fence. Give the article a read and let me know where you stand.
I found this article originally through monkeyouttanowhere.

Things getting pushed aside...

I'm at a loss for words whenever I scroll to the bottom of this blog and see that the visit counter just keeps going up. At first I thought that it must be just me, by coming to check the counter so often I was single handily raising the number to pump my own self-esteem, but as I look farther I see that people are for some reason starting to read this thing. And so I feel obliged to write another post.

I'm big into the 'finding an impacting article and posting about it'. Living at the camp, I'm finding surfing around to find an article to post is getting a little slow. It must be the 14.4 internet connection or maybe my patience is getting thin. I'm pretty sure it's the internet connection because I haven't bit any one's head off yet. I am going back into the archives to find an article which I found super impacting a few months ago. My brother passed this article over to me about the forgotten or pushed aside news stories that humanitarian professionals, media personalities, academics and activists want the world to focus on during 2005.

After seeing Hotel Rwanda a couple of months ago I've been following a blog that is focused on telling the world about the situation in Dufur, Sudan. This would be my pick for the story that should be followed during 2005. I believe that everyone should follow this story and this blog is a good place to start.

Those that are interested in reading some more intense stuff coming out of Sudan, should check out this site . The "Human Rights Watch" go all over the world protecting the human rights of different people groups. Although I'm not really the guy to start hold up a sign at a protest or hugging a tree, this site really impacted my thinking. Researchers Dr. Annie Sparrow and Olivier Bercault took time to study the issues of protection and sexual violence at refugee camps in Chad. As they talked to the parents, they had the children draw pictures. With no direction or instruction these kids drew of the recent events happening to them and their homes.

"I am looking at the sheep in the wadi [riverbed, or oasis]. I see Janjaweed coming—quickly, on horses and camels, with Kalashnikovs—shooting and yelling, ‘kill the slaves, kill the blacks.’ They killed many of the men with the animals. I saw people falling on the ground and bleeding. They chased after children. Some of us were taken, some we didn’t see again. All our animals were taken: camels, cows, sheep, and goats. Then the planes came and bombed the village.” -Abd al-Rahman, Age 13 (hrw.org)

I'm not really sure how to communicate my own feelings I had while seeing this drawings, but I would encourage you to spend some time looking at the pictures and reading the stories. Another interesting part is listening to the audio as well.

American Camping Association

Dave first showed this to me a few years ago, and over the past couple of days I have been giving this website some more thought and so now I publish this for the masses. Anyone that has any interest in camp ministry should give the ACC message board a look. It's a secular message board that is so chalked full of camp ideas and wisdom it gives me shivers just thinking about it. I couldn't find anything that even comes close to compare with this message board on the Canadian Camping Association website or the Christian Camping International (usa) website.

Camps right around the corner for me, and so this is naturally why the message board topic comes up. Even though I very infrequently post to this blog, it will become even less of a occasion during the next couple of months as I am busy at PVBC.

Homeless for five months.

Stan Guthrie interviews Mike Yankoski, author of Under the Overpass: A Journey of Faith on the Streets of America . Mike felt God calling him to become homeless for five months. Leaving his life as he knew it, he came to some intense realizations by seeing the church from the outside. (Interview Part 1, Part 2) I found this article really fascinating as I often pass the homeless on the streets of Winnipeg and wonder what it would be like to switch places with them.

The Great Promise of Christian Camping

The Mb Herald published an inspiring article disucssing the importance of Christian Camping by John Redekop. Redekop definitly has his head screwed on straight, seeing as this is just one of a couple other thought provoking articles done by him.

Anyone serving this summer at a camp, should give this camping article a read. Christian Camping has been a big part of my life and I really hope that the church will continue to see the value of it.

blogVision - The Rules

The reason that I started this blog was so that I could have a place where I could upload photos of my adventures and write updates of what's been going on. Don't get any ideas...this is not going to be a place where you get to hear of my day to day activities everyday. Although I'm sure that you're just dying to become a Steve'sblogfaithful, I would recommend maybe a once a week check of the blogging world of Steve.

Mostly when I feel that I am doing something blog worthy will I post stuff. Right now for instance I am kind of in a transition period from being at University to going to work at the Pembina Valley Bible Camp. This transition period is kind of boring for others to read about, so don't expect a post for another few weeks or so.

The biggest reason for this blog is a place to post photos. I much prefer to post photo's then write a freakin' term paper.

In the past I have found myself getting on the nerves of other bloggers asking them why they didn't post like every hour of the day. You can feel free to ask me about about this blog...but to a certain extent.

In the beginning ...

Here we are, the starting of a new blog. It seems to be the job of the blogadmin to write a first post that really doesn't say much at all. I could write about my goals for this blog or some profound truth that I learnt today. I could write about what I'm wearing or what I had for lunch. I could ramble on and on.

The first post is always the most awkward; nothing to say... I think I'll stop ...