KS Rhodes Dark Hotel Live

KS Rhodes Live Dark Hotel from Chris Hill on Vimeo.


Here's a vid I took last week at The Square Room in Knoxville. KS Rhodes killed it. The very talkative crowd got on my last nerve, but I fought through it and enjoyed myself.

Kyle Gilbert

I met with Kyle Gilbert today from Faith Promise Church. He's their communications guy and he's also working on building their web campus. He offered some great encouragement to me personally and The Ridge Community Church for the city of Oak Ridge.

I look forward to learning from him as we wander through the wilderness of church 2.0 together.

The world needs more kingdom minded big "C" Church type of leaders like Kyle who are are willing to share ideas and knowledge with others instead of keeping inside their church walls.

Kyle, thanks for the insight, encouragement, and the free lunch! btw.....look forward to disc golfing it up with you and my disc golf crew very soon.

Tweets I enjoy getting

Right now I'm following about 70 people on Twitter. Here are a few that I've enjoyed lately. You should follow them too.

@tonymorganlive let's me know what's going on at just about every church leadership conference in the country. How does he do that and also keep up with interesting pop culture tidbits? I'll never know.

@bobbywilliams keeps me updated on what God is doing at The Ridge Community Church. He also shares in my frustration with UT basketball this year.

@jt just let me know about an amazing dessert option last night. "two spoonfuls of peanut butter, a generous amount of honey, nuke it for about 50 seconds and pour it over vanilla ice cream." He also speaks in web developer language that's way over my head but keeps me learning new things about technology.

@ipiphanist keeps me motivated about the web church movement with biblical references and personal victories. He also adds the occasional quote from GK Chesterton that makes my brain explode.

Just a few here today. I'll add some more of my favs later.

Matt Knows Billiards

Matt Robbins Knows Billiards from Chris Hill on Vimeo.

Matt Robbins, the worship leader for The Ridge Community Church, gives us a little insight into his past...total pool shark.

New diseases call for new medicine

In this post by Nick Charalambous, he reveals some issues surrounding the condition of the traditional church service and how it translates online. He does this by showing why people attend church online.

This got me thinking about the future of the Church 2.0 movement and the new issues future church leaders will face. I'd like to list a few of those issues here so we could begin to run down some solutions, but that's just it....we can't anticipate problems we've never run into before.

When a new disease is discovered in the world of medicine, the cure calls for the creation of a new type of medicine. Sometimes the disease is a form of a known disease that has mutated or been amplified by other bacterium. This situation can be remedied not by creating a new medicine from scratch, but by tweaking a current method of treatment.

Since church on the web is a relatively new form of ministry, leaders will face problems and issues that have no known solution. We must be creative in finding new remedies. It is essential that we resist the urge to try and cure these issues with tried and tested methods used to tackle problems in the traditional "brick and mortar" church.

The same old problem-solving methods may mask the symptoms of future issues, but it's going to take brand new methods we haven't even thought of yet to cure the new problems ahead. This is when leaders should rely on God the most. The quicker we ask God for answers, the quicker we can pinpoint problems and fix them so that nothing hinders the life-changing message of God online.

The Power of Common Bond

How does strong healthy human interaction happen? What cultivates it? You probably come in close proximity of hundreds of different people everyday. Whether it's in the coffee shop, gas station, sidewalk, at the office, the restaurant, or online, human to human proximity happens daily. What causes two or more individuals to stop and interact? What causes us to create bullets in our planners that involve interaction? What separates an acquaintance from a friend? It's the common bond.

I have always felt that I have a gift of finding the common bond quickly. I'm borderline obsessed with it. When I meet someone new, I automatically go into a sort of friendly interrogation mode to find out if I share similar interests, mutual friends, if I've visited the city they live in, etc... The common bond can lead to the kind of conversation that goes beyond the surface. It can lead to a very memorable moment. It can begin a long lasting friendship. It can create a learning experience for both parties that otherwise never would’ve occurred if the common bond wasn’t established.

I feel that most of us have some sort of common bond that is just waiting to be revealed. Don't get me wrong here. Diversity is very important to community; however, humans by nature are more alike than we are different. If we emphasize the commonalities in our lives while respecting our diversity, we stand a better chance to whether storms that usually break us up.

Good leaders will always find and reveal the common bond in the people they are leading.

VERY SIMPLE EXAMPLE: I know that Person A likes to watch LOST, play basketball, read books, and eat steaks. I know that Person B is obsessed with coffee, collects antiques, likes to watch LOST, and is a vegetarian. On the surface, the obvious differences outweigh the similarity. However, if I get them together in on a conversation about last week's episode of LOST, there is an opportunity to find many other common viewpoints or interests that help the conversation reach a new level of depth. Not only that, but it also increases the chance to learn so much more from one another about topics outside each other's personal "norm".

Find the common bond you have with someone you consider an acquaintance. There is a good chance that person could quickly become your friend.

Greg Atkinson is getting Potent

I was so motivated by this post by Greg Atkinson that I had to make sure and share it here on BYGC. I read it and had one of those "jump-out-of-my-seat-and-give-a-fist-pump" moment.

http://www.gregatkinson.com/2009/02/09/impotent-conclusion/

Tony Morgan's Coaching Network

Last year pastor and chief strategic officer, Tony Morgan of NewSpring Church in Anderson, SC, started a coaching network “designed for leaders and strategists that serve in a local church.”

This network is a group of 12 participants who serve in similar roles at similar churches. Tony offers this opportunity for church leaders to not only receive valuable leadership coaching from him, but also from each other as they meet once a month over a six month period.

Starting in April, I’ll get the opportunity to join this network of leaders. I’m anticipating my leadership skills, creative mind, and relationship with Christ to be stretched tremendously through this experience. Most importantly though, I anticipate the Kingdom of God to be multiplied through The Ridge Community Church from the coaching and insight I plan to apply to my daily life and ministry. I’m so pumped to put the knowledge I expect to gain into action.

In order to prepare myself for this experience, I tracked down three of the current participants of the first network and asked them a couple questions. Mainly, I asked them what they have benefited from the most by participating. Here are some of their responses:

"I have had a great experience and
really connected with some great guys who
were a part of my network….We had
several topics that were great: working with
our Senior Pastor, discipleship
& volunteer strategies,
branding/communications, growth strategies,
structure...those were all very
beneficial.” – Jason Stewart Worship
Programming & Communications for
LifePoint Church Nashville,
TN

“You will really enjoy the network.
Tony will give you all you need to prep for the sessions…..Tony is really open
to share about his experiences.
I think each topic was relevant – he always
has taken time with us to look at current ministry issues.” – Josh Whitehead
Executive Pastor for Faith Promise Church Knoxville, TN

“It has been a great experience being a
part of the network. It is an opportunity to hear what Tony has learned which is
a big part of the experience, but it’s also a great chance to learn from the
other people in the network…..As far as the sessions, they have all been very
appropriate for where I am as an executive pastor. I deal a lot with volunteers
so I think that was my favorite. My wife and I also worshiped at the Greenville
campus just before Christmas. It was good because it gave me a chance to
experience a lot of what Tony talked about.” – Jack Fisher
Finance/Communications Cornerstone United Methodist Auburn, AL

How to be a crappy husband

This post by my pastor inspired this blog entry about how to really fail at being a husband.

• Always put your own needs, comforts, and preferences ahead of your wife's. (in short: be selfish)
• Never compliment your wife.
• Never ask her about her day or show interest in her opinion.
• Always answer her questions with short one-word answers.
• Always make family decisions without her input.
• Let your hobbies or job become more enticing than time with her.
• Never give her your honest opinion when she asks for it. (there is a fine line with this one)
• Ignore your responsibility to lead her spiritually. (this one should also be filed under: "How to be a disobedient child of God")

Starting on Monday, I will hit each bullet with some detail. I may even get personal.

In the meantime, visit http://www.iwantanewmarriage.com/

UPDATE: I'm suspending the detailed blog on this topic for now. I'll hit it again at a later date.

Google G-Drive....I'm ready for you.

Considering that I have 9GB left on my Macbook Pro, I'd really like for Google to just go ahead and release the G-Drive. Yeah, I know...I could just dump some things on my external HD, but then I'd have to carry it around to access everything on it.

Ok...I don't need the G-drive....but I really want it. Google....Come on already!

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Google/?p=121

killing cockroaches

I received an advanced copy of this new book by Tony Morgan. I'm pretty pumped about finishing it. So far I like the way it reads. It feels like many ideas compiled around one main theme...which is good for my short attention span. I'll be reviewing it here on BYGC when I'm finished.

In the meantime, you can purchase a copy here: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0805447857/tonymorgan-20

..and read some details about the book here:

http://tonymorganlive.com/book/

How can you help a new church?

Pastor Bobby Williams has posted some of our needs for The Ridge as we are gearing up for launch in April. Please visit his blog to find out how you can help.

http://www.confessionsofaworshipper.com/2009/02/how-can-you-help-new-church-plant.html

Be encouraging

This is a quickie..

Be encouraging. Every chance you get to offer someone personal encouragement, do it. Don't wait for the right opportunity. Just do it. The power of personal encouragement is HUGE. Whether it's by email, phone call, text, chat, tweet, facebook wall post, blog comment, or especially in person, encourage someone you know or don't know.

Do this daily.

Your personal encouragement can cause extreme amounts of positive change in someone's life. That could start a fire of encouragement that could spread in the lives of many.

Search frequently for the good in someone's life and encourage them to kindle it.

The Ridge has a new website!

Thanks to the work put in by Pastor Bobby Williams and Factor 1 Studios, the new Ridge Community Church site is live!

Some elements are still under construction and will be updated soon. Keep checking back for the latest updates leading up to our launch this spring.

Check it out here http://www.ridgechurchonline.com/

Productivity

This weekend is our first staff retreat/advance/meeting-out-of-town. The core team from The Ridge are getting away from it all in the mountains of Gatlinburg/Pigeon Forge TN. This is a major event in the life of this church. We will be laying down the final blocks in our initial structure as we prepare to launch this spring.

I'm praying for my Pastor. He has a lot on his shoulders as our leader. He is working dilligently on flow charts and organizational structure. I've been praying that he will hear the voice of God and see the path for us with clarity as we set our cornerstones in place.

I expect this weekend to yield a level of productivity that we've yet to experience.

....in between the productivity though......we'll have this:

Caution: This may be too simple for you

Have you ever seen warning signs that just seem like they’re unnecessary because there is obvious danger involved? Well, just because you may understand the risk involved doesn’t mean everyone will. The reason why those signs sometime seem like overkill is because the risk is too great to assume everyone knows about it.

When you communicate the message of Jesus to others, whether in person, on your blog, via Twitter or Facebook, are you making sure your message is clear enough for everyone to understand? Jesus had the capability of speaking way over everyone’s head, but instead he kept it simple and spoke with the voice of the common man because his message was too important for anyone to miss.

It’s worth the risk of sounding simple or uneducated to your peers when making sure your message is clear to everyone listening.

Just In Case you're new here

Here's what the name Burn Your Grave Clothes is all about. There is also a link under my profile to this explanation as well.

http://www.burnyourgraveclothes.com/2008/11/whats-with-name-explained.html

Who's Driving Who?

In today's culture it is important for the Church to embrace new technology as not only a valid way to spread the message of Jesus, but a powerful way as well. In doing so, we need to make sure our motives are pure and our philosophies drive our methods and not vice-versa.

In other words, we need to make sure we aren't justifying our actions with self-made philosophy in order to stay relevant in today's culture.

I have made a vow to never compromise the message of Jesus for the sake of following the latest technology trend. With that said, if the latest technology trend is the method that it takes to reach the next generation and most effectively deliver the message of Jesus, then by all means I will embrace it and use it to it's fullest potential.

This "Church 2.0" movement of God will always be about actual lives being changed and souls being saved.

If you are involved in this movement, make sure your philosophy, passions, and beliefs are driving your actions and your actions aren't requiring self-made justification.