Effective Church Communications

Personal note—once again fires raging in California

14 November, 2018 By Yvon Prehn 2 Comments

After the fire — What remains of a mobile home park that burned. From parks like this to the homes of movie stars, once again fire tore through our area.

Last Thursday afternoon a phone call came, “Camarillo Springs is on fire.”

Camarillo Springs is a mobile home park not far from Ventura where we live, and we have several elderly friends there. They were told to evacuate. We were texting them and their families and though it was scary for one lady in a huge traffic jam with 2 trembling little dogs with her, everyone made it out OK.

That mobile home park was spared, and they were able to return. But many homes were not. From older mobile homes in the canyons to the mansions of the rich and famous in Malibu, the fire tore through to the ocean with what we call the “Santa Ana winds,” scorching 30-50 plus mph winds that come through our area in the fall.

When I was much younger the Santa Ana winds were a pleasant diversion as the weather turned chilly this time of year. Yes, anything below 50 we consider chilly in S. California. Now they are dreaded because they fuel hellish fires in bone-dry areas and can turn an ember in minutes into an entire hillside erupting in flames—as happened in several places this morning. [Read more...]

Don’t be a Secret Saint—a better way to do outreach and connect people to your church!

14 November, 2018 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

Have you ever been in a situation where you do outreach activities or acts of kindness as part of your church, but you never see anybody come to church because of it? Well, I've got some ideas for you that can change that. That's the topic of this podcast. You can either listen to the podcast here or on many aps listed HERE.

For FREE templates that you can use to create communications that will help identify your church and bring people to it after your event, check out the templates for the holiday or special event you are celebrating. You can reach the overall Template section by CLICKING HERE.

Welcome to a Better Way for Church Communicators! I'm Yvon Prehn and our topic today is “Don't be a Secret Saint, a better way to do outreach on the holidays or anytime to effectively reach people for your church and Jesus.”

Below are the show notes, a transcript of the podcast

Here's a true story about a lost opportunity in a situation just like this in our area. One church often does a compassionate outreach at a laundromat in an area of town where many homeless people do their laundry. My husband was recently talking to a young man who had taken advantage of it and he heard him talking about “some guy who paid for my laundry.” My husband asked him asked him who did it and what they talked about, and the young man responded “Well, the guy didn't say anything. He and his wife just sat in a corner for two hours. I would have talked to him, I would have talked about anything with him. I kind of waited for him to come over, but he never said anything to me! But the guy put in 10 bucks for my laundry.”

Now, my husband and I both thought how sad to pay for washer and dryer use for people who must choose sometimes between clean clothes and a decent meal is a fantastic way to demonstrate caring in the name of Jesus, but only if people know that you're doing it in the name of Jesus.

You see it really isn't fair to them or to your church or ministry if you are a secret service Christian. [Read more...]

A video comparison of PicMonkey, Canva, and Snappa

4 November, 2018 By Yvon Prehn 2 Comments

After the recent overview/tutorial of Snappa, an Effective Church Communications member asked me how it compared to Canva and PicMonkey. That was such a good question and as I thought about it, I realized it wasn't something I could answer in a quick email and that the answer would be useful to many of you.

I like all three programs and use them all, but they are different in what they do best. Below I did a video review of all three. It is short and subjective and far from an exhaustive overview of any of them, but I trust it will help you see the differences. Below the video is a summary of the cost of each and a few additional comments.

Remember Effective Church Communications does not take any advertising or participate in any affiliate programs. You can CLICK HERE if you want to read more of our concerns about affiliate programs. On Pic Monkey (the only one I bothered to look up) they give affiliates 30% of what you pay. I would much rather they had a lower rate than participating in a system that can distort reviews of the product. But regardless of what others do, we will not be part of the affiliate kudzu that infects the web. You can read our reviews knowing they have no secondary agenda. [Read more...]

For the heart of church communicators: Bible 805, a podcast about history and the Bible

1 November, 2018 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

Bible 805, podcast and commentary — A Bible podcast and commentary from Yvon Prehn with an emphasis on church history and how it helps us understand the Bible.

Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks, Jesus told us. It's valid to continue that thought that out of what's in our hearts is what will come out in our communications.

If our hearts are filled with God and his words, that will be reflected in our church communications.

It doesn't mean that we will only write devotionals and Bible lessons—though that might be part of it. It means that the tone, the attitude, the images and examples we use will be reflective of our Lord. The best way for that to happen is to so saturate your mind and heart with God's Word that his way of looking at life and reaching out to people will become second nature to you.

There is only one way to get that perspective and that is to spend time in God's Word and we now have a new and exciting way to do it through PODCASTS!

[Read more...]