Kevin D. Hendricks of Church Marketing Sucks points us to a new report on the results of a survey on church marketing of over 500 church leaders across the country. This short report is worth a read.

Kevin says, “It’s not Barna material by any means, but it is some interesting stuff.”

Tony Dye of Perimeter Church just completed a great series of blog posts about what a good Church Management System (CMS) should do and how it should work. This is great reading for any of you who are considering installing a CMS or changing your existing CMS.

I wonder if any of the CMS companies out there are sophisticated enough to be paying attention to this discussion in the blog world. Some of Tony’s comments seemed aimed directly at the vendors of popular systems. Are they listening?

Six months ago the closest thing to retail at Church of the Resurrection was selling CDs and videos of sermons. Today we have a bookstore (that sells our own CDs, videos, etc. as well as other typical Christian bookstore stuff), a ticketing system for selling reserved seat tickets to events in our main sanctuary, and now a coffee shop. Whew! I’ve never managed technology in a retail operation before, so it’s been a learning experience.

For the bookstore we’re using Booklog software and have been happy with it. For ticketing we’re using Wintix and Webtix from Center Stage Software. It is functional but unimpressive (ask me for more info, if you’re interested). For the coffee shop we’re in the process of installing Restaurant Manager. Should have it running by the middle of next week.

In the process of installing all of these retail systems, we have discovered a great Internet vendor called POS Micro that sells all of the required specialty hardware such as cash drawers, barcode readers, keyboards, receipt printers, etc. They have stuff in stock, can ship overnight, can take orders until 8:00 pm Eastern time, and are inexpensive. Highly recommended.

Adam Roberts from Shepherd of the Hills UMC in Douglasville, Georgia describes how Methodists really are in the theological middle. In the post he quotes Adam Hamilton, our senior pastor. Scott Jones, the Methodist bishop in Kansas agrees, and refers to this position as “The Extreme Center.”

The United Methodist News Service just released a nice article about churches doing podcasting. It features a number of quotes from Peter Metz, Resurrection’s Director of Communications.

Jason took the nerd test. I thought I was a nerd, but I must bow to Jason who scored a whopping 96!

I don’t know how often this happens, but at least here is one story of how the web was used to reach one person.

Our boss, Brent Messick, is one of the top 20 church business administrators in the US. Congratulations Brent!

Tony Long of Wired News wonders how instant communications technology is impacting our humanity. I’m not fully endorsing his point of view, but it spoke to me today.

Barna’s new book, Revolution, is getting a lot of buzz, including a prominent mention yesterday in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal. (Thanks, Jeff, for alterting me to this.)

My mom first told me about the book earlier this week, and offered to pay for a copy. Woo hoo! So I guess this will be on my reading list soon.