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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Now, more than ever, resolve to use your words with kindness

16 February, 2020 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

be kind to others
Kindness should characterize our words and actions as representatives of Jesus.

Words are powerful. As God's Word reminds us:

The tongue has the power of life and death and those who love it will eat its fruit. Prov. 18:21

As church communicators, words are the tools we use to fully fulfill the Great Commission, to introduce people to Jesus and to grow them into mature disciples.

Though most church communicators would agree with these goals, there are many ways we can accomplish them. We can shame people, mock, and malign to reveal what we consider error. We can be caustic cynics of what we don't like in politics or people. We can yell or express righteous anger because we consider it our right to do so. But though we can choose how we use our words, we can't always choose the effect they will have, this verse reminds us.

The words of the reckless pierce like swords,
but the tongue of the wise brings healing. Prov. 12:18

Though I first referenced this article seven years ago, we need it more than ever today. And though there is true evil that we need to confront in word and deed, even there the following advice is helpful. It comes from a longer article by Rev. James Martin, S.J. and after I copied it as an inspiration for actions, I realized what a useful challenge it is for all of us who communicate: [Read more...]

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Filed Under: Characteristics of ECC Tagged With: church communications characteristics, kindnes sin communications, New Year for church communicators, Yvon Prehn blog

Chris Pratt, a Gospel presentation at MTV awards, and a challenge to us all

20 June, 2018 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

Chris Pratt can preach!
We don't usually think of Chris Pratt as a preacher, but his MTV Awards speech has challenges for us all. Image by Gage Skidmore.

When the Bible tells us that when Jesus spoke, “people heard him gladly” and “the large crowd listened to him with delight,” various translations of Mark 12:37, I often wonder what that meant. This passage and others contrasts Jesus way of speaking with that of the religious leaders of the day.

Sadly, there are few Christian leaders or preachers today who people “listen to with delight.”

And then there is Chris Pratt. His job description as super star actor (Guardians of the Galaxy, Jurassic Park, Parks and Recreation) doesn't automatically include preacher to the people—but last night at the MTV Awards he was just that.

He framed his words as his 9 Rules for Living. I’ll share them below, but I highly recommend you listen to them online, not only for the words, but more importantly for the audience reaction.

Here is what he said:

"I'm going to cut to the chase and I am going to speak to you, the next generation," Pratt said. "I accept the responsibility as your elder. So, listen up."

  1. "Breathe. If you don't, you will suffocate."

  2. "You have a soul. Be careful with it."

  3. "Don't be a turd. If you are strong, be a protector. If you are smart, be a humble influencer. Strength and intelligence can be weapons, so do not wield them against the weak. That makes you a bully. Be bigger than that."

  4. "When giving a dog medicine, put the medicine in a little piece of hamburger and they won't even know they're eating medicine."

  5. "It doesn't matter what it is. Earn it. A good deed. Reach out to someone in pain. Be of service. It feels good and it's good for your soul."

  6. "God is real. God loves you, God wants the best for you. Believe that, I do."

  7. "If you have to poop at a party….(sorry I’m leaving this one off—it’s online, but this is my “G” rated blog).

  8. "Learn to pray. It's easy, and it is so good for your soul."

  9. "Nobody is perfect. People will tell you that you are perfect just the way that you are, you are not! You are imperfect. You always will be, but there is a powerful force that designed you that way, and if you are willing to accept that, you will have grace. And grace is a gift. Like the freedom that we enjoy in this country, that grace was paid for with somebody else's blood. Do not forget that. Don't take that for granted."

Again, listen to his speech, not only for his words, but for the audience reaction. They are clapping and cheering through it. Obviously they heard him with delight. It’s worth analyzing why. The truth statements (rules 2,5, 6 and 9 especially) are incredible distillations of biblical reality put into contemporary language—we are not perfect and we need grace, grace purchased with somebody else’s blood. When was the last time you heard a congregation clap at the mention of grace?

He does a masterful mix of humor and truth—very hard for most of us to manage, so I don’t recommend trying, but you can take his words and use them as discussion starters, especially with the younger people in your life: What did they think of it? What is grace? Why is it important to know you aren’t perfect?

#9 is an extraordinary contemporary translation of “for all have sinned” “by grace you are saved.” Discuss his challenge that we not take that for granted.

And for you and your church, can you lighten up a little bit while still being true to who you are and the respect due the gospel? How can we translate Biblical terms into the language of today so people will hear eternal truth? How can we bring joy back into sharing our faith?

I don’t know the answer to these questions, but they are challenges worth discussing. And while doing that pray for the many who heard Chris Pratt’s message that they hunger to find out more about the God who loves them and paid for them with Jesus’s blood.

Pray you will learn to share the words of eternal life in way your audience will hear you gladly.

 

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Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: Chris Pratt MTV speech, contemporary communication, great preaching example, Yvon Prehn blog

What can happen if you if you work hard on your event, but don’t work on event communications

16 March, 2017 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

Church Communication disappointment
If we don't create connecting communications at our seasonal celebrations and few people return to church after them, we are bound to wonder what we did wrong. This article and website can help!

Ed. note: I have shared this story before, but it is such an important reminder of how we need to create communications that will help people connect with the church AFTER the big event.

This is a true story. Though the specific event discussed is Easter, the lessons learned from it can apply to any event. In addition to applying to any event, we can all identify with the situation here. The challenges of ministry are so huge, it is very easy to get overwhelmed in one area and totally forget another one. May the Lord have mercy and help us all.

In one of my seminars, at the break, a woman literally came running up the aisle to talk to me.

“Oh, thank you, thank you,” she said, “Now I understand what went wrong.”

I had just been discussing the same ideas I’ve presented here about the importance of an overall communication plan for maximum results from your holiday outreach. I knew it was useful, but her response was more excited than most so I asked her to tell me more about her experience.

She then told me about a special Easter service her church put on that was a huge amount of work and an equally huge disappointment in results. They were a new church plant and wanted to reach out to their community at Easter.

They were meeting in the grade school, but they wanted to grow and to do that committed to reach their community for Jesus this Easter. On faith, they rented the high school gym so they would have room for a huge crowd. They prayed hard and worked hard to get lots of community involvement. They got it—merchants put up posters; they got lots of media exposure. The day came and the church of 300 had over 1500 at the Easter service held at the local high school gym.

They were so excited. The next week back at the grade school, they set up hundreds more chairs, printed lots of extra bulletins. They were excited to see what would happen.

They didn’t need to go to the extra trouble.

[Read more...]

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Filed Under: Blog, Evangelism & Outreach, Seasonal, Seasonal communication strategies Tagged With: how to get people to come back to church, outreach communications, Season communication success, Yvon Prehn blog

Little communication details can accomplish miraculous results

16 May, 2013 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

Naaman being healed
To be healed, Naaman had to do a little thing--just wash in the Jordan. In the same way, it's often the little things in our church communications that accomplish the most.

The story of a stubborn general in the Old Testament book of 2 Kings, illustrates the critical importance of not ignoring the seemingly little things in church communication because of a focus on the expensive and extravagant. For example, when churches spend lots of money on big communication projects such as a website redo, buying high-end design software with thinking the software will result in impressive designs, or spending so much time on launching a social media campaign that you forget to put adult Bible class schedule on the web. When the large amount of time or money spent does not produce the desired results, discouragement and questioning often result.

The danger of ignoring small actions

It's not that these things may not be important and there are times when they may need to be done, but we mustn't forget the importance of little things, when we do them in God's service. The Old Testament story of Naaman illustrates this lesson well.

Naaman in 2 Kings 5, was commander of the armies of Aram. He expected significant results from extraordinary efforts on the battlefield and he was successful in his expectations. But when he got leprosy, he found an enemy he couldn’t conquer. On the advice of a captive servant girl in his household, he went to the prophet Elisha in Israel to be cured.

As befitting his status, Naaman expected the prophet to appear and with thundering words and grand gestures, heal him of his leprosy. That didn’t happen. “Go wash in the Jordan seven times,” was the message delivered by Elisha’s servant to the general. Naaman was not pleased. In anger, he vented his opinion and prepared to return home, until his servants convinced him to try the little thing suggested by the prophet.

Naaman dipped himself into the Jordan seven times and the seventh time, “his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy (2 Kings 5: 14).”

Applications to church communications

Often as I interact with pastors, church leaders and church communicators, I find they know something isn’t working well in their church communications program. It may not be leprosy, a life or death of the church situation, but it is serious. Most often the key symptoms, even though the church prays and plans, are in following categories:

  • Lack of church growth: not enough people coming into the church.
  • Lack of member spiritual growth: not enough people attending the events outside Sunday morning that will help them grow to Christian maturity.

Right answer, wrong approach

Improved communications are often seen as the answer and I agree with that conclusion.  But just as often, I see the desire to improve communications takes a wrong turn. The wrong turn is that like Naaman, a church will often look for the grand and glorious; the latest and greatest either software of new social media as THE solution to their communication problems.

Remember when email was advertised as the solution to all church communication problems? Currently we're told Facebook and other social media are absolutely essential to church communication success, but a couple of weeks ago NPR had an extended program with the headline:

Letters are dead. E-mail outdated. Text messages so passé. What’s going on with how we communicate? (http://onpoint.wbur.org/2013/04/03/communication)

The feature interviewed people who have shifted to the new social media and texting platforms including: WhatsApp, kik.com, and Snapchat, while declaring that Facebook for many was so outdated.

This is the true story of a church that decided that lots of money and impressive design would solve their communication problems: they hired a national company to create an incredible website for them. They spent thousands of dollars. It took months to create. Their communications director contacted me and asked me to look at the website and a redesigned bulletin that went with it because with all the money and time spent, little had improved in terms of people response. The church spent a lot of money, but attendance had not only did not improve, it declined.

Why the money was wasted

After looking at the website and the revised bulletin I could see why. Both had beautiful graphics, lots of color, pictures, action, etc. The problem wasn’t in the big things, but in absence of the seemingly little details that were essential for people to actually connect with the church events. Lots of graphics, few meaningful links to information that actually informed you of specific events.

The church bulletin was worse. Not in looks—it was beautiful and probably because someone thought they needed “white space” there was a beautiful graphic design and lots of open area, but in the section to inform visitors of ministries going on in the church outside Sunday morning there was a list. That’s it—just a list of the ministries. No information whatsoever on when they were meeting, how to attend, who to call, social media links, website info, who to contact for more information, nada.

The designer designed a beautiful bulletin, but people don't automatically know what time the discipleship class meets and if child care is provided when they look at lovely graphics and cutting-edge typography.

Do the simple things seven times

Interesting graphics do not guarantee people connections—the simple repetition of connecting details does. It doesn't matter if you use Twitter, Facebook, email or send a postcard—a great graphic or the newness of the technology doesn't actually get anybody anywhere. Clear content: who it’s for, when things start, when they end, how to get there, who to contact, how much it costs and if child care is provided—this is what actually connects people with events that will change their lives.

And you need to repeat these details through the various channels of communication: print, web, email, social media, projected media, postcards, whatever you can. In addition, to be sure people get the message, professional marketers tell us you need to get out this information seven times, in seven ways for effective communication. Just like Naaman had to dip himself into the Jordan seven times, though he probably didn't understand why the repetition was necessary, and though we can't figure out why people don't remember something when we tell them about it one time—that's just the way it is and we have to repeat information for it to change lives.

These little details are the links that connect people to the church events that will result in church growth and in personal spiritual maturity for your people.

Why, why are these things routinely left out and money spent on the big and extravagant?

This is a question I agonize over.

  • Maybe, I wonder, is it because of our human tendency is to want to do the big, the quick, the extraordinary to get results and get them now?
  • Is it an unconscious carry-over from the world of business that assumes that throwing money on a problem is a way to solve it?
  • Is it a lack of faith that if we only do the little things, like print boring details week after week, that God can really use them?
  • Is it that if we put our money and time into training the staff to do something like the website instead of hiring an outside professional that we have that we might have to trust God for results we won’t see immediately?
  • Is it because we are impatient and forget that the often used analogies in the Bible, about farmers, shepherds, about growing and tending plants all teach us to wait for results that only come in small, incremental ways?
  • Are we a bit blinded by the media that reports and idolizes the big and spectacular when Jesus described the Kingdom growth as yeast permeating, a small seed germinating?

Our churches need healing and I wonder what would happen if we’d stop looking for the spectacular solution and humbly focus on the little things, the communication tiny tasks that connect people. I wonder what would happen if we focused on training our people at church to do communications, even though it might take longer, instead of hiring for immediate results. Like Naaman, after his seven trips into the water, in our church, after weeks of training and encouraging the people closest to us and a focus the little details that actually connect people to life-changing events, we might be surprised at the new life and healing that results.

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Filed Under: Leading & Managing Tagged With: church bulletins, Communications, details in church communications, web, Yvon Prehn blog

What is really difficult about YouTube and what it teaches us about church communication

12 August, 2012 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

The popular perception of YouTube is that it is really simple, easy, and anybody can slap up a video. In addition--if it is catchy, funny, or inspiring enough that the video will go viral and the video creator will gain immediate fame and fortune.

It really doesn't work that way.

I've spent a lot of time on YouTube lately trying to understand how it works and how I can make the most of it to equip and inspire church communicators. Part of that has been to study some of the popular producers and to look the advice YouTube gives on realistically how to make a video channel that will have significant impact on the audience you want to reach. My first conclusion is that it is much, much harder and more difficult than I imagined.

At the same time, if you follow their instructions--which require a tremendous amount of time and precise, repetitive work--chances are you will achieve your goals.

One set of instructions is their Creator Playbook

Without going into details, which I am very much in the process of learning and trust you will see the results of, I want to share the Creator Playbook from YouTube. CLICK HERE OR ON THE IMAGE to go to download the ebook--it's free for anyone who wants it.

The Creator Playbook has 91 pages of how-tos. The book is one of the most useful, well-written and laid out of any ebook I've seen in a long time. It is worth the time to download it simply to study the structure.

More than that, it is a reality check. If I want to use video effectively to help train church communicators (and notice I said help train, not everyone is into video and I will continue to practice what I preach on the need for multi-channel communication) that it will take lots of time, work, focus, and prayer for understanding to make it work. The big and splashy aren't what count--it is learning how to do many new, repetitive, tasks:adding annotations, creating playlists, release schedule, better links, captions, descriptions--learning how to use analytics. Yet when I get past the initial, "Oh, my....how will I ever do this?" --there is also a growing excitement of how powerful the final results can be and awe of the incredible tools the Lord has given us.

How this YouTube experience applies to church communications [Read more...]

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Filed Under: Social Media Tagged With: church YouTube, Communications, YouTube and church communications, Yvon Prehn blog, Yvon Prehn commentary

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