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"The mystery in a nutshell is just this: Christ is in you, therefore you can look forward to sharing in God’s glory. It’s that simple. That is the substance of our Message. We preach Christ, warning people not to add to the Message. We teach in a spirit of profound common sense so that we can bring each person to maturity. To be mature is to be basic. Christ! No more, no less. That’s what I’m working so hard at day after day, year after year, doing my best with the energy God so generously gives me."

Colossians 1:27-29 (The Message)

I’m really excited about this weekend. Later today I’ll be meeting with the staff team from Daybreak. The church, located near Grand Rapids, MI, has to be one of the most creative ministries in the country. In fact, Terry and I felt so strongly about their leadership in connecting with today’s culture that we agreed they were #2 in our list of Top Ten Innovative Churches back in July.

I hope you’ll spend some time cruising through their website to see Daybreak’s commitment to using the arts to translate the biblical message for today’s culture. They are brilliant in that area. In fact, they offer other churches some of their resources through their series JumpStarts. Also, you may want to check out the information about their Infusion conference coming up in May 2006.

This weekend if the team from Daybreak wasn’t coming to Granger to spend a little time with us, I’d head up Highway 131 to visit them and soak up as much of that creative inspiration as I could get. That makes Daybreak my "Cool Church of the Week."

In honor of Oprah’s appearance on the Late Show with David Letterman, I thought we could play a little game today. Here is:

Two Truths and a Lie

1. Tony regularly watches the Oprah show.

2. Tony has been to Oprah’s house.

3. Tony is relieved the feud between Oprah and Dave is over.

Everyone’s welcome to participate. This is an all-play. Have a fun Friday!

Here are some things that have been stacking up in the "you should check this out" pile for the last several days. Hopefully there’s something here for everyone. Take turns and play nice.

• Kathy reminds us to "never underestimate the power of fun." I happen to believe that’s an important lesson for ministry as well.
• These are 10 Rules for Web Startups, but some of it applies to the church as well. Be narrow. Be different. Be picky. Be balanced.
• I’m discovering new piano bands using Pandora. It’s free.
• Speaking of free…I haven’t given this a test drive yet, here’s a program for image and photo manipulation if you’d rather not buy PhotoShop.
• I took the Signature Strengths Survey at AuthenticHappiness.org. My top five were: (1) Creativity, ingenuity, and originality; (2) Perspective (wisdom); (3) Spirituality, sense of purpose, and faith; (4) Honesty, authenticity, and genuineness; and (5) Judgment, critical thinking, and open-mindedness. That seems to be pretty accurate. (Thanks Virtualosophy.com.)
• Tim and Jeff got me hooked on the daily vlog with Amanda Congdon at RocketBoom.com. It’s just pure entertainment. Don’t try to think too hard about this one.

I know. It’s not "Fun Friday" yet, but this couldn’t wait. Lisa has introduced me to fancy parking. And, fancy parking, of course, is always better when you’re listening to "Fancy Dancer" by The Commodores. Fancy that!

"Google has the functionality of a really complicated Swiss Army knife, but the home page is our way of approaching it closed. It’s simple, it’s elegant, you can slip it in your pocket, but it’s got the great doodad when you need it. A lot of our competitors are like a Swiss Army knife open–and that can be intimidating and occasionally harmful."

Marissa Mayer, Director of Consumer Web Products at Google as quoted in Fast Company (November 2005)

Here’s the "box score" for this past weekend at Granger Community Church.

Music: "Daughters" by John Mayer

Message: "The Challenge of Your Imperfect Parents" — Mark Waltz, Pastor of Connections

Service Highlights: The final weekend in this series featured arts elements from this current decade and included a visit from Ozzy Osbourne. Some might argue that there’s no better illustration for the topic of imperfect parents.

Stats: 5,542 total attendance (4,293 adults + 1,249 kids); 22.7% increase from the same weekend last year

Percentage of weekend attendance by service:

1. Sun 10:15 am = 27%
2. Sat 5:30 pm = 25%
3. Sun 11:45 am = 22%
4. Sat 7:30 pm = 14%
5. Sun 8:45 am = 12%

Final Notes: Sorry for the limited info on this past weekend. I was out of town with my family and didn’t get the chance to experience the service. Next weekend, we launch into the Christmas season at Granger.

I received this from Guy Kawasaki yesterday (sign up for his mailing list). It’s a presentation by Dick Hardt, the founder and CEO of Sxip Identity.

You can ignore the content…though it’s interesting. Pay attention to the presentation. It’s visual. It’s simple. It captured my attention and made me want to hear more. Let it challenge your thinking on your presentation style.

Jesus said: "How terrible it will be for you experts in religious law! For you crush people beneath impossible religious demands, and you never lift a finger to help ease the burden" (Luke 11:46 NLT).

Do you think Jesus was just addressing the law versus grace issue or do you think that same teaching applies to what we’re asking people to do in our ministries today? As we ask people to commit to spiritual disciplines, attend services, participate in events, serve in ministry, connect in groups, reach out to people in need and build relationships with those outside the church–all of which can be helpful in our spiritual growth–are we creating "impossible religious demands?" What’s our responsibility to "ease the burden" in people’s lives? Is that part of our responsibility as ministry leaders?

Just thinking out loud…

Granger sends out two weekly enewsletters. One is targeted to people who are connected to Granger’s local ministry. One is targeted to church leaders throughout the country. I thought you’d like some insider facts to compare with how you’re doing with your email communications.

• About 700 more people subscribe to our weekly newsletter than receive a bulletin every weekend.
• We use Constant Contact to distribute our email newsletters.
• We typically experience 10% bounces, emails sent but not received. The average for other sites that use Constant Contact is 18%. Even with those bounces, more people still receive the enewsletter than receive a bulletin.
• On average 40% of subscribers will open the email messages we send. That compares to 37% for other sites.
• Of the people who open the messages, 18% will click through to our websites. Other sites only have a 9% click-through rate.
• Granger discourages separate ministry-specific email promotions/newsletters so people don’t view email communications from the church as spam. Instead, we encourage every ministry to promote their events and connection opportunities through the weekly all-church enewsletter.

By the way, if you haven’t already, now would be a great time to subscribe to the weekly WiredChurches.com enewsletter. It’s free. Here’s a sample from last week.