The Seabourns

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An iPad and Facebook is HiTech Discipleship

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As I put my things into the overhead bin, I noticed that my seatmate was playing with a new Apple iPad. So, I thought, this is the person assigned by God through the Delta Airlines seat assignment system. This is my next opportunity to be someone who truly follows Jesus.

iPadAs I settled in my seat, I commented on his iPad. He was swishing and tapping his way through app after app after app. He was thoroughly engrossed and having a lot of fun.

After takeoff, he started flipping through apps again. He had just bought the iPad a few days earlier. He had purchased internet time on the GoGo in-flight internet system that Delta offers on many flights. So as we jetted toward Orlando, he was all over the internet using his new iPad.

As our conversation progressed, I learned more about him. He had a new job after many months of unemployment. He was changing careers and doing job training in Orlando for his new job. He was a follower of Jesus.

Still engaged with his iPad, so I asked him if we could become friends on Facebook. I told him there was something I would like to show him on my Facebook page. So right there somewhere over southern Georgia, he requested to be a friend on Facebook. Using his iPad on my Facebook account, I accepted his friend request.

Grow

Then we looked at the tab on my profile called Grow. We explored several articles about growing in your relationship with Jesus.

Being Facebook friends, I can now keep up with him, we could exchange messages, I could pray for him as he updated his status. We exchanged messages a few times. One time, I wrote:

Luke,

I am praying for you as you grow into your new job. Please continue to send these updates as you have opportunity. You are welcome to read my blog at http://seabourn.org where I share things from my own personal journey.

I am asking my friends to pray that I will be “the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing”. [2 Corinthians 2:15]. Would you join me in praying this into my life? Please send me any specific things I can be praying for you, Luke.

Blessings, Keith

He responded:

Hey Keith,

I think that is an amazing prayer to ask for. I really like asking to be an aroma for Christ. Never thought of it quite that way. I can definitely testify that God has given you that! I will definitely check out your blog… Thanks for praying for me. I really appreciate the prayers. Please pray that God will give me strength, and confidence to go down the path he put me on.

Luke

So, we’re on a journey together which began on StartingWithGod.com living in my Facebook page. The journey started about 30,000 feet over southern Georgia on an iPad between Facebook friends. It continues in Facebook messages and email exchanges.

Why not add the Grow:: StartingWithGod app to your Facebook page? It’s easy. It’s free. Here’s how:

http://mediaforministry.org/932/facebook-starting-with-god-app/.

While you’re adding tabs, why not add the God? evangelistic tab to your profile also? Here’s how: http://www.everystudent.info/fb/facebook4.html.

You never know when might have an opportunity to help everyone know someone who truly follows Jesus using your Facebook page.

Worldwide Day of Prayer October 2010

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Kay and I returned last night from 20 days on the road in Thailand. We thoroughly enjoyed our time, including rich time with kids and grandkids. Daughter-in-love M wrote a very sweet blog post about the Departure Gate.

Being home is good too. It was great to sleep in my own bed. It’s great to be sitting in my favorite chair, with my favorite cup of coffee, and enjoying the stillness of my house. It’s 5am and my body doesn’t know which timezone it’s in, but if I’m going to be awake at 5 am, this is the place: my chair in my house with my coffee!

Today is a special day in the life of Campus Crusade for Christ staff. Today, we join around the world in active, intentional, dedicated prayer. Running through my head this morning:

Worship in Thailand last weekFrom the rising of the sun
To the going down of the same
The Lord’s name
Is to be praised.
Praise ye the Lord
Praise Him all ye servants of the Lord
Praise the name of the Lord
Blessed be the name of the Lord
From this time forth and forever more

This is a photo from a worship time in Thailand last week with our local Thai staff leading us. Scenes like this will be happening around the world today from the rising of the sun, to going down of the same. The Lord’s name will be praised.

Kay and I spending this special day in prayer.

Capacity to receive God’s blessing

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Peter and his friends had one net. God provided one net full of fish. But he did not provide more than one net full. (John 21)

The mother and her two sons filled every jar they had and every jar their neighbors had. It was not just a few, but many jars. But when all the jars were full, the flow of oil stopped. (2 Kings 4)

Peter, James and John went fishing when Jesus encouraged them to try again after a long, fruitless night. They “filled both boats so full that they began to sink.” Two boats. Two boats full of fish. But not three boats of fish, because there were only two boats.

I’ve spoken on this before.

God blesses us to the limits of our capacity. He stewards his blessings to not exceed our capacity. If we want more of God’s blessing, we must increase our capacity to receive.

Building capacity is the focus of our operational task in Campus Crusade for Christ. It’s the drumbeat we are marching with in operational areas. Capacity to sustain and increasingly accelerate everyone knowing someone who truly follows Jesus.

One of the things we are asking God to do is to help our staff around the world partner with donors to receive 100% of their financial need every month. There are four parts to seeing this dream become reality.

  1. Training in the skills of how to approach ministry partnership and growth in faithful trust that God will provide. One form of this training called DMPD is expanding around the world.
  2. A  donation process for the donor to send his or her monthly donation to the ministry. In many countries, this can be through a bank check or credit card. One way we are doing this in more challenging places is through mobile phones as I wrote recently. We call this the mGiving project.
  3. A financial process to receive the donation, receipt the donor, deposit the funds into each staff member’s accounts, and pay salaries and ministry expenses. We do this through the Donorwise and Microsoft Dynamics tools which we have packaged into the Financial ConneXion.
  4. A reporting process to inform staff of the donations so they can personally thank the donors and report ministry activity to their partners. One way we are doing this is through the TntMPD and Data.Server tools.

We are building the capacity by faith that God will provide the blessings. When the DMPD training was done in one part of the world, there was a 400% increase in funding in one month! We want to be ready for God to provide that blessing everywhere.

Cellphones can transform indigeneous fund raising

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When I lived in Nigeria, my Nigerian Campus Crusade staff friends would spend their evenings and weekends visiting donors to collect cash, then transport this cash to the national office where it was receipted and deposited into their staff account. Their salaries and ministry expenses were covered in this inefficient way.

Most countries are still primarily a cash-based society where the banking system can be a slow and inefficient way to pay bills or transfer funds.

God is revolutionizing the payments system in many countries around the world. Perhaps, he’s creating a way for indigenous fund raising of national missionaries to explode! As I’ve traveled, I’ve found that the desire to help finance God’s Great Commission exists in the hearts of people everywhere. But the process to transfer funds has been difficult.

And we are leveraging what God is providing to simplify the process of donors participating in the Great Commission.

M-PESA Story

Here is an article and video explaining the huge impact the M-PESA system is having in Kenya. We are running a pilot project in Kenya which we call mGiving. We are adding important fund-development steps to the M-PESA system to build a helpful ministry partner development system.

  • a thank-you notification by text message from CCC that the we have received the donation, and processed it appropriately.
  • a notification to the staff member by text message that they have received a donation so that they can then thank the donor personally.
  • reminder messages to the donor that it is time to give the next donation, thus bringing African donors as close as we can to the automated process that Western donors use with automated monthly giving.

Enthusiasm is high among our fellow staff. We are on a mission to help our national staff around the world raise 100% of their monthly needs.

Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.”  Matthew 9:37-38.

Part of praying for the Lord of the harvest to send out workers is to fund those workers. The Lord of the harvest is providing a new funding system to enable his workers to be provided for as they harvest.

Staying connected to our users

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I read that Google is going to modify Gmail so that users can choose to not use the threaded Conversation View. Since it’s beginning, Gmail has threaded conversations together so it’s easy to see all my communication on each “thread” or “subject line”. However, that is not the chronological (sorted by date) way that Outlook and many other email programs tend to show messages.

Google has pushed hard and held firm to the “new way” of threaded conversations rather than chronology.

But they have “thrown in the towel” and will offer users a choice.

This isn’t the first innovation of Gmail that Google had to adapt to more traditional users’ expectations. Remember the folders vs labels war of a year or two ago? Gmail’s original author staunchly refused to provide folders, wanting to help people adapt to the much more flexible labels idea. But after a couple of years of users’ complaints, Gmail added folders.

What does this have to do with us? I’m glad you asked.

I think it’s important to push the technology envelope with innovative advances. But most people are not early adopters, and if you want many people to use your tools, you need to make evolutionary changes rather than revolutionary changes. It must be easy for people to take a small step in using your tool rather than a large step. You can more effectively introduce a new way to work by advancing in a series of small steps rather than large jumps.

Software designers in Campus Crusade: Take note! Stay connected to your users. We’re about advancing the mission more than advancing the technology.

What do you think?