Things I Learned at #LCI2012: Day 1

I just finished my first day of the Large Church Initiative conference at First United Methodist Church Richardson, Tx. Over 500 pastors, staff and lay people from large Methodist churches across the nation have come together to worship, listen and learn about how we can be more effective in ministry, and how we can do better in our mission to make disciples, for the transformation of the world.

Day 1 started out with our trip to get here. Once we arrived and got checked in we had a great dinner from the volunteers at FUMC Richardson.

We then went to the sanctuary for a concert featuring Eric Michael, Josh Wilson and Jars of Clay. Though I am a big Jars of Clay fan I have to say my favorite part of the night was Josh Wilson playing an instrumental version of "Amazing Grace."

This is not the performance from this concert.. but here's a youtube of him doing that song.

And of course Jars of Clay was good. They did a more acoustic set with two acoustic guitars, keyboard, cello and light drum set. It was nice that they played some of my favorites from their earlier CDs along with some of the more recent songs.

Tomorrow we will hear from some great speakers and head to some breakout workshops.

If you want to follow what's going on here at LCI then check out the hashtag #lci2012 on twitter.

So What is Simple Church Communication?

I used to be a youth director, now I'm a worship leader. So what am I doing writing a blog about communication for churches? Working in a church for over 15 years I have seen how effective great communication can be. Unfortunately I have seen some examples too of poor communication, some of which have come out of my computer. But I have learned over the years from those who communicate effectively through different means, and through my own errors and successes how to use communication better.

I now serve our church in two roles, worship leader and communications director. I handle most of our communication avenues including website, facebook and printed magazine, along with occasional flyers, posters, videos and other means.

I do not pretend to know everything. What I do know is what I have picked up along this journey of mine. My goal is to share what I have learned with you, and in return learn from you.

Over the past few years I have been asked to lead a few local workshops covering things like newsletters, blogging, websites and social media. I hope to use those questions as the launching point for this blog. If I know the answer I'll share that. If I don't know the answer I'll try to find out. Along the way to I'll post any helpful links to articles, blogs and other communicators I have learned, or am learning from.

So with that introduction over let me ask you a question.

What is one area of communications that you feel your church does very well? Why?