So, we have to ask the question – is the church keeping up? Is the church leveraging all the social media and technology tools at our disposal to reach our world and community for Christ?

Consider these statistics from Hubspot:

• 67% of B2C companies and 41% of B2B companies have acquired customers through FaceBook

• 57% of businesses have acquired customers through their company blog

• 42% of companies have acquired a customer through Twitter

• The number of marketers who report that Facebook is “critical” or “important” to their business has increased to 83% in just two years

I know what you are saying – “Those are business statistics. We are a church. We do ministry we don’t sell products!”

If businesses are savvy enough to use social media to get more customers shouldn’t the church be savvy enough to reach more people with social media?

Shouldn’t we be better at it than they are?

Isn’t our message more important than theirs?

Your church being on social media platforms -and having a strategy with it – shouldn’t be an option - it is a necessity in this digital world!

What are some ways you have seen social media used in ministry or church circles that have been effective? Leave your comments below.

Social Media is a great tool to connect with others. The ability to instantly speak to hundreds, and even thousands, of people is amazing.

But, it does bring with it a warning.

Sometimes you don’t need to say it.

If you’ve been on Social Media long enough you’ve seen the meltdowns, rants, and complaints

• The wife letting her husband (who is not on Facebook) “have it”
• The employee telling his boss off
• The teenager griping about their parents
• The young adult chronicling their emotional breakdown – hour by hour
• The middle school kid talking about another middle school kid

All Social Media does is reveal who you really are – so be careful!

Social Media outlets are not the place to:

• Say something negative about your spouse
• Unload on the deacons
• Tell the church how bad they are
• Vaguely (and poorly) leave a “message” to the member who will “know who they are”

You may be tempted – but don’t do it – You will regret it!! Avoid the temptation to put anything negative out – it is not worth it and it could probably be classified as “unchristian”.
Set your phone/computer/device down and walk away.

Sometimes, the best you can do is just leave your status blank.

Personal well-being blossoms among U.S. adults who strongly identify with their religion, regularly attend church and have three or more close friends in their congregation, say sociologists Chaeyoon Lim of the University of Wisconsin–Madison and Robert Putnam of Harvard University. Members of this devoutly connected group cite especially high levels of life satisfaction regardless of how many or how few friends they have outside their congregation, Lim and Putnam report in the December American Sociological Review.

Wow. Regularly going to church & having Godly friends really does make your life happier!

Here are a two bible verses that said it first:

Psalm 5:11-12  But let all who take refuge in you rejoice; let them sing joyful praises forever. Spread your protection over them, that all who love your name may be filled with joy.
  For you bless the godly, O Lord; you surround them with your shield of love.

Psalm 133:1  How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity!

So, don’t ignore the evidence – get connected to God through your local church.

Here are 5 quick tips on how to be happy:

1. Know the Lord as your Savior – nothing else matters!

2. Join a vibrant, Bible believing church. You ought to sense the joy of the Lord when you walk into the building. If you feel like you are at a funeral service – visit somewhere else!

3. Join a small group / Sunday school class / life group – or whatever you want to call it. You need to meet & make friends with people who are in the same life situation as you.

4. Go all the time. The study found that it was people who attended regularly that experienced more happiness. You can’t go to church too much!

5. Grow in the Lord – the closer you get to Jesus the more joy & happiness you will find.

Be happy – go to church!!

After your sermon on tithing we decided to tithe that very day. To be honest, we didn’t have it but wanted to take God at His word. We wrote a check for our tithes and put it in the offering plate and decided to trust God. That was on Sunday.

By Thursday we were completely out of money – and we started looking back on the tithe.

We thought about doing various things to get some cash – but decided we would just trust God. He had said He would bless us so we decided to wait. We were having that conversation and my husband said something like, “No Honey. We tithed. We trusted. We will wait and see what God does.” Those words were not out of his mouth for 30 seconds when our phone rang! I could tell the conversation was about money. When my husband hung up the phone he was so excited. Someone was giving us a check for 10 times the amount of money we had tithed – as a gift!! God came through. We were in tears.

His promises can be trusted!!

This Sunday we are challenging everyone to take God at His promise on “Prove the Tithe” Sunday. Lets all trust God and know for ourselves that His promises can be trusted!!

She heard that recent sermon of yours, felt convicted to tithe on the gross, shared it with me and a discussion ensued.

We beat the horse to death (pros and cons)…is that right or not?…and so on. Finally, I told her we have to trust the man of God and obey his teachings, but ask the Lord to deal with him and educate him if he is dispensing ungodly counsel to the flock (even if erroneously).

We committed to tithe…and to tithe on our gross…to our hurt this week. Well, you know the rest, sortof. {We received}  a check for each of us in the amount of $ _____ ……… this was almost the exact amount we were tithing to our hurt!

Yep. There’s a lesson for you and us. We learned you were “right on the money” (pun intended) about tithing on the first fruits (the gross…before Cesar–or Obama–gets his), and you will learn that God prompts the heart (and purse strings) in mysterious ways for His purposes, spiritually.

This week is “Prove the Tithe” Sunday. Why don’t you join us in claiming the promise of God and watch as He blesses your life – He promised!!

Malachi 3:10 Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the LORD of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.

So, before we move onto another week, there are at least 5 things you shouldn’t forget about this past Sunday:

1. An infatuation on Worry, Wealth, and Worldliness will mess your priorities up. They are weeds in the garden of your Christian life. Get rid of them. Don’t make stressing about the future, the pursuit of wealth, or the pursuit of pleasure the top priorities of your life.

2. Jesus shares top priority with no one or nothing! ‘Nuff said!!

3. Trying to juggle a bunch of top priorities will cause you to drop the ball of your relationship with God.

4. The Christian life is not “neat”. Weeds spring up every day in your life from nowhere. Recognize them and get rid of them and just know it is going to happen. Elsewhere in the Bible it would be called Spiritual Warfare.

5. It’s all not just “preacher talk”. Sunday night you heard from a businessman, mom, and business owner about how they do/have struggled to keep God their top priority and how blessed their lives have been because of it. If they can do it – you can do it!!

Keep living 4 Jesus!!!

Listen as Pastor Joel talks about the privilege and duty of Christians to worship our God even when the circumstances of our lives are not what we want them to be!

LBC is making a real impact in our community and we are constantly showing and sharing the love of Christ. In the last couple of months – Here is a small sample of what we have done:

• We raised over $1,500 to help Dawnville Elementary buy food to send home with children they think are going hungry
• We handed out book bags and school supplies to communities and schools in the hundreds
• We took up over $7,000 [so far] for our world missions offering that will help support missionaries all around the world
• We bought “snacks” for Cedar Ridge Elementary to help them feed hungry kids – $ cost and value in the hundreds
• We have bought – and are buying – coats for children that Cedar Ridge can give out to kids who are cold
• Many of our SS classes adopted families and bought Christmas who would not have anything otherwise
• Our Men’s Ministry took up an impromptu offering and bought Christmas for families who wouldn’t have had it otherwise
• You pledged over $18,000 for FAITH missions for next year
• We took up shoe-boxes for Operation Christmas Child
• We covered communities on Halloween and handed out candy and church information. We gave candy out to hundreds of children
• We wrapped Christmas presents at Walnut Square Mall for 4 Saturdays for FREE – yes FREE! We wrapped around 1,000 gifts

There is more – I just can’t think of it all. And that’s in just the last few months!

That is what separates us from everyone else – we’re not just talking about Christ – we are trying to act like Him as well.

Liberty  – you are doing a great job! You are the Best!

They were worshiping too loud – causing a disturbance – making too much noise – GOOD FOR THEM!!

Wouldn’t it be awesome if people complained that YOUR/OUR church made too much noise? I don’t mean just audible noise – I mean the “news” kind of noise. The kind of “noise” that told about how:

• God was at work in the church
• Lives were being changed
• Sin was being confessed & forsook
• Exciting worship was being engaged
• The community was being changed
• People were leaving false religions and turning to Christ
• The Gospel was being preached on every street corner
• Too much Jesus was going on

Let’s do it! Let’s go out into the world and make a lot of “noise” about Jesus!!

Go to work ~ school ~ community ~and make much ado about Jesus!!

Acts 17:6 But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some brethren to the rulers of the city, crying out, “These who have turned the world upside down have come here too.