RussHutto.com

I walk to work.

It’s green.

It’s good exercise.

And it’s a beautiful day outside.

Here’s my commute in snapshots.

All taken on my new smartphone, which I have no clue how to work…I’m not that smart. But I’m having fun with it.

So I’m giving my new smartphone the ol testaroo tonight. I’m posting this using only Transcriber for my text. That basically means I can ‘t use the Keyboard to type anything in, it’s all my own handwriting.

So far, so good! If I get sloppy, something like this gets transcribed:

pg you Guys’!. Doris :t gorivfl what’s up with you today. Not much wish me

So not only do have a good time writing on my cool touch screen phone, but I also get to continuously sharpen my pen-fu (which is getting worse and worse with the continued advancement of technology in a paperless world).

I thought I’d do a post on using Google to build community within our worship team. Some worship leaders have chosen to use pay services such as Planning Center Online to plan and share resources with team members. I think that is a great option for thos who have the financial resources to implement that.

But what if you’re serving at a smaller church with little to no financial resources set aside for this sort of thing?

Google.

Google works.

Google works nicely.

And it’s free.

So here’s how it works.

1. Get your whole team on email. It’s the 21st century there’s no reason we should be communicating with carrier pigeons
2. Go to Google and sign up for a Google account. I used my own existing email account. You don’t necessarily have to set up a gmail account.
3. Set up a group. You’ll find “Groups” in the top links of google (possibly in the “more” link).
4. Go to the members section and MANUALLY add all of your team members (using the email addresses you’ve collected from step 1).

Voila. You’ve created an email based discussion group that can be accessed through email OR by visiting the groups page you created.

What Can You Do With This Group?

• Upload files to the file section. Each week I add reference mp3s, chord charts, vocal rehearsal tracks, and whatever else my team members need to prepare for rehearsal.
• Start discussions. Similar to a discussion forum, you can start and reply to topics in your group. I post the weekly line-up and who is scheduled to sing and/or play that week.
• We also use the discussion forum for “get to know you” question games, silly photo caption contests, “off” requests (by team members), observations from leaders, praise, constructive criticism, prayer requests, daily or weekly devotionals for team members, etc.
• It’s one of the small ways we build community within the team. Not only do we see each other twice a week, but every team member is constantly connected to the discussion forums. Each team member can also choose the level of email activity they get each day. For instance, you can choose to get every email reply to a topic, or to get one summary with all emails for the day, you can even choose no email activity and participate by visiting the site only, but I encourage our team members to at least select the daily summary email option, since, at times, we make changes to a key or the rotation might change.

We really push pre-practicing. We want all of our team members to be able to sing or play their parts BEFORE Wednesday rehearsal if possible. It only takes a few minutes for our singers to download their tracks and have them in their mp3 players or on a cd. It takes a little bit more for our musicians, but in the end it’s VERY worth it.

Our rehearsals have been going very smoothly since we implemented a google group last year.

After watching Los share a few live events with the blog world, I’m hooked. What a neat way to peak in to the everyday lives of those I’m networked with.

Mogulus is a pretty cool, free video streaming site where you can upload videos, stream live video, and have real time chats. The control panel is really pretty sweet. Transitions are a breeze. Add in a ticker or some overlaying text with a simple click. I’ve had a good time this morning playing with it. Even took a few minutes to stream me live to the world (well only 3 people joined my chat).

mogulus.com/russhutto

I know a few of my blog buddies have jumped on this as well. Mudpuppy and Steel were broadcasting earlier from their work place and so I stopped in and said hi. After that I had to see if I could do it. So I did!

I plan on working up some more worship confessionals and having them run on auto-pilot until I do stream live. And I feel like I could have some fun with some office broadcasts and some feeds from some of our church events.

Props to Los and Mudpuppy for getting me hooked.

Have you checked this out yet?

So at the end of American Idol last night we were all stunned, excited, perturbed, dismayed, overjoyed, to see the broadcast come to a conclusion with a rendition of Shout to the Lord sung by the contestants.

American Idol Shout To The Lord

For those of you who may not be familiar with that tune, it’s probably one of the top 5 songs used in worship services in the history of modern worship.

A lot of us noticed the words had been changed though. The first line of the verse should read:

“My Jesus, My Savior…”

yet we heard:

“My Shepherd, My Savior…”

Problem? Not so much. Some “Christians” are crying foul, giving those who aren’t believers yet another item to add to their list of why Christians suck. Do we need more? Geez.

Still others are applauding AI. Applauding Fox. Applauding the fact that this beautiful song was broadcasted to over 30 million viewers AND that the song [with the name JESUS included] is available for download on itunes [recorded by the contestants].

I’m kind of in the middle on this. Not the song, by any means, but the whole AI Gives Back thing. It kind of irks me. The way we go all googly over the celebrities. I’m jaded with Hollywood. I think those celebs are so disconnected with real life that their words don’t hold much credence with me.

Let me hear about somebody selling all of their mansions and living in a nice home (just what they need) and giving away their money to reputable charities. Let me hear about Oprah giving away more than one million of her bazillions. I know she does, but geez. Her show should be called “Oprah’s The Small In Proportion to Overall Net Worth Give” – I’d watch it without disgust then.

I like AI for what it is a sill singing competition.

I get a little antsy when the who’s who of hollywood that generally live like hell most of the time are treated like saints for “showing their faces” on a 3 hour tv show. Does that seem like a double standard.

Now, before someone cries foul, and asks me how much I donated to AI Gives back, I have to admit I donated nothing. I give regularly and intentionally through my local church.

Where do you give back?

For other fine discussions on this: mudpuppy, chrisfromcanada