We've been going through the book of Nehemiah at church, and as usual, I'm able to relate his wall with a building project of my own. A few years ago I got involved as an usher at my church. One thing quickly lead to another and I was soon asked to use my experience to program a scheduling system for our ushering team...

As I got more involved, I was saddened as I discovered the sad state of software and sharing amongst the Church. I prayed, and am thoroughly convinced that God planted a vision within me. Since I have a fairly deep dislike for money, but really enjoy giving, it made a lot of sense to me: open-source church software. It's a tall order and has its complications, but I have come to discover this vision is shared by others involved with church IT across the nation.

This week I returned from my vacation and received some bad news. A software collaboration deal I was helping to shape had fallen through due to complications with legalese. Before I left for vacation it seemed we would soon have an excellent framework (written by another AZ church) from which to develop ministry-based software that could be shared freely with the world. Needless to say I was more than bummed.

Then my disappointment turned to excitement as I got word that Microsoft had announced that their CRM was skipping v2.0 and would instead move to 3.0 and incorporate many sought after changes. I just finished watching two TechEd webcasts covering the upcoming features. I'm now in the process of recasting my vision and will report back shortly.

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As of Monday June 6, our web site has become slightly more important to us. Somehow XO Communications issued an order to Quest to disconnect our phone service.

Yes, a web site is an important tool, but seeing pastors and ministry assistants without phone communications made me realize how important phones are -- you see, I'm not a big fan of them (especially cell phones) mostly because I'd much rather speak with someone in person.

This event has made me think more about providing additional communication tools for our church. Specifically I've been considering integrating something like those "interactive chat" tools you see on tech support sites. This would allow a receptionist or on-call/on-line pastor to 'talk' with someone who may be to shy to just use the phone. In this age, it does not seem too far fetched.

Have you ever used one of those interactive chat tools to talk with an online support representative?


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We launched our new look-and-feel (theme/skin) today. I don't think this one will generate as much "discussion" as our last one (Vegas/Stakes Are High) but it does still make you think about what a Christian website is supposed to look like... it reminds me what Jesus said about 'cleaning the outside of the cup'.

I suspect if you are not intentional about your site you do run some risks.

Is a church website supposed to look like something? What is its purpose? To me it is an important tool of the fisherman.

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This is something I've hesitated doing for a long time. Now I've used blogs before to journal personal ideas, but until now, I've just been lurking around reading my fellow associates blogs.

In as much as I can speak about what we (CCCEV) are doing without crossing the "information expressed here do not necessarily reflect the views of my church" boundaries, this will be my place to share with other fellow church IT staff what we are doing and why we are doing it.

One of my goals is to convince you (the skeptical developer) of why we ought to be collaborating and combining our programming efforts in order to increase the fruit of our labor. Frankly, I don't care if only three churches buy into this idea. With three other developers we will be able to out-perform a church with a single developer by a factor of 10.

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