ChrisMoncus.com

During my first year of college I started attending First Baptist Brunswick, GA. There I met several ministers who so graciously sowed into my life and really affected the direction of my life. Over those five years I took away so many good tips, experiences, and ideas for ministry that I know I wouldn’t be the person I am today without them. One tip in particular has application throughout all areas of ministry and secular events.

“Kill it before it dies”, Waller Boyer said to me one night while he and I were leading a Disciple Now down in Jacksonville, FL. “Leave them wanting more.”

That statement rocked me.

So I started the implications of doing just that with different areas of ministry. How many sermons, music sets, dramas, videos, _____insert ministry here_____ have started out strong but the end perception was boredom or disinterest? Ministers, have we “lost” our audience and wondered why? This could be the answer.

When writing sermons, blog articles, and tutorials I try to use the “kill it before it dies” method. I get rid of all the extra stuff and try not to repeat myself unnecessarily. When possible I provide pictures to illustrate my point so I don’t have to beat the point to death. I try to write a 30 minute sermon, condense it to 15 minutes, and then when I go over (like usual) the message ends up being 25 minutes - the perfect length. I believe that I should be able to illustrate my point within the alloted time. If not, there’s probably too much “extra” stuff that could be removed, condensed, or otherwise better said. I also believe that a sermon should rarely be finished at church. There should always be some takeaway for the audience to have to work through and thus finish the sermon in their hearts. Leave room for that. Leave room for God to work.

Application to worship music? We need to keep a bead on the crowd and not let the songs go on too long. Luckily I am in a situation where that doesn’t happen much. If anything I want more. I could stand another 10 minutes of music easily, but maybe that’s the point. Leave me wanting more. Force me to seek out that satisfaction.

In my line of work it has applications on the non-sermon side of things as well. When being approached by someone to build a website I pass on a tip to them regarding their site content. I tell them, “Write what you want to say to the reader. Come back the next day and get rid of half the words. Then come back the next day and get rid of half of what’s left. You are then left with all the information you wanted to communicate in a smaller and easier to digest package.” It is more likely to be read and remembered if there is less to read and remember.

So that’s my little takeaway. Apply this to whatever you do in ministry and I believe the perception thereof will be more pleasant and engaging.

Please comment and let me know your experiences with this. Good or bad. Did this click with you? Do you disagree? Let’s talk.

Tomorrow begins our church’s new series on the Holy Spirit titled “Just Breathe”. It’s the breath of God that brought Adam to life, blew in the upper room with the disciples, and gives us life today.

I started off with a piece of parchment, added the rays, colored it orange, distressed the parchment, added flourishes, added a dove, gave it a touch of light behind the dove, changed the color to blue, and here ya go!

Travis then did some pretty sweet stuff in Adobe After Effects as a setup/transitional element between music and the sermon. He used “The Adventure” by Angels and Airwaves for the background music. I’d include it here but why not give him some traffic?

So, head over to TravisPaulding.com and let him know what you think.

A couple weeks ago I did a shoot with Mckendree Augustas for his new album. Here’s the keeper for the poster. Pope Saint Victor did the artwork and post-processing.

http://www.virb.com/popestvictor

There might be some of the pics going on the album art so I’m interested to see how Victor processes them and his design.

If you listen to Underoath (or if you don’t you should) then this will make your day/night/mid-afternoon. It’s a music video with clips from Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ” set to the Underoath song “Some Will Seek Forgiveness, Others Escape” off the album “They’re Only Chasing Safety”. It’s intense. Watch it loud and on full screen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uin8Cphh1U

What’d you think?

After almost four years of abuse my 15″ PowerBook G4 - nicknamed the Powerbook of Doom - is finally confined to an almost exclusive desk job. The logic board is failing (one memory slot doesn’t work, a fan is out, and the processor is unseated slightly). It’s a single core 1.5GHz IBM. PhotoShop CS3 eats it for breakfast. It can only be used at an angle. It’s enough to finally send me to Apple.com to replace it.

So as of 2:00pm today my new 24″ Intel Core2Duo 2.8 GHz, 500GB iMac is on its way. It’s gonna help me in being more efficient editing photos, websites, and video. The “crunch time” is going to be decreased greatly. Plus, moving from an 80GB drive to a 500GB drive gives me lots more room to keep my music and the like all on one hard drive.

I bought it refurbished (the only way to go). It cost $700 less than a new one with the same specs and carries the same exact warranty. Most likely it was a store model or even just sat on the shelf too long. Either way, I got a current Mac for 31% off retail.

It should be here next week!