In a word, Wow! Those are some big churches and they have a lot of cool tech stuff. If you go here, you can click the icon for my mega church tour pics.  We toured:

• Crossings Community Church
• Church of the Servant United Methodist Church
• Henderson Hills Baptist Church
• LifeChurch.tv

From a tech perspective, they all share similar aspects, yet they each do things in their own way, and are each so unique in their style and atmosphere.

It’s inspiring to see how the big dogs do it because at my church, we have so far to go.  At the same time, it’s encouraging because we are starting to do more and laying a foundation for where we are headed.

We saw many server rooms that day and I know Mike was pretty much done seeing server rooms by the time the day was over.  It blows me away to consider how much these churches spend on technology to enhance the message they are delivering.

Is it too much? I don’t know, consider the impact they have on their community.  I would like to dig into that and compare their tech budget vs. the actual number of people in their community they reach.  Maybe even go farther and look at the percentage of their community that they reach.

For our church, our weekly attendance is about 5% of our community and that percentage is about the same that these churches reach of their community in Edmond, OK.  Percentage-wise, our 650 weekly attendance is the same as an Edmond church of 4,000. Interesting! (to me at least)

For details of what was blogged about from MinistryTECH, check here.

For details of what was blogged about from CITRT, check here.

I have more to share, but this is all for now.

Our problem is not a lack of resources, it’s a lack of imagination. We, as IT people, are usually pretty concrete and we need to be more creative.

We are focusing on the problem and not on a creative solution to get it done.

If the only resource is the church’s budget, then your imagination is too small.

Someone suggested that we don’t always include God in our process, Clif says we need to agree to pray and expect God to show up.

John 13:14-15

This is a neat concept, be creative and don’t focus on the problem, just figure out how to do it but that sure is hard. The easy solution is to throw money at the problem but most of us don’t have the budget or the resources to adequately take on every request that comes our way.

The challenge is to think creatively to address requests from our customers, which includes church staff, other volunteers, other ministries and even outside groups.

Great reminder, Clif! Great insight too. It’s going to help all of us raise the standards of our service.

He warned me that I was part of his talk but I didn’t know how exactly he was going to do this.  He referred to a series of posts I wrote last summer that started here, then went here and here.   This series actually began with Clif and it is a constant theme of Clif‘s life and ministry and leadership style.

Thanks Clif, for continuing to encourage me in what you say, in how you lead and how you live your life.

Also, for a good overview of what our day was like, check Mike’s post.  He did a great job of detailing the highlights of the day.  I agree with most of what he said, although I was one of the ones excited to see most every server room and that did absolutely nothing for him.

The pic on the right is Ian in the jungle, church that is, which is Church of the Servant.  That’s a unique church, where Ian is faces the choir loft and there are 3 or 4 sections in a circle around the podium.

Today is day 1 of MinistryTECH and I am really looking forward to that.

Stay tuned for more pics and info as the next few days occur.

Technorati Tags: OKC,MegaChurchTour,MinistryTECH,CITRT,Kia

We will both be Twittering and blogging throughout the entire week so tune in to hear about what we are hearing and learning.  We will only be in one breakout session together and the rest we are on our own, so we are able to cover a lot of ground.

We are the two good looking, bald guys, so we should be easy to spot.  Track us down, we would love to meet you.

Mike’s Twitter – @downtownmike
Jim’s Twitter – @jimwalton

Mike’s blog
Jim’s blog

See ya in OKC!

I finally went to my first roundtable last fall at Church of the Resurrection in KC and I can’t wait for the one on April 5 in OKC.  Last fall I was able to meet many people I knew of and people I interacted with via e-mail, yet had never met.   Take it from me, this church IT community is the most open, friendly, helpful bunch of people I have ever been with, seriously.  Everyone seems to be available to help anyone in any way.

There are so many different backgrounds, experience levels, denominations and more and as far as tech goes, it’s all the same.  Some are full time staff of mega churches, some at smaller churches, some are volunteers but we all have the same goal.

My experience in my short time (I had to leave early) at my first roundtable was that we all had something to contribute.  We all have experiences and backgrounds that bring us to where we are right now and we all have specific issues that we are facing in our church right now.

I say all of this to lead up to my point for writing this.  Last night, we had a tech team work night and honestly, some work nights are more like sit around and eat cake night, which is what last night was.  We actually had cookie cake for someone’s birthday and we sat and talked tech.  We talked about upcoming projects and many different things related to our world at church.

One thing we discussed was MinistryTECH and CITRT.  One guy on my team, I’ll call him Daniel, expressed an interest in CITRT and we talked about it.  At one point, he wasn’t sure he would have anything to contribute, yet he’s been serving in this church  for at least 5 years in various techy ways.  I encouraged him to find a way to get there.  Another guy on my team, whom I’ll refer to as Mike, is going with me to MinistryTECH so we will already be down there.  At this point, Daniel is working on coming up with a way to get there, which also prompted my 12 year old daughter, who I’ll call Rachel, to speak up and say she wants to go.  She has served in various way in tech for at least the last 3 years and really has a heart to do more.  She is an important member of our team.

My point is this, if you are within driving distance of OKC and are involved with tech ministry and have a heart to do more and connect with like minded people, then go to CITRT.  Don’t get stuck on the thought that you don’t have anything to contribute, trust me, you do.

(Within driving distance to OKC includes but is not limited to: Dallas, Tulsa, Bentonville, Carthage, OKC, Wichita plus many more, I’m sure.)

If you have a legitimate excuse, like wedding shower or replacing your roof then that might exempt you from missing it.

Otherwise, I guess my team and I will see you there on April 5!

As I talked to my pastor about going, he wondered who else I could take from my ministry team and after pondering that question, I knew Mike Brown was the guy.  Mike was someone that thought he had no interest in the tech team, but over lunch one day, I shared more about what we do and he is totally in.  Tech Arts is much more descriptive than simply tech team and Mike has jumped in with both feet.  Yesterday, he walked around the building, even up on stage during worship, shooting footage for the Easter video project we are working on.

I haven’t firmed up hotel reservations yet but I need to soon. For now, Mike and I are sleeping in my car but we will be there.

Are you going to MinistryTECH and CITRT?  If so, where are you staying?  It would be fun to stay in the same hotel where others are staying.  I really don’t want to sleep in my car.