churchrelevance.com

The Internet Evangelism Coalition has tweaked and relaunched their church website assessment tool. The new and improved test is very robust with 55 questions. It also includes a free customized report designed to help each church develop strategies to better reach their community.

Each question also comes with tips explaining the importance of each area. A few of my favorite tips are:

• “Splash pages” are intensely irritating to users, and a percentage will never bother to click through. Equally annoying are websites that automatically play music when the visitor arrives at the homepage.
• Poor spelling, grammar, or punctuation will reduce the credibility of any website. And all written text should be checked and revised by someone other than the writer. It is frequently possible to reduce word-count by 25% or more.
• Interior shots will de-mystify and familiarize the church building to outsiders.
• Many people report the experience of emailing a church and never hearing back. If you can’t respond to emails quickly, maybe you should not offer email links on your website!

Web designers may have differing opinions on the importance of each of the 55 areas, but over all, it is an exceptionally useful tool.

FYI: Internet Evangelism Day is April 27th this year.

Rick Warren of Saddleback Church (Lake Forest, CA) has made a list of seven common church leadership mistakes to avoid.

1. You stop growing.
2. You stop caring.
3. You stop listening.
4. You get distracted.
5. You get complacent.
6. You become arrogant.
7. You fail to delegate.

For Rick Warren’s tips on overcoming each mistake, read the full article.

For Discussion:
Are there any leadership mistakes you would add to this list? If so, how can one keep from making those mistakes?

Going All the Way by Craig Groeschel of LifeChurch.tv (Edmond, OK) was written as a guide to having a better marriage, but it also has some valuable lessons for leaders. In particular, Craig discusses how to be a better listener in 3 easy steps.

1. When someone is speaking, stop everything and focus intently on the other person.
   Don’t think about something else. Don’t formulate your response. You’re goal is to comprehend not just the person’s words, but their heart.
2. Don’t just listen with your ears, but also with your eyes.
   Pay attention to facial expressions and to body language. You’ll be surprised how much information comes through gestures and stance, even how the other person breathes while they’re talking.
3. Repeat back to the person what you’re hearing so the other person knows what you heard.
   By telling [someone] what I think [he] meant, I can confirm that I’ve understood [him]. It also affirms to [him] the value of what [he] said. It shows [him] not just that I heard [him], but that I was listening. Which demonstrates to [him] that I care.

Being a good listener not only makes you more likable but wiser. There is a lot to be learned from the ideas and insights of other people.

For Discussion:
Are there any tips you would add to these three for becoming a better listener?

The Guttmacher Institute has published findings from a study that discovered that the U.S. abortion rate is at its lowest level since 1974. In fact, the 1.2 million abortions of 2005 were 25% fewer than the all-time high of 1.6 million abortions in 1990. Unfortunately, despite the decrease, roughly 1 in 5 pregnancies still ended in abortion in 2005.

Why the decrease?

1. Fewer Clinics Available
   The proportion of counties without an abortion provider increased from 77% in 1978 to 87% in 2000.
2. Unaccounted for Medication Abortions
   In September 2000, when the Food and Drug Administration approved mifepristone for use for early medication abortion. As knowledge about and comfort with mifepristone has increased, it likely has been introduced into settings where surgical abortions were previously not provided (e.g., family planning clinics and the practices of family doctors), possibly increasing access to abortion and reversing the trend of services’ being concentrated in clinics and larger providers.
3. Laws
   Between 2000 and 2004, five states enacted laws that impose burdens on abortion providers.
4. Better Birth Control Usage
   Numbers and rates of adolescent pregnancies continued to decline between 1995 and 2002, largely because of improved contraceptive use among adolescents, and fewer adolescents have needed to access abortion services.

The full report goes into extensive details about abortion usage, including geographic distribution.
[via The Washington Post & The Dallas Morning News]

In his book Microtrends, Mark J. Penn discusses over 70 microtrends that are emerging in U.S. culture. There are three microtrends, in particular, that I think are reshaping the way churches must approach singles ministry. Here is a brief overview of each microtrend using excerpts from the book.

1. Surplus of Single Women
   Issue:
   There are too few straight men for all the straight women… at least 3 percent of [women] are going to be left.
   Why:
   - There are 90,000 more boys born every year than girls. But by the time those kids turn 18, the sex ratio has shifted a full point the other way to 51 to 49, because more boys die in puberty than girls.
   - Gay men outnumber lesbians in America by approximately 2 to 1. If you subtract them from the already lopsided numbers of overall men and women, you get… a straight sex ratio of 53 to 47.
   Related Trend:
   A related trend, given the rise of single women, is the number of women bearing or adopting children without a partner - known as Single Mothers by Choice. In the early 1990s… there were only about 50,000 such Moms in America. Now there are an estimated three times that many.
   
2. Cougars (women who date younger men)
   Issue:
   One in three women between 40 and 69 is dating a younger man, and about one-quarter of those men are ten or more years younger.
   Why:
   - High divorce rates combined with longer life spans means a greater likelihood of women’s reentering the dating market.
   - [According to Match.com] between 2002 and 2005, men interested in dating women five or more years older increased 44 percent. Those interested in a ten-or-more-year difference doubled.
3. Online Dating
   Issue:
   Nearly 1 in 4 single Americans who are looking for a romantic partner use the 1,000 or more dating Web sites out there. That includes almost 1 in 5 Americans in their 20s, and 1 in 10 Americans in their 30s or 40s.
   Why:
   - 61 percent of online Americans do not consider online dating “desperate.”
   - Nearly half of online Americans think Internet dating is a good way to meet people.
   - 17 percent of online daters - or nearly 3 million American adults - have turned online dates into a long-term relationship or marriage. That’s exactly the same number of couples in America who say they met in church.

In other words, the typical singles ministry is likely to be reaching more women than men. And these singles are not just twenty-somethings but include older ages, even senior citizens. Despite the age gap, some of those singles are willing to date significantly older or younger people.

Singles ministry is no longer just about young adults, and while its demographic makeup continues to widen, I have to wonder if its perceived value and allure of dating opportunities will lessen as more singles make their way onto the Internet to find love.

For more insights on each microtrend, read the book Microtrends by Mark J. Penn.

FOR DISCUSSION:

1. Do you think these microtrends or any other trends affect the way modern singles ministry should be done?
2. If so, how can the church more effectively reach singles?

Comments are now open on Church Relevance! So send me a nice friendly “hello” and join in on the conversations of my future posts.

Now there are some guidelines. I expect each commenter to follow three basic rules:

1. Be polite.
2. Stay on topic.
3. And try to add value to the conversation.

I look forward to talking with you. And I hope our discussions lead to a better understanding of how to do ministry in a more effective and relevant way.

Perry Noble of NewSpring Church (Anderson, SC) recently blogged about seven joy killers in ministry. Here is a quick summary:

1. Comparing your ministry to other ministries.
2. Focusing on critics.
3. Being too busy.
4. Being proud.
5. Losing perspective.
6. Having too little faith.
7. Becoming stagnate in personal growth.

To read Perry’s thoughts on each area, check out the original post.

With the 2008 presidential election nearing, The Barna Group investigated what issues concern America the most. What are the biggest problems that the nation is facing? Here is what they found:

1. Poverty
   >> 78% of Americans
   >> 78% of U.S. Born Again Christians
2. Personal Debt
   >> 78% of Americans
   >> 79% of U.S. Born Again Christians
   >> 81% of U.S. Evangelicals
3. HIV/AIDS
   >> 76% of Americans
   >> 77% of U.S. Born Again Christians
4. Illegal Immigration
   >> 60% of Americans
   >> 68% of U.S. Born Again Christians
5. Global Warming
   >> 57% of Americans
   >> 33% of U.S. Evangelicals
6. Abortion
   >> 50% of Americans
   >> 67% of U.S. Born Again Christians
   >> 94% of U.S. Evangelicals
7. The Content of Television and Movies
   >> 45% of Americans
   >> 60% of U.S. Born Again Christians
   >> 79% of U.S. Evangelicals
8. Homosexual Activists
   >> 35% of Americans
   >> 49% of U.S. Born Again Christians
   >> 75% of U.S. Evangelicals
9. Homosexual Lifestyles
   >> 35% of Americans
   >> 51% of U.S. Born Again Christians
   >> 75% of U.S. Evangelicals
10. The Political Efforts of Conservative Christians
    >> 23% of Americans

What I find most surprising about this research is that American born again Christians, particularly Evangelicals, are more concerned about personal debt than are non-Christians. With such a high percentage of Christians concerned about personal debt, I cannot help but wonder how many Christians are bound by debt to such an extent that it hinders them from doing anything great for the cause of Christ.