Effective Church Communications

Effective Church Communications provides Timeless Strategy and Biblical Inspiration to help churches create communications that fully fulfill the Great Commission

Effective Church Communications provides Timeless Strategy and a Biblical Perspective to help churches create communications that fully fulfill the Great Commission. Our tools constantly change; our task doesn’t; we can help.
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Why we need to share the gospel at Halloween and the tools to help you do that

18 October, 2011 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

In church communications, we do what we do because we believe that the eternal destinies of people depends on how they respond to Jesus. We know that--but in the midst of long days and overwhelming demands it is easy to forget.

As we approach Halloween, I know this isn't a holiday most people think of as being particularly spiritually challenging, but it really is. At this time of year, everyone is thinking about and talking about the supernatural and that makes it one of the easiest times to bring up the topic of the one person who conquered death--Jesus.

Erasing hell, a great motivational book for Halloween outreach
This book provides great motivation for Halloween outreach because it is a reminder of the eternal consequences of our decisions about Jesus.

Francis Chan's and Preston Sprinkle's book, Erasing Hell. In addition to being a very well-researched and well-written book, I greatly appreciated the tone of the book, which is one of gracious, gentle conviction.

Though the tone is gentle, the topic is about one of the hard issues of our faith--the eternal destiny of people who die without Jesus as Savior. Universalism, the idea that eventually everybody goes to heaven, is the popular answer today (one of the great promoters of this being Rob Bell's book, Love Wins), but popular as the idea might be, as this book shows through careful historical facts and careful biblical exegesis, universalism is simply wrong.

As much as we might wish it were otherwise, the eternal destiny of every person--literally heaven or hell depends on what we do with Jesus. Your job is to make that clear and that is why your work in church communication is of extraordinary importance. We can do that with our church communications and below is a list of communication resources for Halloween.

The purpose of this website is to help you create communications that enable your church to fully fulfill the Great Commission. That is why we do all we do.

[Read more...]

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Filed Under: Church Invitation Cards, Fall Festival and Halloween Tagged With: Church Halloween, Church halloween outreach, Halloween invitations, Halloween outreach

Why Marketing isn’t evil—or doesn’t need to be anyway

10 October, 2011 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

As often happens, marketing is currently taking a bashing in some ministry magazines and blogs. Though I am one of the first people to decry the evils of untrue church marketing—in my mind epitomized by the commercial website headers of mostly white, all thin, happy folks—when few folks at the churches I know look anything like that—especially when you look at the church universal and the tragedy of hunger domestically and worldwide...but I digress.

As I was saying, though marketing can be used in untrue, unworthy of the gospel ways, to bash "marketing" with a broad brush as evil is like saying because Jim Jones of Jonestown massacre was a preacher that all preaching is evil.

Chapter Four: Effective Church Communication Marketing

Intro note: The following material is from the book, Ministry Marketing Made Easy, by Yvon Prehn.  A PDF of this material is available as a download, by CLICKING HERE and at the end of the article. You have permission to make as many copies as you need for your staff, congregation, or volunteers.

Some church people are genuinely concerned about marketing and wonder about the appropriateness of marketing in the church. This is a valid concern and an important one to address. This chapter presents a biblical view of respectful marketing and provides biblical and practical examples of appropriate uses of marketing in the church.

I strongly recommend you take time to go over this chapter as a staff and with the leadership of your church. If you don't and people in your church have concerns that are not answered, you can be certain they will come out and often, not in pleasant ways.

You want everyone (as much as is possible) in the church to be of one heart in your communication and marketing efforts. Yes, it takes time to explain why you are doing what you are doing, but the oneness of heart that should be the result is worth it.

Marketing misconceptions defined and defused [Read more...]

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Filed Under: Church Outreach and Marketing, Leading & Managing Tagged With: church growth, church leadership, church marketing, church outreach, Fall church marketing

Church Newsletter Samples, three great ideas for your church

19 September, 2011 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

Newsletters in all kinds of formats and to a variety of audiences in your church are still one of the best ways to communicate with your people. Following are three samples of newsletters that were sent in on one of our Great Idea Swaps. Below are images and then at the end of the page is a downloadable PDF of all of them.

  • Three of the church newsletter samples that were sent in, illustrations only.
  • The downloadable PDF file of the newsletters is normally only for Effective Church Communication Members. but I'm making this a free sample for everyone. Communication downloads like this are just one of the great advantages of membership! CLICK HERE for information on how to join, it's only $9.99 a month or $99 a year for all the communicators in your church to be able to use the site.

Newsletter Samples

Flock Talk NewsletterFlock Talk
This is a sample PDF emailed church newsletter. I just love the name and the header and logo, plus the colorful, yet-easy-to-read layout. So much is here: updates, prayer requests, humor, ministry needs. You don't need a lot of space to communicate a lot!

Flock Talk
This is a sample PDF emailed newsletter. I just love the name and to much is here: updates, prayer requests, humor, a lot!Flock Talk

Mission Thrift Newsletter
Mission Thrift Shop Newsletter

Ministry inspiration is one of the core reasons we do the Great Ideas & Sample Swap and this newsletter is tremendously inspiring. The stories, the policies, the ministry overall is an inspiring example of caring in the name of Jesus.

The stories, the policies, the ministry overall is an inspiring example of caring in the name of Jesus.

Family newsletterFamily Newsletter
Some of the most effective newsletters your church can produce are ones that target a specific ministry and this one does a fantastic job of that by providing ministry updates, resources, tips for parents and family inspiration. Often the church staff does not have time to produce niche newsletters like this, but they can be a fantastic job for a volunteer.

Oftunteer

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD OF PDF FILE OF THE NEWSLETTERS shown above.

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Filed Under: Church Newsletters Tagged With: children's newsletter, church newsletter samples, church newsletters, Newsletter Samples

Operation Christmas Child: a fantastic idea from one ECC Member that involves the congregation

8 August, 2011 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

Operation Christmas Child
Photo from Carmel Lutheran website--this church has an innovative way to involve the members of the congregation in this fantastic ministry--read the article to find out about it.

All of you have the GREATEST IDEAS! Following our previous  article that featured Bulletin Inserts to encourage your people to  shop ahead for Christmas Child Boxes (CLICK HERE to go to it) one of our wonderful ECC Members sent me this email.

It shares a fantastic way a church does their Operation Christmas Child ministry, not only getting lots of boxes for the children, but involving the congregation in the project:

I absolutely LOVE OCC, (Operation Christmas Child, from Samaritan's Purse) so your inserts were especially great for me! In fact, I’m in charge of our church’s OCC efforts. Over the last 5 years, we’ve put together about 2100 boxes!

For these last 5 years, I’ve been able to secure a grant from an organization, as well as getting some $$ from our Outreach Team & Lutheran Women’s Missionary League group. I then take that $$ and shop the super-deep discounts throughout the year for school supplies, toys, clothing, etc. (it fulfills my need to shop without my husband getting nervous!).

Then, for 6 weeks in Oct. & Nov., we set up a “store” in one of our classrooms at church that’s open Sunday nights and other arranged times. Small groups, families, kids, etc. from church will come by, grab a shoebox (that’s already been wrapped by some great volunteers!) and go around the store and fill the box.

I ask them to either cover the cost of shipping a box, or donate items. It is just so great to see all ages fill boxes. (Last year, a teen boy went to fill a box for a girl, and I kept hearing him say “Now, what would a 5 year old girl like???” He spent about a half hour carefully deciding. I loved that!) In fact, just today, I got a letter from someone in Uganda, and it included a photo of him holding one of OUR boxes! I almost started crying!

From: Cathy K., Carmel Lutheran

PLEASE SEND additional ideas and we will organize and share them

I'm sure many of you have wonderful ways that you reach out to those with great needs at Christmas and many other times of the year. After reading Cathy's example and after watching the news tonight about the ongoing hunger crisis in Somalia, I realized that as communicators we can do a lot to help meet the needs of those around the world.

We can help with our communications that inspire and encourage people to give and we can then give concrete examples of where and how to give.

Sometimes creating these kinds of communications isn't easy, so Effective Church Communications will start a program to collect them, organize and host communications about meeting needs and make them freely available.

If you are interested in helping, CLICK HERE to go to the article that explains this.

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Filed Under: Missionary or support communications

Bulletin Inserts: Back-to-School Backpack Ministry, ways to involve your congregation

4 August, 2011 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

Backpack Image 1
Back-to-school, Backpack Ministries are a fantastic way to care for the children of your community. This article and the one linked to it provide ideas for church bulletin inserts that will communicate your message to the congregation.

Back to School was always a wonderful time of year for me, but for many kids, it can be a time of sadness if they don't have what they need. This is a simple, but powerful ministry your church can do. Below is the introduction to the church bulletins:

Back-to-School Backpack
Ministry
—an opportunity to bring joy to needy kids

School is about to start and it’s a time of excitement, fun, and discovery for many children. But for some children, it means showing up at school without crayons or pencils, notebooks or glue, without the supplies they need. Sadly today, many parents can’t pay for them and schools are unable to provide them.

But the body of Christ can. Our church has a ministry where we provide filled backpacks to little kids who need them.

We have four ways you can help:
......and the inserts go on to give specific advice

Last year's bulletin inserts are free CLICK HERE to go to them.

For a personal article on the meaning of this ministry to me, CLICK HERE.

This year, samples for inspiration and editable files

The samples on this page are new versions of the Bulletin Inserts. At the bottom of this page is a link to a ZIP FILE.

The ZIP FILE contains:

  • PDF ready-to-print files of the inserts
  • MS Publisher editable files
  • MS Word text file if you want to create your own
  • PNG low-res images if you want to promote them on your website
  • JPG hi-res images if you want to print them

Below is the Free ZIP FILE --simply click on it, save on your hard drive, click to open and use as you will!

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE ZIP FILE

Last year's bulletin inserts are free CLICK HERE to go to them.

For a personal article on the meaning of this ministry to me, CLICK HERE.

For the bulletin inserts in the video on Sales Tips for Children's Shoe Box, CLICK HERE.

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Filed Under: Children's ministry, Church Bulletins, Missionary or support communications Tagged With: back to shool ministry, backpack ministry, Backpack outreach, Children's ministry, church bulletin inserts

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Link to Easter Templates of all sorts

Seasonal Templates

  • OVERVIEW of TEMPLATES for Church Communicators, please read first
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FREE Bible Verses and Sayings in both print and social media format at Bible805Images.com
FREE Bible Verses and Sayings in both print and social media format at Bible805Images.com
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