Cancer Blogger’s Last Post Goes Viral

One year ago, I read this news article: B. C. cancer blogger’s final words go viral

Derek Miller,  a 41-year-old father of two, died from complications of colorectal cancer.  He had written a farewell post which a close friend published for him on his blog.

Perhaps you could generate a discussion on what your last words would be that leads to the gospel.

Does anybody  have a “last post” lined up?

NOTES:

• Derek Miller’s “last post.”  Unfortunately, Derek was a committed atheist and believed he would not exist after h
• Meet e4e author Russ Martin and read Russ’s posts on e4e.

Jesus IS Bigger Than Angry Birds

If you’re interested in YouVersion or in what you might need to consider when putting together a mobile app for ministy, watch this seven-minute interview, Jesus IS Bigger Than Angry Birds, by  TechCrunch with YouVersion’s founder, Bobby Gruenewald.

Takeways:

- YouVersion has positioned itself as a “Bible engagement” tool and “interactive” app

- YouVersion measures ‘everything’ including amount of time the app is open

- YouVersion has positioned itself as a cause (they are trying to get people to read the Bible)

- YouVersion thinks that if something is on a mobile device, it’s more a part of your life

- YouVersion thinks there are many more mobile apps in this ‘religious’ mobile space.

Interesting.  What take-aways do you have about how YouVersion is helping people connect with God?

NOTES:

• Since this interview YouVersion has been installed on 50,000,000 mobile devices.
• Meet e4e author Russ Martin and read Russ’s posts on e4e.

Pray for the Unreached over Skype

Have you ever thought of praying for the unreached with others from around the world on Skype?

Check out Unreached Prayer Initiative.

Could be a great way to cast vision for your team and join one of these times.

Do you know any other internet-telephone based prayer groups?

Meet e4e author Russ Martin and read Russ’s posts on e4e.

A compelling reason to make your sites ‘shareable’

A friend recently pinged me to say that he saw something Google is playing with in his search results.  He had searched for “merge PDFs” and one of the top sites returned was a site that I, one of his friends, had referenced on Twitter months earlier.

This has lots of applications for us.  Imagine a student doing a search for “Does God Exist?” and then discovering one of the search results is an article from EveryStudent.com that has a classmate’s tweet (or some other “like” in social media.)

A social ‘recommendation’ seems really powerful.

One application: When posting things to your blog, make sure you have a Facebook like button and a tweet button that readers can use to share with others.

What other applications or implications do you see for social recommendations in Google searches?

Meet e4e author Russ Martin and read Russ’s posts on e4e.

Three Questions to Ask About Your Ministry

Here’s what I’m going to be asking myself about my ministry this year:

1. Is it social? People need to be able to talk about your cause and share it with others on Twitter, Facebook, and other social networks. Harness the power of your biggest fans to promote your cause. People influence people. So, give the people you minister with the ability to promote your cause within spaces they live in every day.

2. Is it mobile? Increasingly, many of the people you work with are connected through mobile devices. Figure out what your biggest value action is for your cause and make it dead-simple to do on a mobile device.

3. How many clicks did it take? I’ve realized that it takes far too many clicks to get involved with many good causes (including ones I’m responsible for). The barrier needs to be so low to get involved with your cause that it takes only a few (and I’m going to start counting them) clicks to take the first step.

What ideas are you emphasizing to accelerate your cause?

NOTES:

• From Russ’s original post at Three Phrases You’ll Hear A Lot This Year
• Meet e4e author Russ Martin and read Russ’s posts on e4e.