Do you know of any system that would allow me to do this?

These sites are still a work in progress but we are going live with them as I continue to introduce myself to our volunteer and leadership teams and as a hub for learning about each ministry’s strategies and goals. Here is the list.

http://harrahkids.org

http://harrahgroups.org

http://renovatestudents.org

http://harrahchurchproduction.org

http://harrahchristian.org

I like that I was able to tie the sites together and still provide each with their own personalized theme. Though I have spent many hours on the sites and their configuration the theme subscriptions only cost me $20 and I am using the lowest 1and1 hosting package at ~$4.99 per month. I think we have a pretty great set of sites.

How is your church using multiple sites to leverage your reach? Is it necessarily a bad thing to spread your ministries out over several sites? I don’t think so. I don’t think people will have any problems searching us out and think that each site will lend itself well to a saturation strategy designed to help us dominate search.

      After discovering these stats I have decided to help as many churches get into a website as possible this year. How am I going to do that? I have grabbed some domains and set up a site at http://tmabcwired.com to show people the system. I spoke with my pastor, Bob Green, today about my idea and he was really excited about helping more churches get online. Besides helping connect churches with people I am really interested in seeing how simply adding a very simple, well design website affects the growth of a church. I am hoping to be able to see more than 100 churches participate in this program. I am scheduling some meeting with associational directors and mission leaders to obtain some support to see this project kick off in a big way. I hope to handle domain registry, initial site set up, email, and a few other services for each church in a centralized way. Just like the SBC in a way for churches to pool their money to reach others in incredible ways I hope that http://tmabcwired.com will transition in a similar way that allows churches do more together than they could do on their own. Not every church can afford to hire a Media and Marketing Director like Arrow Heights, but many churches can pool their resources to create an organization that will provide them the same services. I want to lead out in this field, because I believe that the Gospel can be spread through the internet and that the web is the well of today.

So let me ask you a few questions:

• Do you think people are more likely to visit a church that has a web site?
• Do you consider a church web site a must have?
• How do you use your church’s web site and why do you go there?

The second item over there is Google Friend Connect. Join my social network and let the other people who stop by Fish is The New Cheese connect with you.

• http://www.twitter.com/intimidavidson
• http://www.twitter.com/arrowheights
• http://www.twitter.com/ahbcstudents
• http://www.twitter.com/upfromunder

Not only am a I able to have multiple twitter account open on the same page, but I also have my Facebook, Gmail, MySpace, Google Calendar, and some of my favorite blog feeds. I now have 10 homepages that open up when I open FireFox, but I have moved NetVibes to my primary position and may even get to narrow the list down since they will show up on my NetVibes page.

I am digging this new service because it brings so many of the place that I usually go into one place. I love that. Simply my life please. Check out the service and leave a comment here about what you think of this service.

I have read about several churches that broadcast their twitter feed onto the wall in the sanctuary so that people can interact with the service in real time across the church. These tools can used to build community with your church or small group. It would be great to have a twitter prayer group for your church that sends a text to your prayer warrior followers who get the update in real time and can respond with other requests or say that they are praying.

How often do you text? How important has texting become to you and/or your kids?

I have become very fond of Craigslist in the past few months. Several times a day, I find myself rushing to the computer to see if there are any new finds. I have gotten rid of some things that I would have otherwise had to have paid to have hauled off and I have acquired many things that make my husband groan.

Some of the fun of Craigslist is the chase. You have to be the first to respond to the post, and sometimes, I think it helps to have a sob story of how much you wish you had or need their item. (I don’t do this, of course!) It is also interesting meeting all of the different people on Craigslist. I have picked something up for a lady in a shiny BMW and I have given something to someone in a van being held together with duct tape.

Craigslist provides great ministry opportunities. I have seen many people giving away bags of clothes, furniture, and even food. I have had the opportunity to give an old mattress to a lady whose current mattress had springs sticking out. I have also been ministered to on Craigslist. A lovely lady who was giving away some monkey grass went out of her way to help me with my garden. She taught me much about gardening. She also gave me much insight into how the garden relates to our daily lives as Christians.

I have truly enjoyed my experiences with Craigslist.org and encourage everyone to use this site!

Remember: One man’s trash is another man’s treasure!

Do you go to Craigslist.org? What have your experiences been?

      Hi, I’m Katherine Conner, and I get to be your guest blogger today.  My favorite Jeremy Davidson friend asked me to write to you about the impact that www.youtube.com has on my life, and the ways that I see we could use YouTube to reach others for Christ.

      I use the YouTube service on an almost daily basis.  I have Flock set as my current web browser, and one of the features I like most about it is the ability to log into my YouTube account.  The videos that I have previously favorited will then be displayed across the top of my screen.  I can play those while continuing to browse the Internet.  This is easier to me that Itunes most of the time, because all of my favorite songs are in one place.

      I mainly use YouTube to access music.  Lately, I have been on a big kick to discover new songs and artists, and YouTube makes it very easy to do this.  Tulsa used to have a pretty cool “Christian alternative” radio station that I enjoyed listening to- unfortunately it was changed to another “contemporary Christian” station, meaning there is too much Amy Grant and Michael W. Smith for me to handle.  Using YouTube, I can get online to hear new songs by the artists that I used to listen to on the Kross.  I use the “Related Videos” tab on to often find new music.  I recently unearthed a cover of one of my favorite Rush of Fools song that I am determined to learn to sing- which is a big deal since I can’t sing.  At all.

      I feel that YouTube is a valuable resource for those of use trying to further the Kingdom of Christ. Wikipedia states that “few statistics are publicly available regarding the number of videos on YouTube. However, in July 2006, the company revealed that more than 100 million videos were being watched every day, and 2.5 billion videos were watched in June 2006. 50,000 videos were being added per day in May 2006, and this increased to 65,000 by July. In January 2008 alone, nearly 79 million users had made over 3 billion video views.”  These facts are old, and I’m sure that they’ve only increased since then.  I feel that the dreams and desires of my generation to see the love of Christ could be shared through videos- how cool would it be to see tutorials such as “How to Love the Skaters” or “How to Witness to the Gay Guys Next Door”?  It would be totally neat to get on and see other Christians sharing their walks and relationships with us.  I would like to log on to YouTube and watch testimonies from around the globe of how God is moving.  Sermons and music are helpful and needed, but I would love to see real world application of how I can fulfill the commandment to “go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.”  (Matthew 20:28 NIV). 

-Katherine Conner
You can help save lives- one mile at a time!!
Check out our NEW webpage for TNT-
http://pages.teamintraining.org/ok/rnrsa08/kconner

You can see my Facebook profile here.

I have noticed many of our students here at Arrow Heights spend most of day online in this application now that they have added an IM feature, making it a great way to connect with your friends and develop relationship with people that you haven’t had the chance to spend face to face time with.

Check out this great article, FaceBook for Pastors by marketing coach Chris Forbes.

Are you on Facebook?  Leave a link to your profile in the comments.

Find my twitter feed here.

-Jeremy Davidson