Tag: e-mail

Thoughts on St. Peter’s Brewery

Just received this via email from a good friend…

JB….I got past all the holiday company and finished your book last night…a few thoughts:

1. I was very impressed with the depth of character development all the way though…especially Jimmy, GT, Kim, and Eddie…..but Pete was my favorite BARNABAS of the bunch.

2. I also thought you did a great job of developing the threads of multiple themes…you had to think way ahead to do that and weave it all together!

3. Of course the obvious message about discovering faith-life through authentic relationships was crystal clear and effectively communicated too.

4. Most importantly, someone with a gift for writing like this needs to do it for a lifetime….I know you stir the water in lots of arenas, but my opinion is that this area is a calling for you. The pen is still mightier than the sword! This type writing gives you room to develop ideas/personalities/core values that goes much further than the typical blog. I know you seek to follow HIM and will do that well….but, I believe HE has given you an unusual talent, a “sword”, for advancement of the Kingdom.

—

Thanks so much for the kind words!

You can read other reviews or order the book at stpetersbrewery.info.

If you’ve read the book (or are reading the book) I’d love to get your thoughts as well – good or bad. What do ya think? What’s challenging you? What questions are coming to the forefront?

140 characters of prayer

I feel like I’ve been sending a lot of prayer–related txt messages and tweets lately. Absolutely nothing wrong with that. I actually have only heard positive things from folks getting them (however please let me know if you’d rather not receive them).

I’ve found that txt messages, Twitter and e-mail have turned the traditional “prayer chain” into a rapid fire prayer blast. Within seconds/minutes folks all around the world can be updated with the latest prayer needs.

I’ve used txt messaging and e-mail for some time now. And with my new phone I love the ability to assign folks to message groups so I’m not selecting multiple people each and every time I send a message out.

But I have to wonder if there’s still yet a better way to send out rapid-fire prayer needs/requests. If more folks signed up to Twitter it could really become an informational network where folks could chose to receive updates via the web or txt messages. Perhaps an alternative Twitter feed could be setup just for prayer requests/alerts.

I wonder what it would take to build a system for churches or ministries where prayer alerts could be entered into a system and a message would be sent to Twitter, Plurk (get the most responses from Plurk), Jaiku, etc feeds (140 characters max of course), sent to those requesting cell phone updates, and then a longer more detailed message could also go directly to an RSS feed that could be subscribed to via traditional RSS readers and or e-mail.

Ultimately folks could subsubscribe, unsubscribe and also choose how to receive the prayer alerts.

Is this asking too much? Am I over thinking this? Is it already there? I bet with a little planning a system could be built using WordPress and a couple different plugins.

Hmmm…. could lead to some great possibilities.

What do you prefer? How is your church spreading news/announcements/prayer requests? Still using traditional mediums like bulletins, announcements and prayer chains? Are you on the “cutting edge” and using txt messages, or RSS?

Share you thoughts and ideas!

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Your age by dinner math

Got this from an e-mail… it’s a cool trick, but it’s basically just a simple math problem.

It takes less than a minute.
Work this out as you read.
Be sure you don’t read the bottom until you’ve worked it out.
This is not one of those waste of time things, it’s fun.

1. First of all, pick the number of times a week that you would like to
go out to eat. (More than once but less than 10) or you can just pick any number between 1 and 9
2. Multiply this number by 2 (just to be bold). or to make the problem work 😉
3. Add 5.
4. Multiply it by 50.
5. If you have already had your birthday this year add 1757. If you haven’t, add 1756.
6. Now subtract the four digit year that you were born.

You should have a three digit number.
The first digit of this was your original number (How many times you want to go out to restaurants in a week (or the random number you picked.)

The next two numbers are:
YOUR AGE (oh yes, it is!).

THIS IS THE ONLY YEAR (2007) IT WILL EVER WORK, SO SPREAD IT AROUND!