New Bible Reading Plans

If you’re looking for ways to encourage your church to read the Bible more this year, we’ve got some great new tools available at YouVersion.com. We just launched more than 20 free Bible reading plans, which are available on the website as well as all mobile platforms. Here are a few highlights:

• You can customize each plan by making it shorter or longer.
• Easily track where you are by checking off each day’s reading. We’ll also show you how far along you are with a percentage of completion.
• Your online and mobile accounts will synchronize your information, including your plan and your progress.
• If you’ve created a group for your church on YouVersion, you can select a plan to be associated with your group.
• Soon, you’ll be able to build a support system by opting in for accountability emails to you and/or a friend.

We hope these new reading plans help you and your church engage with Scripture in 2010!

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Christmas Blogging Break

Hey Swerve Friends,

Thanks for being a faithful part of this community. Bobby and I are deeply grateful for you.

We’ve decided to take a short break from blogging during the Holidays. I pray you have a blessed Christmas with your loved ones. We’ll be back blogging Monday, January 4.

Merry Christmas,

Craig and Bobby

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One Billion Minutes

I’ve been so excited to see this huge milestone getting closer, and just this week we finally reached it:

People have spent one billion minutes reading the Bible on YouVersion.com with their mobile devices!

It is incredible to think of people all over the globe, phone in hand, reading the Bible…on iPhones, BlackBerrys, and Android phones…in their choice of 41 translations and 21 languages…all engaged in God’s word.

Thanks to all of you who have been a part of those billion minutes.  We’d love for you to take a moment and celebrate with us at http://onebillionminutes.com.

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Christmas 2009

I hope you are already having a great holiday season!

If you are serving at a church, I imagine many of you are busy preparing for Christmas (Eve) Services or other Christmas events.  I’m always fascinated by the creativity and diversity of the Church surrounding the celebration of the birth of Jesus.  For some churches, it’s a time to return to long-standing traditions.  For others, it’s an opportunity to try to creatively grab the attention of their community with a large production or event.  Yet there are still others who approach Christmas like they would any other week of the year (just maybe with a few more decorations than normal).   One thing that is fairly consistent between churches is that church attendance will likely be higher at Christmas than normal.

One of the new things we will be doing this year is incorporating a unique short film our team developed into the message during our Christmas experiences.  It will definitely be something different for us.  I hope to be able to share it with you all soon.

I’m curious - what new (or traditional) things are your churches doing to celebrate Christmas in 2009?

Tags: Christmas

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Worth Revisiting: Excellence/Effectiveness

There are several principles that I seem to revisit when talking with pastors.  A couple of these are the cost/excellence curve and the cost/effectiveness curve. I wrote about those on swerve almost two years ago, but I think it is worth revisiting today.

If I gave you $100,000, could you make your house or apartment excellent?  I imagine that with some careful investments in furniture, paint, etc you could probably do it.  If I then gave you another $500,000, could you make it more excellent?  How about $5 million?  You get the point.

Now, when was it excellent?  After the $100k investment?  The $500k?  Somewhere in-between? Or is it already excellent?

The pursuit of excellence is just that…a pursuit for many and rarely a destination.  In nearly every investment we make (our time, money, etc) we can generally always invest more to make something more excellent.  The big question is “When is the investment enough?”  The good news is that we do have a choice.

Read this post on the cost/excellence and then this one on cost/effectiveness.

I’d love to hear your thoughts.  What are some of the things that guide your decision about when enough is enough?

Tags: effectiveness, excellence

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The Timing of Feedback

Not only do you want to ask the right people the right questions, but you’ll also want to do it at the right time.

I see three different times when feedback is valuable:

1)    Before the event

Most leaders I know look for feedback on the back end. I crave it on the front end. Each week before I preach a sermon, I have no fewer than a dozen different people work through my notes with me. I always ask, “What one thing was the most helpful? What one thing would you cut? What is one other suggestion you have?” Feedback on the front end helps me make changes when changes are easiest.

2)    Immediate feedback

Receiving immediate feedback is valuable (especially if you are doing an event or talk more than once). People can be very helpful when an event is fresh on their minds. I always try to write down what they say so I can review their thoughts later.

3)    Much later feedback

Occasionally, immediate feedback isn’t wise. You may be too vulnerable after a talk or event. The highs seems too high or the lows seem too low. You (or others) might be too caught up in the moment to be objective.

Once everyone sleeps on it, has a chance to talk to some other people, and has some time to process, you might learn more from post-event evaluations. We’re often much more objective once the immediate emotion dies down.

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The Right People

Asking the right questions is helpful to get valuable feedback. It’s also important to direct the right questions to the right people.

When it comes to feedback, not all people are equal.

Two groups that shouldn’t always be trusted include:

• Your greatest critics.
• Your greatest fans.

These groups shouldn’t be ignored. You can occasionally learn a lot from your critics or your fans. But, generally speaking, your critics will be harder on you without understanding your full context and your fans will overlook ways to help you improve.

If you are a pastor or leader, you might be more challenged than you realize to find the right people. When I ask for feedback from my staff (or even church members), they might be slightly intimidated and hesitate to tell me the truth.

Developing a trusted group that can be objective is invaluable.

I’ve searched for constructive feedback from hundreds of people over the years, and have found a group of individuals who understand the importance of truthful and helpful feedback.

These people weren’t necessarily born with this gift. We have actually developed a relationship and trust that draws out feedback. They see it as a part of their ministry and I see it as a helpful gift.

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The Right Questions

In the church world, you will almost always get feedback. But not all feedback is equal. Finding the right feedback is vitally important.

A key to finding the right feedback is asking the right questions.

Here are a few questions that won’t be very effective:

• What did you think of the sermon? (A general question will likely draw a general response.)
• I’m not sure if that song was any good. What did you think? (A leading question will likely draw a less truthful response.)
• Was that program beneficial to you? (People are generally polite. You’re question isn’t likely to solicit helpful feedback.)

Here are some more helpful questions:

• Of all the things we did, what one thing should we change next time? (This specific question is likely to draw a specific result.)
• What one thing was the most helpful to you? What one thing was the least helpful? (By giving a person the opportunity to tell you what they liked first, they might be more likely to offer constructive suggestions next.)
• I really need your help to make a decision. We need to cut 10 minutes off this talk. What part of the content was least helpful to you? (This direct question will certainly get a direct response.)
• What is the one thing you’ll take away from this event? (Limiting the feedback to the one big thing should be valuable.)

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