What did you learn at Echo 2010?

The church is a communication/storytelling machine. Narratives of changed lives, transformation, renewal, and, most importantly, the gospel include every component of a great story. But we communicate it like a textbook rather than a story. In many ways, story has taken a back seat to the cultural wave drowning out the unique voice of many churches. They have lost their brand and market place, instead creating fractured communication and presentation. Churches need greater content and less distraction in the stories they tell. We should revive the power of testimony to inspire people with our living God. Visual Communication and Storytelling are the language of our culture. No matter if its a graphic, typography, photography, or a video the primary way of learning today is through seeing. The more you see, the more you know. Words are no longer enough and people communicate visually more than ever.

You requested them, so here they are the slides from today’s session; love to carry on the conversation.

Door Prize #1: The books Making Ideas Happen by Scott Belsky and ReWork by Jason Fried and David Hansson. Plus HOW Magazine, Good Magazine and a Moleskin to hold all those visual ideas you come up with.

Door Prize #2: First addition painting I painted as a test for a sermon series last Feburary (See this Post) and the book Making Ideas Happen by Scott Belsky.

So how can you win?  It’s simple, you need to be active on Twitter by tweeting ideas and things that strike you tweet worthy. In addition I ask that you are engaged in our conversation in the room. The winners will be chosen at random by a third party at the end of the session.

So are you going?

Okay, I got to admit I’m really excited about speaking at ECHO again this July 28-30 in Dallas with some great friends: Tony Steward, Dawn Nicole Baldwin, Carlos Whittaker, Blaine Hogan, Michael Buckingham, Tim Schraeder and Nathan Davis.  I will tell you from first hand experience this conference is one in a million.  No matter if you’re in a new role, wanting to branch out into social media, or develop skills on how to more effectively reach current culture with media and tech this is the place to be.  I’ll shut up, you can find out a lot more about the conference by visiting www.echoconference.com.

So what do you think?  Are you coming? Thinking about it.  How about I sweeten the pot?  Early Bird is already gone, but you can register here for 20% off by entering my name —> matt <— in the promo code.  Plus if you attend my session we’ll have some pretty epic gifts for a select few.

Last night, I painted the last painting for the series Organic Christianity. The series was about stripping everything away, getting down and dirty with scripture, but most importantly focusing on how we can be the hands and feet of Jesus. We had TOM’S helping us out with our own brand of shoe and tons of other cool stuff. But what I’ve been most excited about is getting to painting during worship throughout the entire series you can check week 1, week 2, week 3, and week 4 paintings out by clicking the links. I would love to hear your thoughts.

Last night, I painted the third painting for the series Organic Christianity.  The message for the third week is PURE. I was inspired by the beauty around us each and everyday.  It may seem messy, chaotic, mismatched or ugly, but when God looks at it all he see’s the beauty in the ordinary.  He has the right filter or lens to see his creation and the purity he bestowed to each of us.  You can check the last two paintings out week 1 and week 2

Last night I did my second painting of five for our Youth and Young Adult Ministry’s new series Organic Christianity. The series is about stripping everything away, getting down and dirty with scripture, but most importantly focusing on how we can be the hands and feet of Jesus. You can check the last painting out by clicking here.

This morning I received a very encouraging message via Facebook from one of my past employees; It made my day. It’s power made me think about how an encouraging word can dramatically change the direction for the day.

Legend has it that Abraham Lincoln’s dying mother called her small son to her bedside and whispered, “Be somebody, Abe.”  Only three words, but who’s to say that those three words didn’t change the future of America?  We should never underestimate the power of an encouraging word to a young person who may not get it anywhere else.  I firmly believe those who are lifting the world upward and onward are those who encourage more than criticize.

The statement i speak of is “mountain top experience.” Martin Luther King, III, used that expression to describe his visit to India on the fiftieth anniversary of his father’s trip. The elder King had made the trip to help him further understand Mahatma Gandhi’s successful tactics of passive resistance. “This was truly a mountain-top type of experience for me,” the younger King said. “I remember my mother, sharing this very special experience with us children in the family of how moving this experience was for her. … Now I truly understand that it’s one thing for a parent to share the experience, it’s another thing for you to be physically at the site and experience it for oneself.”

Martin Luther King, III repeated this saying numerous times throughout his life, but most importantly in his last spoken message.  Insane if you think about what he is communicating.  When you think about it, in our daily lives admits the struggles, the climb to the top of the mountain isn’t particularly inspiring. Life is like that. It’s more difficult to be motivated during the daily “climb” The mountain-top experiences are a great reward for a hard climb, but the real value comes from the climb. It’s during the climb that we really develop the strength and stamina for the next challenge. There is a natural tendency to avoid the climb. It’s important for us to see the climb as an opportunity to become stronger and more capable.