September 2009 Archives

But, is super natural power from God through enough to carry out a God vision?

Honestly, I can thing of arguments and points for both sides of that question. Yes, God is all powerful and all knowing. Yet, does everyone who has come to faith in Jesus Christ actually live out and fulfill the God vision they were to fulfill and live out?

I have a fortune cookie saying I found in a cookie years ago on a day much like yesterday, it said, "Every truly great accomplishment is at first impossible." Thats pretty smart insight for man's wisdom. I still have that slip today stuck in the corner of a picture in my room so I am reminded of that often.

What I'd like to do is open this up and ask for feedback. I have a pounding headache today and I don't want to just "wing" this. Sometimes the best way to go about doing something is by asking questions. Let's see what everyone has on this. If you are reading this via email then you will need to come to my blog to leave a comment.

You may have been inspired or you may have overwhelmed or even disappointed from the Nines conference, but how did you view most if not all of those who shared their 9 minute message? Always ask yourself what you are thinking about what you are observing because our thoughts can be tricky and are not always our own.

I think I make a correct assumption that the word "peer" is not one of the words that comes to mind - at least not a peer like you see most of the peers around you. Which isn't surprising because the marketing did not condition that mindset. Which of course is understandable because it would be difficult to draw 10,000 people to a venue on leadership without conditioning a mindset of expectation from "top" leaders. What I think we all failed to realize was the result was pressure on speakers to perform and live up to that expectation along with us attendee's expecting it. 

Depending where you are at in your spiritual journey this then produced a wide range of feelings. One thing I have found very liberating in ministry is to intentionally not let myself fall into the I must perform.. live up.. deliver.. strive.. etc mindset. That mindset withered the fruit of the spirit in my life and ministry and was toxic to my heart and relationship with the Lord. I never want to be more like the wizard behind the curtain than the characters living the adventure walking the yellow brick road. 

I remember years ago when I was sharing my passion for ministry before I was ever given the vision for this ministry. I was at a retreat and just out of college at 23 and was sharing with a man maybe 10 years older than me at the time. After I finished sharing he told me wow I am impressed and your going to really make a difference in the world. I was somewhat shocked and taken back by what he said and I asked why do you say that? To which he told me something I have never forgot. Everyone else here is talking about all these great big ministries and dreams and goals, but you are talking about how you have helped individuals and I see your passion from that and they have in turn gone on to minister to others. Most people dream big and think of large ministries and big accomplishments, but you really care about people and helping them so much they are compelled to then go help others. That's that's rare people live and think like that and that's revolutionary.

It was about two years after that when God gave me the vision for this ministry. He didn't give it all to me at once and rightfully so because I would not have had the faith to step out in it. God began to reveal a small part of a big vision and has since then brought me closer to that mountain. It didn't look so big at first, but the closer the Lord has brought me to it - the more I can see on that mountain.

So to my friend who was overwhelmed by the Nines. Don't worry, ministry and walking with God is much like us as a young boy (or girl) with our feet in the ocean right beside our dad. He is there with us and we are not the father, but the son (or daughter). We don't have to be the teenager trying to act like we know it all, but we can and rightfully should be the young son who trusts his father. Even if we later realize we made mistakes and didn't know better along the way - we can be like the young son (or daughter) in our underpants splashing our feet in the ocean right beside our Father. As time goes on our Father will father us and we will grow through the stages of life, but those are stages of maturity and growth we must journey through with the Lord. 

So where ever you find your walk with the Lord in ministry - remember your father is right there beside you. 

What that is most likely in return doing is drawing in a huge surge of free untargeted traffic on the conference from people all over the world not just outside of Christian leadership, but projecting the conference into world media. Given those speaking not only a platform to speak to other Christian leaders, but to speak to world leaders interested in learning how they were able to do this through Twitter. While the majority of them may not be followers of Christ - they will in the process of checking this out be hearing leaders speak on their passion in serving Christ to reach others. That may end up producing fruit for this conference with large scale evangelism and or sowing in that process and that may or may not have been an intention of the leaders who organized it.

The planners behind this with the @CatalystLeader and @leadnet networks have done what few (if any) have been able to do in any ministry circles as far as I know in successfully tapping into the power of social networking and reaching a huge audience with some what limited resources on a scale this big and this fast. 

Now it's true both of those networks have fairly large established networks of followers and supporters already from multiple efforts and years of ministry events. However, in the past 2 weeks they added over 5,000 online registrants of Christian leaders through what I am guessing was largely the use of Twitter and social media. That count was more than 24 hours away from the launch of the conference this morning so with all the buzz about The Nines on twitter today I'm guessing the amount of traffic they will generate to their website with a live video feed all day long that hosts 9 minute talks from Christian leaders is going to be several times over the last count of 8,500 people.

The great thing with Twitter is even a newbie like me can plug in and connect with it. While I joined Twitter many months ago I have only started getting active in the last month and have just under 500 people following me. I have also learned a lot and gained a lot of insight from those I am following and by simply putting myself out there. I have met new people with similar interests and it's been an enjoyable and fairly simple process.

Developing leaders and visionaries in DLM through the process of the restoration of the heart and the renewal of the mind through the life map model with the hope of empowering vision in people's walk with God is my focus in ministry. Part of being an effective person of vision is being able to communicate that to others and you must get your message to them to do that.

What has been of particular interest to me in watching The Nines is seeing how they have used Twitter to reach so many and with limited resources. What is going to be of interest of many Christian (and non-Christian) leaders is in seeing how The Nines this morning got on the top of Twitter's buzz list. Leaders and organizations in learning how they can likely replicate the processes through viral tweeting within their peer groups in their area of passion can signigicantly benefit from Twitter.

If you have the desire to take your ministry or organization's message to the masses on Twitter by getting it on the Twitter Buzz list this is how I would go about doing it:

First, you need a targeted and passionate base group of peers and supporters on Twitter who are active and use it frequently. I suggest doing what I did to form my base following of just under 500 Christian leaders in the past 30 days. You will need far more than just 500 followers though to do this (Catalyst alone has over 10,000). Find other leaders in your subject or area of focus and then follow their followers. Start with following a 100 or so and then many of them will start to follow you back after looking at your twitter bio and seeing your common interest. It will take some time, but you can grow your following by just staying active on Twitter and seeking to find and follow others with similar passions.

Here are a few tips for new twitter users to make the process faster and easier. First, make sure you have a picture of yourself or organization posted on your twitter profile. It is best to make the profile for you personally and not your organization. Also use your name and put a link to your blog, facebook, etc. and then share a little about your passion or your interests. 

Then when people click on your profile if it is one for you personally more people will tend to follow you back. What you must realize is Twitter is not going to work as well for you if you make your profile and your focus about promoting your organization or ministry. It is called social media because you are to be social (don't self promote alone) and that's what works the best and your passion or organization will in time gain followers and traffic from your personal twitter page. 

You want to follow about the same number of people who are following you although at first you are going to be following more because you are starting new on Twitter. If you follow more people than who follow you out of proportion then you will find fewer people follow you back.

Once you build up your follower base stay active and get to know others by giving feedback and interacting with your followers. As you grow your follower base you will get closer to being able to launch an event like The Nines. 

Then of course you need a live event to promote and sponsor for which to start the buzz around it on Twitter and it needs to be something people will rally around and get excited to attend online. Again, you will need to use live media or at least have your event done as a launched and limited time event. You want to drive the thousands of people to it at once and create a buzz around it and that's what gets people tweeting about your event on Twitter.

You want to build the anticipation for your event weeks in advance and once you have a large following on Twitter you can over time share bits about your planned event to do this.

I suggest having multiple people who give input in your live event and or who are on it because this will add more excitement to the event. The Nines brought in multiple Christian pastors and leaders and made it in 9 minute segments so its a low commitment level for people to tune in for just a 9 minute segment if that's all they can do. 

In a online event you want to build the excitement and make it easy for people to plug in and yet keep the commitment level to a minimum because online people don't stay in one place very long. This wasn't done to be like a regular conference or with powerful moving speeches, but was more of a spread the word on the movements and of course the sponsoring networks will benefit from hosting this event. It has been a well executed plan and very entertaining.

The 9 minute talks is genius because it's enough time for someone to give a good message and yet brief enough that people are going to logon because it's a short time commitment. Most likely though many people will stay on for more than just one speaker and or come back through out the day. 

The organizers also in registering people for this were able to add a lot of targeted people to their lists and I suggest you do the same in having people register for your event. Make it free, but have a simple form to capture a name, address and email list. This way you can continue to communicate your organization's vision to those who attended after the event is over.

Now how to come up with an event to create the buzz on Twitter.

What ever your cause or focus is you need something that isn't targeted on just one mirco niche or you won't draw a lot of people to it or get this kind of buzz on Twitter. The live page for the event The Nines had built in twitter feed and the ability for people to submit it with the #thenines hash tag automatically added to them it appears from what I have understood from their live page thus far. This is part of how they had over 5,000 tweets with that has in their first hour on Twitter from what I can tell and it was well designed.

You may not be able to replicate an event with speakers on leadership like this, but you can find many themes for your own live event. You could host a day long musical festival with different bands and guest speakers. 

The time commitment to your viewers is then small as they can come for one song or two and yet if you have dozens of bands and types of bands you will appeal to a wide range of people.

If you have everyone register you capture their name, email and address and could simply have a survey with the registration form on their interests within your focus. Let's say your organization raises money for orphans, you could then have the bands playing throughout the day and a registration form with a few questions about orphans so you can get an idea of what your audience knows, thinks and believes regarding orphans. 

Then during the event have a few speakers in between and or people who have sponsored orphans through your organization share about their experience and or the stories of those impacted by your organization. Simply having a button for people to click and give while watching the bands and or speakers in having drawn a live audience for the day with tens of thousands of people could be your method or goal.

If you are on Twitter you can follow me @epicwalk.

The great thing about Twitter is that unlike email, facebook and myspace it is easy for groups or circles to merge and or for news to spread outside of them faster. This is part of why it works so well. Very few of my followers were people I knew before I got on Twitter and most of my new followers are outside my circles and networks of people I know, but we have a common connection in being Christian leaders in many ways.

I do not have time to go into detail on what I have learned in observing the use of Twitter for The Nines conference, but I can tell you it is unlike anything I have ever seen and I certainly understand why so many people in the media are touting twitter as being such a phenomenon that is going to change the internet.

As I am seeking to fill multiple purposes through the use of Twitter for DLM I have found the site to be very useful. What ever your vision, dream or goal - you are likely going to need and or will benefit from having the right people to help you in that process. I'm using Twitter to meet and interact with multiple circles, groups and people outside my circle and or network of people I know. You can do the same and it's very easy to do with Twitter. You can follow me on twitter @epicwalk.

To register and or try to hop on The Nines online conference at 9:09 am go to:

Right now the following speakers are confirmed. The format of The Nines is each speaker gets 9 minutes. Thus the messages are going to be targeted and to the point. So even if you can only catch a few this is still an event you will want to attend online.

The last confirmed schedule for The Nines I found is as follows:

The more deeply I dig beneath the surface of church growth principles, the more thoroughly convinced I become that the real battle is a spiritual battle and that our principle weapon is prayer.

I am quite confident apart from prayer and an encounter with the presence of God in which he surprised me when I did not expect it nor particularly desired it I would never have been given nor trusted with the vision for this ministry in March of 2005.

I am also quite confident that apart from the continued prayer of those prayer warriors elected by God who have so faithfully prayed for me and this ministry and continued to have faith God will carry through what He started that I would have long ago lost hope and given up in the pursuit of this ministry vision.

Yet, I know there is far more yet to be done and much that has not and will not happen until a movement of God takes place within and through this ministry. That simply can not happen apart from the continued prayer of those God has called to pray for this ministry and me. 

So as the Schaeffer 's asked..

Where does the supernatural power of God have a real place?

What difference would it make practically between the way we worked yesterday, and the way we would work today, and tomorrow? 

Is this a question you have an answer to in your life as well?

I have to ask myself these very questions often. My skills, talents, gifts and abilities are not enough to establish, build and advance a ministry vision of this kind. I've known that since the first year of this ministry - this is not a vision that can be built apart from God or with clever ministry marketing and organizational methods of growth.

Human method's will only produce human results.

What difference would it (the supernatural power of God) make in the majority of Christians' practical work and plans?

Has it made a difference in your work and plans today?

This week?

This month?

This year?

This decade?

I must agree whole heartedly with Spurgeon that the real battle is a spiritual battle and that our principle weapon is prayer. The real advancement of the Kingdom into darkness will only come about in large movements by prayer.

Designed in 2005 it looks like this:

The questions I am referring to are those with deep roots within the heart and mind that yearn to be satisfied and need to be - to grow in depth and intimacy with God. They are not questions we can ignore or trick ourselves into believing we have satisfied when they are not. They are not even questions we can trick ourselves into thinking we do not have. They are questions we can not subdue and ignore for they will hinder the heart's ability to love, obey and trust God. They are questions that will cause us pain and effect our life if we ignore them.