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LifeChurch.tv (Edmond, OK) is doing a sermon series this upcoming June called One Prayer. But they are not the only church doing it. In fact, over 25 other churches have already signed up to preach the sermon series, as well.

What’s it all about?

Well, Craig Groeschel does a good job summing it up in this video:

Each pastor will preach one week from his church about what one prayer he would pray if God would answer one prayer for the Church at large. And then the participating churches will share video teaching from other participating churches in the following weeks. For example, Craig Groeschel of LifeChurch.tv (Edmond, OK) will be preaching “Make Us One.” And Ed Young of Fellowship Church (Grapevine, TX) will be preaching “Make Us Creative.”

But that is not all. Aside from the sermon series, each church is encouraged to participate by:

• Receiving an offering and combining it with hundreds of other churches to help people in need.
• Mobilizing your church to do something ministry-related in your local community and with other local churches if possible.
• Promoting the unified website (to be announced) that will encourage your people to fast and pray with other believers.
• Using the free promotional resources online (including graphics, mailer templates, video promos, banners and other promotional tools).

Some participating churches include:

• Celebration Church (Jacksonville, FL)
• Champions Centre (Tacoma, WA)
• Church of the Highlands (Birmingham, AL)
• Elevation Church (Indian Trail, NC)
• Fellowship Church (Grapevine, TX)
• Free Chapel (Gainesville, GA)
• Genesis Church (Tallahassee, FL)
• Granger Community Church (Granger, IN)
• Healing Place Church (Baton Rouge, LA)
• Journey Church (Norman, OK)
• Lake Hills Church (Austin, TX)
• National Community Church (Washington, DC)
• New Hope Christian Fellowship (Honolulu, HI)
• New Life Church (Conway, AR)
• NewSong Church (Irvine, CA)
• NewSpring Church (Anderson, SC)
• North Coast Church (Vista, CA)
• NorthwayChurch.tv (Malta, NY)
• Seacoast Church (Mt. Pleasant, SC)
• The Church at South Las Vegas (Henderson, NV)
• VictoryChurch.tv (Oklahoma City, OK)

For more information about One Prayer, visit www.lifechurch.tv/one-prayer.

Sacha Baron Cohen, the creator of the infamous movie Borat, is filming another movie called Bruno. It is about Bruno, a gay Austrian fashion reporter, who is one of Baron Cohen’s many comic personalities. Because Christians are stereotyped as antihomosexual and homophobic, Bruno has already interviewed a pastor, a Christian musician, and an event sponsor from a Christian Rock festival. His goal is controversy, and he usually gets it.

Earlier this month, Bruno and his film crew crashed the Easter play at Central Community Church (Wichita, KS). Bruno’s crew told the church they were working on a documentary for German TV One, and they asked the congregation to sign waivers and provide their Social Security Numbers. But church staff discovered their real intentions when -

One of our pastors (Clint Dunn) came around in the back hallway, and they were surrounding a biblically dressed person in chains on a cart.
Greg Smith :: Executive Pastor :: Central Community Church

Pastor Clint Dunn locked the doors to prevent Bruno from interrupting the end of the Easter play, and he told the audience to go home. Bruno’s film crew even went as far as preparing to cover security cameras for the prank. It is a reminder that, in the pursuit of laughs, some are willing to disrupt the Church’s mission of saving lives.

On his blog, Greg Smith offers the lessons his church has learned from almost being pranked by Bruno.

For Discussion:
- What are some best practices for ushers, staff, and church security for preventing disruptions or harm during a church service?

[ via KAKE-TV & Family News in Focus]

CreativeMYK.com now offers more than free photos and graphics for ministries.

This week they launched a Christian artist social network. Graphic designers, photographers, and other visual artists can set up a “Creative Space” to display their portfolios, network with other designers, and potentially get hired by a new client. Artists can also participate in a Discussion forum or Critique forum.

I set up a Creative Space. So if you are a visual artist, sign-up and say “hello.”

It is always interesting to see what other churches are doing for Easter. One trend is evident this year - more and more churches are moving away from the traditional Easter cantata. I already highlighted what two Tulsa churches did for Easter 2008, but here are three other examples of unconventional Easter events this year.

Granger Community Church (Granger, IN)
Photo Credits: Jeff Petersen & Dustin Maust.

For a sermon illustration, Mark Beeson had the congregation play a giant game of Simon using glow sticks and music by Daft Punk.

The Rock Church (San Diego, CA)

The Rock Church had their hip-hop ministry, Rock Steady, perform.

Mariners Church (Irvine, CA)
Photo Credits: Mariners Church website.

Easter egg drops have been around for years. I don’t know who first started them, but almost two decades ago, Jim Wideman dropped 17,000 candy eggs from an airplane for his children’s ministry. In recent years, helicopter egg drops have grown in popularity. And this Easter, Mariners Church hosted quite a large Easter egg drop.

For Discussion:
- What other unconventional things are churches doing for Easter?

For Easter 2008, I visited two Tulsa churches - LifeChurch.tv and Church on the Move. I thought you might be curious to see what each megachurch did for their Easter services. Here are some photos and a video.

LifeChurch.tv Tulsa

For Easter weekend, LifeChurch.tv began a new series called “Warrior.”

To promote the series, LifeChurch.tv equipped members with invite cards and fortune cookies. They also mailed postcards and even painted the sermon series graphic on the side of the Tulsa campus building.

To kick off the service, worship pastor, Derrick Henslee, sported a Guitar Hero controller and performed “The Pretender” by Foo Fighters with his band, while video of the game played on the projection screen.

A total of 3,088 people attended LifeChurch.tv Tulsa this Easter, and 43 hands were raised during the altar calls. And a grand total of 31,264 people attended all 13 LifeChurch.tv campuses this Easter weekend with 479 hands raised during altar calls.

Church on the Move

For Easter weekend, Church on the Move continued in their sermon series called “Gethsemane.”

Church on the Move hung three large sheets of fabric around their stage and projected the sermon series graphics onto them before the service began.

During the beginning of the worship service, these sheets of projection screen fabric were used to project video footage of Jesus and motion graphics while music played. After about seven minutes, the sheets dropped to the floor, and the worship pastor, Andy Chrisman, began leading the congregation in worship. I managed to get a couple minutes of video footage showing the fabric panels in use.

Church on the Move had a total of five Easter church services.

In case you missed it or just want to reexperience this year’s Unleash Conference from NewSpring Church (Anderson, SC), you can now watch the main sessions online for free.

The Unleash Conference website also offers free PDFs of breakout session outlines, including Tony Morgan’s “10 Steps to Becoming Blogging BFFs.”

[via Perry Noble]

With more and more churches launching exceptional websites, it is becoming increasingly difficult to keep my top church websites list to only 75 sites. So to make it easier on myself and give you more eye candy, I am expanding the list to the Top 80 Church Websites.

Ten new church websites made list, and The Life Church (Memphis, TN) recently redesigned their website. Here are the eleven new screen shots. I hope they inspire you.

#1 - Buckhead Church (Atlanta, GA)

#2 - Catalina Church of Midtown (Tucson, AZ)

#3 - City of Grace (Mesa, AZ)

#4 - Cornerstone (Chandler, AZ)

#5 - Crosspointe Church (Cary, NC)

#6 - First Baptist Church (Orlando, FL)

#7 - Kingsfield Church (Irvine, CA)

#8 - Lenexa Christian Center (Lenexa, KS)

#9 - One* (Spokane, WA)

#10 - The Life Church (Memphis, TN)

#11 - Windsor Crossing Community Church (Chesterfield, MO)

For more church web design inspiration, check out the complete list of the Top 80 Church Websites. What other sites do you think should be on the list and why?

In July 2007, The Barna Group asked American adults to identify their most important relationships and most significant groups. Here is what they discovered:

Most Important Relationship

• 70% said family or specific family members
  >> 33% said their entire nuclear family
  >> 22% said their spouse
  >> 17% said their children
  >> 3% said their parents
• 19% said God, Jesus Christ, Allah, or the Trinity
• 2% said a specific friend

Most Significant Group

• 29% said their church
• 18% said the people they affiliate with at work
• 14% said loose associations of friends that regularly gather together
• 12% said a hobby club or social group
• 7% said interaction with people in the neighborhood

These results are not surprising. But it is interesting to see the correlation between the perceived importance and influence of each relationship. In Surprising Insights from the Unchurched, Thom Rainer asks the previously unchurched, “What person was the greatest influence in your coming to church?”

Greatest Influence in Coming to Church

• 42% said a family member
  >> 35% said their wife
  >> 18% said their child
  >> 16% said other
  >> 9% said parents
  >> 3% said siblings
  >> 2% said parents-in-law
  >> Husbands had a minimal influence. They ranked below wives, children, and parents.
• 25% said no one
• 17% said other
• 8% said coworker
• 6% said neighbor
• 2% said merchant

This research reiterates the importance of the church being active in the community. Your greatest church marketing tool is not billboards or a website but your congregation. And a congregation that pursues living and loving as Jesus did is sure to influence their families, coworkers, neighbors, and community.