looking out the window

the storm....

Last night was pretty crazy!!! After having a great day up at GCC for the First Impressions workshop (and lunch with Jason and Ed) we got back home, ready for a relaxing night... not so! At about 10:00 the storms starting rolling in... 

It was about 10:20 when my wife said "Matt, these seem bad... should we go to the hall?" and it was about then that all of our power went out and all heck broke loose! It sounded like it was raining gravel... the wind was blowing HARD and it was an out and out NASTY storm. 

Below are a few pictures of the area around our house. Luckily our damage was minimal... some hail damage on our barn, and fairly young tree that will need cut down.... other than that, and the power being out still... we're pretty good.

ha!

I'm looking at a book on amazon about web project management and this cartoon was in it.... it makes me laugh.

volunteers

Discovering, leading, and building a volunteer team is a tough one for me. Recently I've been discovering the vast... and I do mean VAST.... IT professionals in our congregations... a CFO of a major financial institution, 2 Network engineers who are tasked with managing thousands of users, help desk pros, programmers working on BIG projects with global implications, Web advertisement pros who spend time at the googleplex, and the list goes on...

So here's my delima... Time is so valuable... between kids, spouses, and work... time is short for all. So how do you begin to harness the MASSIVE power that lies within a volunteer base and yet make sure you don't run them over. I understand there have been books written and conference talks given about this subject but how are other people in my shoes doing this? What kind of agendas do you have? Are you doing anything particular to encourage them? How are you gaining buy-in?

So far it seems like the easy way to harness some of the power is to be task driven... in other words... this needs done so track down the people who would know what to do and ask them to join the task. But then what... when the task is over, how do you keep someone connected? What do you do with the server guys while your talking network... or the email guys while your talking intranet....?

Do you have a pattern or practice?

I can say this for sure... They guys I've worked with so far are AMAZING. I am continually humbled by the amount of knowledge, experience, and time they give us. It truly is great!!!

my road

This is what my road looked like on the way to work yesterday....

photo shoot

Here are a few photos for our photo shoot last week. We were shooting at uber volunteer Joel's house in his studio. It is for an upcoming series called life hd... All the printed stuff got here today and we are gearing up to hit it hard Easter Morning....

I'll put up some of the final art here soon, but take a look at these pictures from my iphone in the meantime...

hmmmm

I had the privilege of having lunch with our city's mayor today. It seems a month or so back, he talked to the ministerial association in Greenfield about how the churches could reach out to the community. His observations from that meeting were interesting to say the least. Basically he talked with the group about an article he read in the Indianapolis Star an article that should open the eyes of the church everywhere... but the scary thing is, I don't think it does.

I've posted the pdf below... Sometimes I just wish the church would get out of the way...

Download Church.pdf

out of sync

It seems lately I've been out of sync... Just a lot going on and kinda dropping routines I shouldn't drop. I did get a chance to read some blogs I've neglected lately. I found this one an extremely important reminder... thought I'd pass it along.

http://swerve.lifechurch.tv/2008/02/28/isolation/

cost

I like F1... I know I've said that before.... but let me tell you why I'm liking it right now....

I am sitting here at Panera in between appointments working in our database... call me crazy... but I like it....

The other thing I like about F1 is the fact that the cost is forcing us to use it. I know its an odd way of looking at it, but the dollars we pay them every month underscore the need for this to work! I guess there is more than one way to force us into good habits....

an early valentine's day gift **UPDATE**

Achy joints, head ache, fever, stopped up nose, sinus pressure... it can't be, it isn't.... IT IS!!! The only problem is, I don't get sick... ok maybe a sinus infection here and there but not really sick.... but the doctor ruined that streak.... its the flu.... and it sucks... now I think I've given it to my wife.... I told her to call it an early valentine's present... she didn't think that was funny.... oh well...

**UPDATE**

Turns out, I still owe my wife a gift.... in other words, I didn't give her the flu...

WE ARE LIVE!!!

It felt really good this week to sit in our ministry staff meeting and let everyone know that we are live with F1!!! I have been looking forward to this day and I am glad its here!!! Thanks for Fellowship Tech for all of your work in getting us going AND a big thanks to Will our delivery manager!!! He's pretty much THE man!!!