WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.800 Welcome to the Church Digital Podcast, powered by Stadia Church Planting. 00:00:04.480 --> 00:00:09.360 Through this podcast, learn about how God is using technology and innovation in digital 00:00:09.360 --> 00:00:11.580 and digital environments around the world. 00:00:12.100 --> 00:00:12.520 Our goal? 00:00:12.940 --> 00:00:16.000 To help churches like yours learn to be the church digitally. 00:00:16.640 --> 00:00:17.260 Our heart? 00:00:17.740 --> 00:00:23.080 That churches like yours will discover a newfound focus on disciple-making that will revolutionize 00:00:23.080 --> 00:00:23.620 your church. 00:00:24.120 --> 00:00:26.660 And now, your host, here's Jeff Reed. 00:00:26.960 --> 00:00:30.900 So, we're continuing on with this Season 2 conversation here. 00:00:30.980 --> 00:00:35.380 Hey, Jeff, with the Church Digital, once again, powered by Stadia Church Planting. 00:00:35.460 --> 00:00:40.780 Here with Season 2, we're highlighting the crazies out there, the crazy conversations, the innovative 00:00:40.780 --> 00:00:41.320 people. 00:00:41.860 --> 00:00:48.340 And this gentleman that we've got here, this guest on this show, is one of these innovative 00:00:48.340 --> 00:00:50.340 people over the decades. 00:00:50.560 --> 00:00:54.020 Jeff Hook is CEO of Communitas Software. 00:00:54.020 --> 00:00:56.920 It's a CHMS, a church database. 00:00:57.240 --> 00:01:03.360 And Jeff has been hugely influential in the church tech space, even going back to the early 00:01:03.360 --> 00:01:05.100 days of Fellowship One. 00:01:05.220 --> 00:01:09.800 Now, Jeff talks about his story, and you can hear some of that in the podcast, in the actual 00:01:09.800 --> 00:01:10.160 interview. 00:01:10.540 --> 00:01:14.960 But in a recent conversation with Jeff, the thing that kind of perked my ears a little 00:01:14.960 --> 00:01:19.840 bit was we were talking about this idea of digital discipleship. 00:01:19.840 --> 00:01:24.540 And if you listen to the podcast, you hear me talk about this all the time. 00:01:25.140 --> 00:01:28.760 And so, I've got my conversation, and I know how other people talk about it. 00:01:29.060 --> 00:01:32.280 And so, I'm constantly having the same conversation over and over again. 00:01:32.780 --> 00:01:38.360 Now, Jeff took this to an area where I quickly realized I wasn't the smartest person in the 00:01:38.360 --> 00:01:38.580 room. 00:01:38.840 --> 00:01:39.840 And I sat back and listened. 00:01:39.960 --> 00:01:41.360 By the way, that's why I love this podcast. 00:01:41.580 --> 00:01:47.260 Because I get to sit back and listen and learn almost as much as you guys are and gals are 00:01:47.260 --> 00:01:49.740 wherever you are, dialing into the podcast. 00:01:49.920 --> 00:01:53.740 You see, Jeff, he starts talking about machine learning. 00:01:54.160 --> 00:01:56.240 He starts talking about artificial intelligence. 00:01:56.240 --> 00:02:02.960 He starts talking about personalizing, utilizing technology, personalizing what discipleship can 00:02:02.960 --> 00:02:03.660 look like. 00:02:03.660 --> 00:02:11.840 And all of a sudden, my mind is exploding at this idea of utilizing technology to better 00:02:11.840 --> 00:02:12.800 disciple people. 00:02:12.800 --> 00:02:18.320 Not because we can communicate better or not even the equipping standpoint, but how technology 00:02:18.320 --> 00:02:25.040 can understand who people are and through that process, better shape what discipleship can 00:02:25.040 --> 00:02:25.500 look for them. 00:02:25.560 --> 00:02:27.880 By the way, some of you are already freaking out on me. 00:02:27.900 --> 00:02:28.200 It's cool. 00:02:28.560 --> 00:02:30.180 Hey, isn't that the pastor's job? 00:02:30.180 --> 00:02:33.460 Hey, what if this could complement what the pastor is doing? 00:02:33.560 --> 00:02:41.120 What if this can assist even lay people to better disciple other people within and outside 00:02:41.120 --> 00:02:42.500 of the church? 00:02:42.920 --> 00:02:46.680 Yeah, we don't hear about, you know, words like artificial intelligence and machine learning 00:02:46.680 --> 00:02:47.840 in the Bible. 00:02:47.840 --> 00:02:55.040 But if we can utilize the innovations that are here, if we can utilize this technology, man, 00:02:55.100 --> 00:02:59.580 you can hear in the conversation, there's incredible potential that's available. 00:02:59.580 --> 00:03:03.520 By the way, don't sleep on the whole data strategy piece that's kind of tucked in the 00:03:03.520 --> 00:03:04.240 conversation too. 00:03:04.720 --> 00:03:07.180 Incredible conversation here with Jeff Cook. 00:03:07.340 --> 00:03:13.880 So I'm bringing into the conversation Jeff Cook, CEO of Communitas Software, myself, Jeff 00:03:13.880 --> 00:03:18.800 with the Church Digital and of Stadia Church Planning, of course, in a conversation that I'm simply 00:03:18.800 --> 00:03:24.760 calling machine learning, artificial intelligence, and the personalization of discipleship. 00:03:25.160 --> 00:03:26.580 All right, everybody, here you go. 00:03:26.580 --> 00:03:29.700 And hey, so Jeff, tell me about yourself. 00:03:29.760 --> 00:03:34.140 Maybe tell us some of your best experiences and tell me a little bit about Communitas. 00:03:34.480 --> 00:03:35.080 Thanks, Jeff. 00:03:35.160 --> 00:03:38.060 Thanks for the opportunity to be on your podcast as well. 00:03:38.260 --> 00:03:44.680 As you're aware, yes, I actually grew up a small town preacher's son, Assemblies of God, 00:03:44.720 --> 00:03:50.380 and then got into computers and became a programmer, then a management consultant for 10 years. 00:03:50.380 --> 00:03:55.600 I started running the Dallas office for Oracle Consulting, and then I was a COO of a supply 00:03:55.600 --> 00:03:56.680 chain software company. 00:03:56.800 --> 00:03:59.760 So I was well on my way to just corporate America. 00:04:00.160 --> 00:04:04.740 And then I had the opportunity to actually start Fellowship Technologies. 00:04:05.000 --> 00:04:06.860 And so that got me into the church space. 00:04:07.740 --> 00:04:15.260 Subsequent to that, after selling that to Active Network, I was the COO of Parish Soft, which 00:04:15.260 --> 00:04:17.080 is a Catholic-based software company. 00:04:17.560 --> 00:04:23.580 And coupled with all that, once we sold Parish Soft to ministry brands and my non-compete was 00:04:23.580 --> 00:04:31.340 up, we started Communitas Technologies, which is the next-generation platform approach to church 00:04:31.340 --> 00:04:31.720 software. 00:04:32.220 --> 00:04:34.000 So that's what we're doing now. 00:04:34.660 --> 00:04:36.840 So just tell me a little bit, like, give me an overview. 00:04:36.980 --> 00:04:39.080 What does Communitas do? 00:04:39.300 --> 00:04:40.780 Like, what's the heart of this? 00:04:40.900 --> 00:04:43.520 Why would a church be using Communitas software? 00:04:43.680 --> 00:04:43.880 Right. 00:04:44.000 --> 00:04:50.940 So the platform approach to church software includes not just church management, but it extends 00:04:50.940 --> 00:04:54.460 that beyond what happens on Sundays. 00:04:54.460 --> 00:04:56.480 We like to say, let's get beyond Sundays. 00:04:56.480 --> 00:05:02.860 Let's get beyond the church building, and extends that beyond into the congregation and what their 00:05:02.860 --> 00:05:04.460 spiritual life is all about. 00:05:04.940 --> 00:05:10.920 So, you know, it's kind of ironic that churches are natural communities, yet the software they 00:05:10.920 --> 00:05:15.820 use doesn't support any kind of community-type tools, right? 00:05:16.380 --> 00:05:22.360 Churches have to rely upon Facebook and be subject to the algorithms of Facebook instead of having 00:05:22.360 --> 00:05:31.380 their own platform where they can deliver content, i.e. YouTube thing, or in our case, we think the 00:05:31.380 --> 00:05:37.500 churches ought to move to a private media network that is their own channel, if you will, and start 00:05:37.500 --> 00:05:44.080 engaging with their congregation the other 167 hours in the week, not just the hour on the weekend. 00:05:44.080 --> 00:05:50.720 And so what we've done is, if you know anything about digital transformation, right, there's 00:05:50.720 --> 00:05:58.820 digital disruption that happens that's happening in this economy, and that's where Uber is circumventing 00:05:58.820 --> 00:06:00.200 the taxi cab industry. 00:06:00.840 --> 00:06:05.040 Airbnb is circumventing the hotel industry. 00:06:05.040 --> 00:06:11.920 The churches are actually being digitally disrupted themselves, because if somebody goes out to an 00:06:11.920 --> 00:06:18.500 abide or prayer.com, they're going to a solution to get part of what the local church ought to be 00:06:18.500 --> 00:06:19.300 providing them. 00:06:19.760 --> 00:06:25.800 You know, if they go read their Bible on YouVersion, and YouVersion is a great tool, love it, but 00:06:25.800 --> 00:06:32.160 yet that the engagement with YouVersion is not being shared with the local church, right? 00:06:32.160 --> 00:06:37.820 And so if somebody goes out and does a Bible study, let's say on RightNow Media's platform, 00:06:38.260 --> 00:06:44.680 that information is not being connected to that congregant's profile so that we understand 00:06:44.680 --> 00:06:46.380 what their spiritual walk is. 00:06:46.720 --> 00:06:54.360 So if churches don't choose to step in and do digital transformation, they're going to be 00:06:54.360 --> 00:06:57.480 digitally disrupted more and more. 00:06:57.480 --> 00:07:04.640 So we're about trying to digitally transform the church and go with the church to actually 00:07:04.640 --> 00:07:10.560 help their congregation live more functional Christian lives through discipleship, through 00:07:10.560 --> 00:07:15.680 communication, and through some learnings that we call personalized ministry. 00:07:16.080 --> 00:07:19.820 So this is probably going to be one of my favorite podcasts over the past year or so, because you 00:07:19.820 --> 00:07:24.840 have said so many buzzwords that I'm in love with in that past conversation. 00:07:25.380 --> 00:07:31.800 And I'll be honest, Jeff, I got an email from you talking about some different things. 00:07:32.020 --> 00:07:38.520 And even in that email, you said some buzzwords that I was like, man, I want to think like 00:07:38.520 --> 00:07:40.480 this, and I don't yet. 00:07:40.560 --> 00:07:41.940 And I want to understand it better. 00:07:42.120 --> 00:07:47.120 And so, Jeff, one of the things that you had talked about in that email was this idea of 00:07:47.120 --> 00:07:52.660 digital discipleship, where if you're listening to this podcast, you know so much time is spent 00:07:52.660 --> 00:07:57.240 talking about how the church needs to take advantage of digital discipleship. 00:07:57.300 --> 00:07:58.340 We talk about equipping. 00:07:58.480 --> 00:08:04.140 We talk about relational evangelism and utilizing digital to connect with people. 00:08:04.140 --> 00:08:09.040 But so much of what we talk about, at least in context of the church digital, in context 00:08:09.040 --> 00:08:16.060 of how Stadia is doing digital, really is centered around this relational approach and doing 00:08:16.060 --> 00:08:18.100 disciple-making practices through it. 00:08:18.700 --> 00:08:23.340 Jeff, the thing that intrigued me was you started talking about digital discipleship, but you 00:08:23.340 --> 00:08:26.320 started saying words that I don't often hear in context of church. 00:08:26.320 --> 00:08:30.040 It was like machine learning, artificial intelligence. 00:08:30.700 --> 00:08:33.240 And all of a sudden, like, I know what these words mean. 00:08:33.600 --> 00:08:37.440 I don't have a foundation of how that works in church. 00:08:37.560 --> 00:08:39.720 So I'm actually operating a little bit here on a negative. 00:08:40.420 --> 00:08:43.880 Explain to me, help me understand here, and the audience as well, because I'm sure they're 00:08:43.880 --> 00:08:44.580 asking questions. 00:08:45.120 --> 00:08:48.740 How can artificial intelligence be tied with digital discipleship? 00:08:48.840 --> 00:08:50.000 What does this look like? 00:08:50.240 --> 00:08:52.960 Well, let me correct you, though. 00:08:53.260 --> 00:08:56.280 I don't talk about digital discipleship much. 00:08:56.620 --> 00:09:00.600 I talk about personal discipleship or personal ministry. 00:09:00.880 --> 00:09:06.840 It just so happens if you're going to do personal ministry, more of it's going to have to be 00:09:06.840 --> 00:09:12.620 digital because you're not going to do too many personalized things from the pulpit, right? 00:09:12.620 --> 00:09:23.160 So let's think about how do you reach somebody differently that's in a, let's say, a first-time 00:09:23.160 --> 00:09:23.760 marriage. 00:09:24.920 --> 00:09:31.060 And so let me back up to say I believe personalized ministry helps somebody get from point A to 00:09:31.060 --> 00:09:36.300 point B, and we all are coming from different point A's, right? 00:09:36.360 --> 00:09:40.140 So if we're all trying to live a more functional Christian life, but where did we come from? 00:09:40.220 --> 00:09:44.080 Is our background that we were in church? 00:09:44.320 --> 00:09:45.620 Are we unchurched? 00:09:45.740 --> 00:09:47.120 Are we de-churched? 00:09:47.540 --> 00:09:49.160 Were we burned by a church? 00:09:49.660 --> 00:09:54.040 Are we in a first-time marriage with biological kids? 00:09:54.140 --> 00:09:56.260 Or are we soon to be empty nesters? 00:09:56.420 --> 00:09:58.320 Or are we in a blended family? 00:09:58.320 --> 00:10:05.780 So churches have been known for years to do marriage classes, correct? 00:10:06.760 --> 00:10:11.300 But the marriage class that you need when you're just starting out is very different than the 00:10:11.300 --> 00:10:15.200 marriage class you need when you're soon to be an empty nester, which is very different 00:10:15.200 --> 00:10:19.400 than the marriage class that you need if you're dealing with the issues around a blended marriage, 00:10:19.820 --> 00:10:20.420 right? 00:10:20.580 --> 00:10:26.740 And so the parenting class that you need when your kids are newborns versus when they're toddlers 00:10:26.740 --> 00:10:28.640 versus when they're teenagers. 00:10:29.180 --> 00:10:34.860 And by the way, any teenager parenting class that came out 20 years ago will not work today. 00:10:36.140 --> 00:10:39.820 The teenagers today are very different than they were 20 years ago. 00:10:39.920 --> 00:10:42.820 They know so much more than we did back then. 00:10:42.820 --> 00:10:46.420 And I wasn't a teenager back then, but I can imagine, right? 00:10:46.520 --> 00:10:49.640 But I was a teenager, you know, 50 years ago. 00:10:49.900 --> 00:10:55.860 And so many times these people who are in control of ministry and they think back of, oh, here's 00:10:55.860 --> 00:11:00.000 what I would have liked to have had back then, may or may not be valid. 00:11:00.140 --> 00:11:05.920 So when I talk about personalized ministry, how can we look at some demographics? 00:11:05.920 --> 00:11:09.740 And by the way, think about digital discipleship, right? 00:11:10.400 --> 00:11:16.940 Digital discipleship will require an essence of data collection that the church has never 00:11:16.940 --> 00:11:17.980 seen before. 00:11:18.340 --> 00:11:23.540 Because when I see you on Sunday morning, I can size you up. 00:11:23.600 --> 00:11:24.740 I know how old you are. 00:11:24.900 --> 00:11:26.960 I know what color you, what race you are. 00:11:27.260 --> 00:11:31.480 I know, you know, a lot of things about you just by looking at you that if a computer is 00:11:31.480 --> 00:11:34.580 going to know that, it's going to need to be in the database. 00:11:35.580 --> 00:11:41.800 I look at churches and the data that they have in their databases, including even Fellowship 00:11:41.800 --> 00:11:43.700 One, we looked at it and it was very holy. 00:11:43.880 --> 00:11:50.060 It had a lot of missing pieces because the system only needed enough data to check your 00:11:50.060 --> 00:11:55.040 children in and to send you your giving statement at the end of the year. 00:11:55.320 --> 00:11:56.240 That's pretty much it. 00:11:56.300 --> 00:12:02.280 Maybe an email, but I didn't have to have that email to send you a newsletter because you 00:12:02.280 --> 00:12:04.360 maybe didn't want to get the newsletter. 00:12:04.820 --> 00:12:10.000 So I had to know how old your kids were and where your address was. 00:12:10.100 --> 00:12:11.060 And that's about it. 00:12:11.120 --> 00:12:16.140 But to do digital discipleship, I need to understand some deeper demographics. 00:12:16.680 --> 00:12:22.100 When we say digital discipleship or personalized ministry, what about the psychographics? 00:12:22.420 --> 00:12:23.580 What's your love language? 00:12:23.580 --> 00:12:30.960 Because how can we help couples understand each other's love languages better so that the 00:12:30.960 --> 00:12:32.200 divorce rate goes down? 00:12:32.320 --> 00:12:33.540 That's an outcome, right? 00:12:33.580 --> 00:12:34.180 Not an output. 00:12:34.320 --> 00:12:39.440 How can we understand an Enneagram combination between a husband and a wife? 00:12:39.580 --> 00:12:44.740 And then the machine learning comes in down the road of, oh, what kind of issues? 00:12:44.920 --> 00:12:50.000 And I'm talking about once the system has some data and starts learning, what kind of issues 00:12:50.000 --> 00:12:54.220 does an Enneagram three and an Enneagram seven have? 00:12:54.880 --> 00:13:02.360 And how can we help them, you know, get ahead of those issues to stop any resentment that 00:13:02.360 --> 00:13:06.060 might happen in the couple to then stop any kind of divorce issues? 00:13:06.460 --> 00:13:10.240 What kind of conflict style does this person have, right? 00:13:10.240 --> 00:13:18.200 So that we can actually provide some training on how conflict styles differ and how sometimes 00:13:18.200 --> 00:13:20.220 that's frustrating in relationship. 00:13:21.040 --> 00:13:26.380 And so how can we make people more aware of it so that everyone can start moving towards 00:13:26.380 --> 00:13:31.840 that better conflict style called collaboration, not compromise, right? 00:13:31.920 --> 00:13:34.680 Compromise is, if we compromise, it's a lose-lose. 00:13:34.760 --> 00:13:39.640 Or if I dominate you or you back off, those aren't good conflict styles, but collaborative 00:13:39.640 --> 00:13:42.120 conflict is a good conflict style. 00:13:42.480 --> 00:13:45.540 In other words, Jeff, what do you need out of this decision? 00:13:45.800 --> 00:13:47.360 Here's what I need out of it. 00:13:47.380 --> 00:13:48.580 And can we meet in the middle? 00:13:48.580 --> 00:13:53.840 So it's things like that, including even what we call spiritual graphics, a totally made 00:13:53.840 --> 00:14:00.180 up term, but that goes into, okay, what religion did you grow up in, right? 00:14:00.540 --> 00:14:08.720 What are some of the theology things that you believe so that then we can leverage that into 00:14:08.720 --> 00:14:13.280 helping you understand your theology better, right? 00:14:13.320 --> 00:14:19.460 Because we're trying to get somebody's belief to be very deep, not just superficial. 00:14:19.920 --> 00:14:26.140 I'm sure you understand that if you water grass every day, the root systems in that grass, 00:14:26.140 --> 00:14:31.240 in that turf is going to be minimal because it gets used to getting that water every day. 00:14:31.240 --> 00:14:35.880 But there's got to be some drought every so often to get those roots deeper. 00:14:36.880 --> 00:14:43.680 And so if you think about what the roles are within the family, if I'm a father or a stepfather, 00:14:43.920 --> 00:14:50.200 that kind of information might dictate different content, different discussion groups for you 00:14:50.200 --> 00:14:52.180 to be suggested to be part of, right? 00:14:52.820 --> 00:14:56.360 So think about Dave Ramsey, how to get out of credit card debt. 00:14:56.440 --> 00:14:58.220 But what if I'm a wealthy Christian? 00:14:59.220 --> 00:15:01.160 Will Dave Ramsey actually help me? 00:15:01.280 --> 00:15:07.140 Or should I be in a different kind of class on how to actually use my wealth for the kingdom? 00:15:07.640 --> 00:15:16.240 So this is the level of sophistication that isn't required of the church staff to figure out. 00:15:16.240 --> 00:15:23.000 They're going to curate the content, but the algorithms will actually, based upon the data, 00:15:23.900 --> 00:15:30.500 help these people understand what groups and discussion groups and different classes that they ought to be a part of. 00:15:31.260 --> 00:15:35.040 Because you have to admit, right, content is blowing up. 00:15:35.340 --> 00:15:37.700 You think there's a lot of content available on the web now? 00:15:37.920 --> 00:15:39.580 Just wait five years from now. 00:15:40.400 --> 00:15:42.940 So if I can't get it through the church, where am I going to go? 00:15:43.040 --> 00:15:43.280 Google? 00:15:43.800 --> 00:15:44.480 That's interesting. 00:15:44.580 --> 00:15:49.940 Actually, people do go to Google for spiritual answers, but that may be another conversation. 00:15:50.880 --> 00:15:52.300 I love this. 00:15:52.800 --> 00:15:52.960 What? 00:15:53.500 --> 00:15:59.940 So you're utilizing artificial intelligence, machine learning, to process data, 00:15:59.940 --> 00:16:06.140 to almost create a personalization approach towards discipleship. 00:16:06.360 --> 00:16:21.620 The newly married couple with no kids isn't going to get articles, is not going to get content or resources or invitations towards parenting classes or information on the student ministry. 00:16:21.620 --> 00:16:27.140 They're going to get something that's stylized, specific for where they are in life. 00:16:27.520 --> 00:16:33.180 Direct them more towards conflict resolution or some of those things that you had talked about. 00:16:33.800 --> 00:16:38.120 How much data are we talking about here? 00:16:38.280 --> 00:16:44.520 It almost feels like it's overwhelming for a church to be collecting. 00:16:44.660 --> 00:16:52.720 You talked about holes previously in Fellowship One and some of these other databases that aren't caring about that stuff. 00:16:52.940 --> 00:16:59.060 Is the church going to have to pivot here and all of a sudden start to be a data hog? 00:16:59.200 --> 00:17:02.700 How much are we going to collect and what's that going to look like in ministry? 00:17:03.160 --> 00:17:10.040 Yeah, so in ministry, one of the biggest issues about Fellowship One, one of the biggest complaints is, wow, this takes a lot of data entry. 00:17:11.560 --> 00:17:13.620 And back then, we didn't have the iPhone. 00:17:14.160 --> 00:17:15.560 So who did the data entry? 00:17:15.940 --> 00:17:16.940 The church staff. 00:17:17.320 --> 00:17:19.940 And how did they do it off of a form, right? 00:17:20.140 --> 00:17:28.260 So what we need to do is push that data collection out to the congregant and give them value for that information, right? 00:17:28.600 --> 00:17:39.280 So if you think about the medical industry, the medical industry is trying to push it upon you to be responsible for your medical records, your health records, correct? 00:17:39.700 --> 00:17:43.300 As a matter of fact, you have IoT and different things hitting that health record. 00:17:43.300 --> 00:17:51.140 And over time, as this all gets sorted out amongst the health care IT companies, it'll get better and better. 00:17:51.600 --> 00:17:56.400 But what about the concept of making you responsible for your spiritual health records? 00:17:57.280 --> 00:18:00.240 And because you have a vested interest in that, right? 00:18:00.380 --> 00:18:04.780 And so you want to live a more functional Christian life. 00:18:05.120 --> 00:18:10.720 And that's a big deal to me from when I was a young boy in my father's church. 00:18:10.720 --> 00:18:13.260 I would see these people coming to church on Sunday. 00:18:13.920 --> 00:18:16.860 We were charismatic, so they'd be speaking in tongues. 00:18:17.120 --> 00:18:22.700 And then they'd go right back to their family dysfunction because they didn't know any better. 00:18:22.920 --> 00:18:23.880 There was nobody. 00:18:24.080 --> 00:18:24.980 We were a small church. 00:18:25.100 --> 00:18:27.140 We didn't know how to help them get out, right? 00:18:27.280 --> 00:18:32.680 So there's really a level of ignorance that goes with dysfunction. 00:18:33.580 --> 00:18:38.700 Now, you can be the most educated person in the world, and there still may be a level of dysfunction in your life. 00:18:38.880 --> 00:18:46.480 But if we can squeeze that dysfunction out, and I call it dysfunction, but frankly, it used to just be called sin, right? 00:18:46.620 --> 00:18:51.460 And if we can squeeze some of that out during the week, then we'll live a better life. 00:18:52.180 --> 00:18:54.580 John 10.10 is my favorite Bible verse. 00:18:54.680 --> 00:18:56.640 I came that you might have life and have it to the full. 00:18:57.180 --> 00:19:09.800 We'll live a better life, not just for ourselves, but we'll live a healthier life for our kids, meaning they'll live more emotionally stable, more mentally stable. 00:19:09.800 --> 00:19:16.460 We haven't really scratched the surface of the mental health problem this country has with their teenagers. 00:19:17.260 --> 00:19:19.100 So how are we going to fix that? 00:19:19.140 --> 00:19:26.340 Are we just going to fix the, I'll call it the symptoms and drug them, right? 00:19:26.400 --> 00:19:32.180 Or are we going to let them choose their drug of choice, which looks like more and more it's cannabis, right? 00:19:32.440 --> 00:19:37.920 Is that how we're going to deal with the mental health crisis and emotional health crisis of our teenagers? 00:19:38.280 --> 00:19:53.280 Or are we going through the church to actually create more functional families by understanding how relationships and marriages ought to work, how friendships ought to work, and taking responsibility for ourselves? 00:19:54.100 --> 00:19:56.260 That has nothing to do with IT, right? 00:19:56.680 --> 00:20:03.140 But IT can help solve it because look at the impact that IT is having on this society. 00:20:03.280 --> 00:20:05.660 And when I say IT, information technology. 00:20:05.980 --> 00:20:09.020 There are some churches that are very technologically savvy. 00:20:09.520 --> 00:20:13.940 You look at their stage, you look at their microphones, you look at their cameras, that's technology. 00:20:14.560 --> 00:20:17.020 That's not the technology I'm talking about. 00:20:17.080 --> 00:20:19.200 I'm talking about information technology. 00:20:19.620 --> 00:20:30.600 And with that, we'll have to be a level of maturing within some of our churches around what is a good data strategy and how am I going to collect it? 00:20:31.000 --> 00:20:36.780 I had a conversation not too long ago with an executive pastor from a very large mega church. 00:20:37.380 --> 00:20:42.140 And his complaint was, Jeff, we can't get the people to share their information with us. 00:20:42.620 --> 00:20:50.860 That's because their data collection strategy, that's part of their data strategy, is simply too dependent upon the Connect card. 00:20:51.940 --> 00:20:54.480 And so that Connect card, please fill it out. 00:20:54.980 --> 00:20:56.440 We know nothing about you. 00:20:56.760 --> 00:20:58.000 You know nothing about us. 00:20:58.080 --> 00:21:02.040 Would you please fill out this Connect card and give us as much information as you can? 00:21:02.540 --> 00:21:06.560 Well, Jeff, when you and I first met, did I throw up my whole life story? 00:21:07.140 --> 00:21:12.540 Did I tell you everything that you needed to know about me or was the level of trust not there? 00:21:12.680 --> 00:21:15.900 And you would have thought it was pretty weird had I done that, right? 00:21:16.220 --> 00:21:19.860 Going, wow, I didn't need to know about, you know, your ex-wife, Jeff. 00:21:20.680 --> 00:21:32.560 But so churches need to learn how to get a little bit more information at certain contact points so that when somebody goes to a newcomer's class, what is that? 00:21:32.980 --> 00:21:34.640 It's an opportunity to collect more data. 00:21:35.380 --> 00:21:43.000 When somebody joins a small group, it's an opportunity to collect more data, deeper data, because that relationship is getting deeper. 00:21:43.940 --> 00:21:48.940 And so that, you know, I love how some people say, oh, the church will never do what you're saying, Jeff. 00:21:49.000 --> 00:21:50.180 And that may be true. 00:21:50.300 --> 00:21:52.600 I may just go out and flame burn, right? 00:21:52.640 --> 00:21:53.660 This company may go down. 00:21:53.660 --> 00:22:04.280 But I remember being a consultant back in the 80s, and we were teaching small manufacturers about MRP2, materials requirements planning. 00:22:04.580 --> 00:22:09.700 We got out the Ollie White books, and we taught them how to do master scheduling using a computer. 00:22:10.520 --> 00:22:11.940 Is this going to be any different? 00:22:12.680 --> 00:22:16.860 Yeah, I can count on one hand the number of churches I know that even have a data strategy. 00:22:17.960 --> 00:22:26.860 I feel like I had conversations in this COVID season about how to make changes to their connection card to make it more viable that people will fill it out. 00:22:26.960 --> 00:22:31.340 But, I mean, you're throwing away the entire connection card, which I'm a fan of, by the way. 00:22:31.780 --> 00:22:32.900 That's very perceptive. 00:22:32.900 --> 00:22:43.340 A lot of people look at that connection card going, how can we do this with the connection card, that with the connection card, until whatever solution is going to tear that connection card apart is going to be very complex. 00:22:43.660 --> 00:22:47.080 Why not just tear it apart and collect certain things at different periods of time? 00:22:47.360 --> 00:22:48.560 Boil the frog slowly. 00:22:48.680 --> 00:22:52.300 Get what you can in that season to properly connect with people. 00:22:52.520 --> 00:22:59.840 But don't, I mean, I've worked with churches that would have on that connection card the birthdays of all of their children. 00:23:00.020 --> 00:23:04.440 And it's like, okay, you don't need that information right at the beginning. 00:23:04.440 --> 00:23:28.040 And if you do want that information, to your point, there's ways to get that information where it would make more sense and not become overwhelming or obtrusive or, you know, overly, lack of personal, you know, trying to give some of that privacy is the word I'm looking for, trying to, you know, break that privacy. 00:23:28.940 --> 00:23:33.720 So this is really interesting, this idea of creating that strategy. 00:23:35.660 --> 00:23:41.320 If you were to ask, if you were to give advice, like how would a church, because there's a lot of churches that are on this road. 00:23:41.440 --> 00:23:45.520 Okay, you just described, this isn't even really what I want to talk about, but let's hang out here for a second. 00:23:45.860 --> 00:23:51.400 So you're talking about creating a data strategy for a church. 00:23:51.540 --> 00:23:53.440 My church has no data strategy. 00:23:53.780 --> 00:23:59.060 I'm not prepared to rip up the connection card into little pieces and disperse it all over the place. 00:23:59.460 --> 00:24:06.340 What's the, what is the, what's an approach for somebody that's interested in developing a data strategy? 00:24:06.500 --> 00:24:08.740 How do I even start in that conversation? 00:24:09.240 --> 00:24:11.440 Well, you always start with the end in mind, right? 00:24:12.960 --> 00:24:13.960 Covey taught us that. 00:24:14.100 --> 00:24:16.020 So what do you want to measure? 00:24:16.020 --> 00:24:27.700 Now, digital transformation, if you go out to salesforce.com, talks about looking at the customer, putting the customer and what they're trying to accomplish in the center. 00:24:28.520 --> 00:24:35.120 And so as you would back up, looking at the, the, the, you're, the congregant, we don't call them customers, right? 00:24:35.200 --> 00:24:36.840 I'm going to get, you're going to get phone calls. 00:24:36.920 --> 00:24:40.200 I'm sure I'm going to get nasty emails going, we're not a business, we're a church. 00:24:42.280 --> 00:24:43.860 That's a whole different discussion. 00:24:43.980 --> 00:24:46.960 That's pretty, that's pretty enlightening probably for some people. 00:24:48.120 --> 00:25:05.920 So to, to, to, to look at the end in mind, and there are probably a small percentage of people go to church because of this church has a budget of end dollars, or this church has attendance of this many people, right? 00:25:06.200 --> 00:25:14.020 And so what is important to the customer or the congregant is that, well, you help me get closer to God. 00:25:14.120 --> 00:25:16.460 You let me know who God is. 00:25:16.520 --> 00:25:20.460 You help pass my faith off to, to my children. 00:25:20.840 --> 00:25:23.820 There's a number of reasons why people go to church. 00:25:23.860 --> 00:25:25.040 They may be at a loss. 00:25:25.280 --> 00:25:27.340 They may have just lost a parent. 00:25:27.980 --> 00:25:35.160 And one of the things that we emphasize is why don't you capture why they're there so that you can understand what part of your role is. 00:25:35.160 --> 00:25:44.540 There's a, a, um, concept that came out of, uh, Harvard, uh, Clayton Christensen, at least carried the flag calling jobs to be done. 00:25:44.680 --> 00:25:45.980 Have you ever heard of jobs to be done? 00:25:47.560 --> 00:26:00.120 So jobs to be done is a framework, but it's not, it's not gospel, but it's a, um, lens that a business should put their, uh, their, uh, eye through to look at their own business. 00:26:00.120 --> 00:26:03.200 Well, think about jobs to be done in church. 00:26:04.120 --> 00:26:10.680 You hire out the church to do what, what do you, what did, what is the congregant hiring the church to do? 00:26:10.900 --> 00:26:15.760 Because they're spending time out of their lives to do that. 00:26:15.800 --> 00:26:16.040 Right. 00:26:16.080 --> 00:26:17.760 And part of it is to be community. 00:26:17.900 --> 00:26:21.960 Part of it is to hear the gospel and be reminded of the gospel. 00:26:22.460 --> 00:26:29.000 Part of it is to learn how to be a better spouse or to be a better parent or to deal with money. 00:26:29.000 --> 00:26:30.660 What does God say about money? 00:26:30.860 --> 00:26:31.380 Right. 00:26:31.640 --> 00:26:38.180 And so what job to be done did, did, did an individual hire the church to do? 00:26:38.420 --> 00:26:44.060 And it's usually more complex than that, but it's an interesting way to look at it. 00:26:44.060 --> 00:26:51.540 So if people aren't coming back after COVID, then did they get somebody else to do that job? 00:26:53.280 --> 00:26:53.920 Right. 00:26:54.240 --> 00:27:00.440 Did, did they, are they listening and getting enough, uh, uh, let's say spiritual guidance through a podcast? 00:27:00.700 --> 00:27:05.080 Are they getting enough praise and worship off of iTunes, right? 00:27:05.180 --> 00:27:08.660 But why do different people go to church? 00:27:08.660 --> 00:27:12.160 And then are we fulfilling that as the church? 00:27:12.880 --> 00:27:15.860 And if not, then we have to say, why not? 00:27:16.220 --> 00:27:20.220 One of the things I want to, you know, you, you, you talk about the future of church a lot, right? 00:27:23.280 --> 00:27:25.780 Future church is going to be the same as it always has been. 00:27:27.060 --> 00:27:34.580 The church of the future will be very different, but the future of church is the gathering place for Christians. 00:27:35.020 --> 00:27:35.420 Right. 00:27:35.780 --> 00:27:39.020 But the church of the future might do it very differently. 00:27:40.380 --> 00:27:41.240 The other thing. 00:27:41.340 --> 00:27:45.440 So one of the things I didn't mean to do this on podcast, but I will. 00:27:45.780 --> 00:27:49.900 You sent out, you know, the, the whole, uh, discipleship process, right? 00:27:49.900 --> 00:27:57.860 And I think it's four steps and it starts with, uh, what, uh, would be referred to in my terms as Christ curious. 00:27:59.300 --> 00:28:02.060 So we talk about data strategy. 00:28:02.220 --> 00:28:03.820 What about content strategy? 00:28:04.420 --> 00:28:08.780 And content strategy for a church needs to attack all four of those. 00:28:09.480 --> 00:28:23.520 Yet it should also attack the one or two before that, especially in this multi-ethnical world where we, you know, just now the whole group of Afghans that are probably not Christian are coming into our country. 00:28:24.080 --> 00:28:31.340 So before they're Christ curious, maybe they're God curious and maybe they're agnostic or atheist. 00:28:31.340 --> 00:28:42.500 Uh, what kind of content do I have to drip on these people digitally because I want to segment my congregation in order to attract somebody? 00:28:42.500 --> 00:28:50.620 So if somebody's God curious, you know, I think that's where we should start with everyone because let's get on common ground. 00:28:50.620 --> 00:29:00.520 This creator who made this wonderful world, the more, you know, about quantum physics, the more it'll spin your head about how wonderful, uh, the, the, the Yahweh is. 00:29:00.840 --> 00:29:06.000 But then when we get on common ground, then we can talk about, and by the way, he loves you so much. 00:29:06.100 --> 00:29:11.080 He sent his son to die on the cross so that we can spend eternity with him, right? 00:29:11.240 --> 00:29:15.000 So getting on common ground of God. 00:29:15.300 --> 00:29:22.940 And even before that, if somebody's an atheist, well, let's talk about cosmology and how did this world get created? 00:29:23.100 --> 00:29:28.820 And isn't it amazing, you know, and, and so get on common ground and then take them to the next level. 00:29:29.040 --> 00:29:29.740 I love that. 00:29:30.080 --> 00:29:39.660 And there's, there's, um, man, there's so many different approaches to this, but my pastor, uh, that I've attended recently is, uh, he's got like a negative 10 to 10 scale. 00:29:39.660 --> 00:29:41.540 It's like negative 10 is like an atheist. 00:29:42.240 --> 00:29:46.780 10 is like a disciple making multiplication leader. 00:29:47.380 --> 00:29:50.180 Zero is somebody who's just now accepted Christ. 00:29:50.180 --> 00:29:57.420 And he talks about how, you know, sometimes within the church, our jobs to get like a negative 10 to a negative eight and play that role. 00:29:57.420 --> 00:30:00.400 It's not necessarily to go all the way across. 00:30:00.600 --> 00:30:05.180 Um, and so what's, and we'll put a bill white is, his name is over at Christ journey church. 00:30:05.180 --> 00:30:06.760 He's got a book on it just recently. 00:30:06.760 --> 00:30:11.020 There are several other scales and kind of ranges that are, that are on that. 00:30:11.020 --> 00:30:19.060 But what's interesting with that, and even creating some of this content, even some of the personalization that, that, that we're talking about here. 00:30:19.580 --> 00:30:22.820 Um, there was just an article maybe within the past month. 00:30:22.820 --> 00:30:24.320 It was a gospel coalition. 00:30:24.320 --> 00:30:25.600 It came out on my birthday. 00:30:25.600 --> 00:30:26.540 Happy birthday to me. 00:30:26.540 --> 00:30:33.960 The gospel coalition is talking about how virtual reality church, excuse me, virtual church, digital church, our language is a, is a farce. 00:30:33.960 --> 00:30:42.840 It's not real because it's so individualized now, you know, and I would look at that and I would say, yeah, we're, we're, we're connecting people in the community. 00:30:43.060 --> 00:30:47.680 You know, there, you know, there, there's things like, you know, there, there's things like that within digital scope, what you're talking about here. 00:30:47.680 --> 00:30:57.680 And I'm just curious your, your take, because you're, you're talking about creating content digested via mobile app digested via different methods that have distribution. 00:30:58.180 --> 00:31:04.720 Uh, but essentially there, there, there's a little bit of, uh, there's a little bit of isolation in, in, in, in this context. 00:31:04.720 --> 00:31:19.600 Is, is there any, when you're looking at discipleship, disciple making, utilizing this personalization approach, this personalization ministry, do you feel like it leans too much towards this, um, individualized? 00:31:19.600 --> 00:31:23.600 Individualized lack of, of, of community, lack of ecclesia? 00:31:23.900 --> 00:31:25.240 Like, how do you see that? 00:31:25.580 --> 00:31:25.760 Yeah. 00:31:25.860 --> 00:31:30.740 So again, it's, it's personalized ministry, not digital discipleship. 00:31:31.040 --> 00:31:39.180 And, um, the reason I make that distinction is, well, one, the gospel coalition is looking at an or situation, right? 00:31:39.860 --> 00:31:41.640 Instead of an and situation. 00:31:41.640 --> 00:31:49.320 And if I'm talking about personalized content that is for where I need things in my life, 00:31:49.600 --> 00:31:52.020 that doesn't mean I'm doing it alone, does it? 00:31:52.840 --> 00:31:55.700 Because we don't have the technology, we're building it. 00:31:55.760 --> 00:32:02.740 By the way, the machine learning stuff, the AI stuff isn't ready yet, but some of the foundational stuff is being built, right? 00:32:03.180 --> 00:32:07.760 So we want to replace a church management system first and then build off of that. 00:32:07.760 --> 00:32:19.080 But let's go back to, um, what if we had the technology of consuming that content and then discussing it either digitally or over Zoom? 00:32:19.600 --> 00:32:22.360 Or in person, right? 00:32:22.360 --> 00:32:34.600 So there's this reverse classroom approach that's coming out is you consume the content on your time and use that joint time, that synchronous time in discussion with others. 00:32:35.600 --> 00:32:35.880 Right? 00:32:36.200 --> 00:32:38.840 So that I'm, you know, this is synchronous, right? 00:32:39.520 --> 00:32:45.760 So we could go pick out The Unseen Realm, which is a great book, a little Michael Heiser plug there. 00:32:46.000 --> 00:32:52.280 But we could go through that separately, but discuss it digitally or in person. 00:32:52.520 --> 00:33:03.860 But it would be once every other year or so if we discussed it in person, Jeff, because you and I, one, we have this relationship now, digital relationship. 00:33:04.440 --> 00:33:07.020 But as far as I know, we've never met in person. 00:33:07.440 --> 00:33:09.400 So let's say we become pretty good friends. 00:33:09.500 --> 00:33:10.960 I don't get to Miami that often. 00:33:11.080 --> 00:33:12.740 You probably don't get to Dallas that often. 00:33:13.020 --> 00:33:20.220 So if we're going to disciple each other, then it would be some drought time in between, right? 00:33:20.260 --> 00:33:29.340 So we can do certain things digitally that technology allows us to do that causes you to stretch and me to stretch. 00:33:29.340 --> 00:33:38.960 But that doesn't take away from me being with my local church, the branch, and, you know, being in my small group together. 00:33:39.760 --> 00:33:42.460 But it's an extension of. 00:33:42.540 --> 00:33:44.060 So it should be an ant. 00:33:44.440 --> 00:33:57.440 So I'm not going to say, you know, if the Gospel Coalition says it's got to be one or the other, well, I don't know which one would win then, because for certain people, digital will win, right? 00:33:57.500 --> 00:34:01.280 And for other people, physical, and they go, I don't like digital. 00:34:01.420 --> 00:34:02.300 And that's fine. 00:34:02.560 --> 00:34:04.500 But it's kind of like Burger King, right? 00:34:04.580 --> 00:34:05.680 Have it your way. 00:34:05.680 --> 00:34:17.180 But try to be in community with other Christians, but that doesn't mean you have to wait for physical church in order to learn to be discipled. 00:34:17.780 --> 00:34:25.260 If I had to depend upon the one hour a weekend, I'm afraid I'd be a pretty slow learner. 00:34:26.080 --> 00:34:29.400 It takes me daily time in the Word. 00:34:29.540 --> 00:34:39.700 It takes me listening to books about other perspectives, you know, and I get deep into it of, you know, Calvinism versus Arminianism. 00:34:39.980 --> 00:34:49.020 I get into that kind of level because I want to learn about this God, this Creator who loved us so much to send His Son. 00:34:50.200 --> 00:34:54.820 That's the kind of stuff that I get into that, frankly, is not going to be preached from the pulpit. 00:34:55.680 --> 00:35:00.680 But it's that opportunity for my grassroots to get deeper and deeper and deeper. 00:35:01.300 --> 00:35:04.360 Why do some people go through the dark night of the soul? 00:35:05.200 --> 00:35:08.800 That's that drought that causes those roots to get even deeper. 00:35:08.800 --> 00:35:12.080 I mean, what you're describing is the principle that we've been talking about. 00:35:12.180 --> 00:35:13.420 I just don't know that I've applied it. 00:35:13.900 --> 00:35:15.840 There's different ways to disciple different people. 00:35:16.580 --> 00:35:23.480 And so how you disciple someone in a physical space is different than how you would disciple someone digitally. 00:35:23.740 --> 00:35:34.860 And so we're working with digital churches that are discipling, utilizing tools like Discord to create asynchronous conversations, utilizing software. 00:35:35.040 --> 00:35:43.680 But through those conversations, they're manually, relationally, person to person, connecting with people and helping answer spiritual questions, 00:35:44.180 --> 00:35:49.640 going through material that are helping them better understand who Jesus is and what their story is in Jesus 00:35:49.640 --> 00:35:53.400 and who needs to understand what their story is in Jesus. 00:35:53.560 --> 00:35:58.320 And so we're doing that on an interpersonal level. 00:35:58.660 --> 00:36:05.860 And what I'm hearing from you is now this is an opportunity to create a complementary maybe resource 00:36:05.860 --> 00:36:15.060 that works alongside some of the physical community, the engagement community that's happening digitally. 00:36:15.440 --> 00:36:26.780 But now we're creating an asynchronous, a on-demand resource that really gets to know people with some of the data that they have 00:36:26.780 --> 00:36:39.000 And is able to start to provide resourcing, provide training, provide insights that maybe the person on himself or herself doesn't even realize. 00:36:39.200 --> 00:36:44.880 Like you're able to understand who the person is based off of some of this data. 00:36:45.740 --> 00:36:55.500 Like, and I've known organizations that have tried to pull some of this from social media, some of this like back channel type of thing. 00:36:55.620 --> 00:36:57.760 Like, is there validity from this? 00:36:58.020 --> 00:37:01.600 Is the church going to have to like ask point blank questions? 00:37:01.760 --> 00:37:03.540 Like, what is the capturing? 00:37:03.720 --> 00:37:07.980 What is the gathering of this data? 00:37:08.460 --> 00:37:08.860 What is this? 00:37:08.980 --> 00:37:10.260 What would this even look like? 00:37:10.260 --> 00:37:14.820 Well, there's something called a conversational UI, UX, right? 00:37:15.180 --> 00:37:21.160 How can I, you know, and you see it all the time when you go to a website and a little bot shows up 00:37:21.160 --> 00:37:23.220 and they're trying to get in a conversation with you. 00:37:23.340 --> 00:37:26.840 And it may be a machine that's trying to get in a conversation with you. 00:37:27.140 --> 00:37:31.600 But that's the data collection that we see happening more than not. 00:37:31.900 --> 00:37:36.700 Getting away from the forms-based collection of, oh, fill out this form. 00:37:36.800 --> 00:37:37.860 But, hey, what's your name? 00:37:38.300 --> 00:37:39.620 What's the best way to get a hold of you? 00:37:39.900 --> 00:37:41.920 How can we help you, right? 00:37:41.980 --> 00:37:47.520 And if I ask you when you come to a church website how I as a church can help you, 00:37:47.900 --> 00:37:53.740 that relates into programs that we might have that I might want to plug you in on, right? 00:37:54.040 --> 00:38:02.780 But one of the things we're also studying is how do we not plan out your entire journey? 00:38:03.340 --> 00:38:05.820 We just need to plan out your next couple steps. 00:38:05.820 --> 00:38:10.040 And so it's something we call dynamic journey-based curriculum. 00:38:10.620 --> 00:38:12.360 So what happens in your life? 00:38:12.440 --> 00:38:18.740 And so if you lose your first parent and you don't know how to grieve, that dynamic journey-based 00:38:18.740 --> 00:38:24.120 curriculum will say, hey, based upon a prayer request, because we can mine text, right? 00:38:24.600 --> 00:38:30.520 So let's use R or Python to mine the text of a prayer request to say, hey, based upon that prayer request, 00:38:30.520 --> 00:38:32.760 you probably need to take this little corselet. 00:38:33.820 --> 00:38:35.720 And so think about a content strategy. 00:38:36.060 --> 00:38:39.620 All content within a church should not be long-form content. 00:38:40.620 --> 00:38:43.320 The sermons or an entire marriage class. 00:38:43.320 --> 00:38:51.940 There should be some mid-length content and some short-form content that's 30 seconds to two minutes that is being drip on these 00:38:51.940 --> 00:38:55.540 people through the church app, you know, throughout the week. 00:38:56.140 --> 00:39:02.440 And then if you see that they click through on something that is a mini form and you give them a short form, 00:39:02.440 --> 00:39:12.500 and I believe in the future we will see a time that because of your MAPS technology on your phone, it says, wow, you've got 20 minutes. 00:39:12.840 --> 00:39:18.780 Let me drip something on you for 20 minutes, probably audio, unless it's a self-driving car. 00:39:19.480 --> 00:39:26.440 But let me fill in that time with some Christian content that has been curated by your church. 00:39:27.560 --> 00:39:36.000 That's a key, too, is curated by the church, not curated by Communitas Technologies, curated by the church. 00:39:36.120 --> 00:39:44.140 Now, I believe that someday we'll be a managed service provider and we will have people on our staff that says to a certain church, 00:39:44.220 --> 00:39:54.680 hey, did you realize that you have, you know, 23% of your teens are struggling with this and you have no content in your content library to help them? 00:39:54.680 --> 00:39:58.780 You have no discussion groups for them to discuss this thing. 00:39:59.140 --> 00:40:04.960 And so you've left them either hanging out or they have to go figure it out on their own through Google. 00:40:06.080 --> 00:40:09.900 And by then, Google probably had three pages of ads instead of just one. 00:40:10.260 --> 00:40:15.940 I mean, so it's, I mean, you're almost setting up the picture like the, you know, I'm an iOS guy. 00:40:16.020 --> 00:40:20.640 It's about like the health app where all these different tools pour into it. 00:40:21.360 --> 00:40:41.200 Essentially, you're creating a church app that's taking in insight from RightNow Media, from YouVersion, from a church, XYZ, maybe historical churches, the current church where they're involved in. 00:40:41.200 --> 00:40:55.500 And it's painting a rich tapestry of who a person is spiritually, maybe some of their strengths or weaknesses, maybe even, you know, taking a spiritual assessment test every, a survey every six months or a year. 00:40:55.600 --> 00:40:56.820 What are some strengths and weaknesses? 00:40:56.960 --> 00:40:57.860 How have you improved? 00:40:58.260 --> 00:41:00.600 What are some areas that you need to improve in? 00:41:00.660 --> 00:41:09.040 And so we're providing here some opportunities for churches to better understand the people, to minister to them. 00:41:09.040 --> 00:41:13.780 And really, you're providing an opportunity for the people to better understand themselves. 00:41:14.340 --> 00:41:16.320 And each other, themselves and each other. 00:41:16.540 --> 00:41:17.760 So we're talking machine learning. 00:41:18.200 --> 00:41:20.600 We're talking artificial intelligence, AI. 00:41:21.360 --> 00:41:25.140 I'm willing to bet here, there's probably some churches out there, some lead pastors. 00:41:25.560 --> 00:41:27.420 I don't even think they can spell AI. 00:41:28.120 --> 00:41:37.140 And so, like, the understanding of churches to try to master this area, like, they're not going to be able to. 00:41:37.220 --> 00:41:38.240 We were talking offline. 00:41:38.440 --> 00:41:43.540 I actually, in my church career, I've tried twice to build a personalization ministry like this. 00:41:44.100 --> 00:41:47.500 And actually had funding secured, but the funding was nowhere near necessary. 00:41:48.020 --> 00:41:53.800 And the vision wasn't strong enough to actually, like, succeed in making this thing happen. 00:41:53.880 --> 00:41:57.940 And so, as we're moving to the future, it's 2021. 00:41:58.320 --> 00:41:59.820 COVID sped up the train. 00:42:00.060 --> 00:42:03.320 We're seeing things move more quickly in a technological stance. 00:42:03.540 --> 00:42:10.200 We're not done with digital because of Delta variants and some things like that even coming back around. 00:42:10.840 --> 00:42:14.920 What needs to happen for churches to better understand? 00:42:15.320 --> 00:42:23.120 How do churches get their head wrapped around maybe utilizing personalization ministry, artificial intelligence, machine learning? 00:42:23.340 --> 00:42:24.320 Like, how do we get there? 00:42:24.620 --> 00:42:28.320 Well, the machine learning side is going to handle itself, right? 00:42:28.320 --> 00:42:36.300 So, the churches can – and probably a lot of the large churches will get there. 00:42:36.460 --> 00:42:37.980 Maybe the small ones won't. 00:42:39.100 --> 00:42:43.220 But I don't like the – you know, I don't like the term artificial intelligence. 00:42:43.440 --> 00:42:46.960 I like it to be augmented intelligence, right? 00:42:47.080 --> 00:43:03.760 So, if you went through the church database and tried to determine certain things – and let's say you have an average attendance of 300, which isn't a small church, but it isn't a large church either. 00:43:03.760 --> 00:43:09.260 But the point being, their database is probably 3,000 people. 00:43:10.760 --> 00:43:14.900 And how many of those people do they really want to count, right? 00:43:15.040 --> 00:43:16.860 Are they going to – when do they drop off? 00:43:17.960 --> 00:43:25.340 When is somebody who's a visitor who comes in, they fill out a contact card, they check their children in, they never come back to your church? 00:43:26.020 --> 00:43:29.660 So, if you're going to try to be – this goes back to the data strategy. 00:43:29.880 --> 00:43:30.900 What are you trying to measure? 00:43:31.960 --> 00:43:33.820 Do you really want – oh, look at our database. 00:43:34.000 --> 00:43:35.300 We have 3,000 people. 00:43:35.880 --> 00:43:47.880 Now, you have 3,000 records, but you probably only have 800 people who have been there in the last year, even though your average attendance is only 300. 00:43:49.360 --> 00:43:52.980 Now, there's a couple interesting things coming out of that discussion, right? 00:43:53.220 --> 00:44:01.000 So, if your average attendance is 300, pastor, how big do you think your ministry is? 00:44:02.180 --> 00:44:05.340 I've talked to a number of pastors, and they say, well, it's 300. 00:44:06.060 --> 00:44:11.020 No, the average attendance has gone down to 1.8 times a month, and that was pre-COVID. 00:44:11.500 --> 00:44:13.840 So, let's just use an algorithm of two. 00:44:13.840 --> 00:44:21.980 If your average attendance is 300 and people come twice a month, then you have regular attendees of 600. 00:44:23.220 --> 00:44:28.100 Do you realize that you need to start thinking of your church as 600 people? 00:44:29.460 --> 00:44:35.060 Because – and how do I get to those other 300 the other two times a month? 00:44:35.180 --> 00:44:35.880 How about digitally? 00:44:37.520 --> 00:44:45.840 But the systems in place and what you measure and things, the processes, need to be thinking like you're a church of 600. 00:44:46.900 --> 00:44:51.940 And how can I get that 600 to come more often than twice a month? 00:44:54.200 --> 00:44:56.640 It's kind of just simple math, right? 00:44:57.240 --> 00:45:00.540 And we have some concepts called front-door analytics. 00:45:01.140 --> 00:45:02.680 Where are people coming from? 00:45:02.940 --> 00:45:04.700 How many front doors do you have? 00:45:04.840 --> 00:45:06.200 Is Facebook a front door? 00:45:07.480 --> 00:45:08.100 Is it? 00:45:08.200 --> 00:45:13.160 Or is it just a side door because you have no idea if anybody's going to your Facebook page or not, right? 00:45:13.380 --> 00:45:15.040 And then backdoor analytics. 00:45:15.500 --> 00:45:18.080 Backdoor analytics is why are people leaving? 00:45:19.180 --> 00:45:20.740 Many churches don't even know. 00:45:21.860 --> 00:45:24.500 But in the software industry, we call that churn. 00:45:24.500 --> 00:45:32.740 And if your churn is too high, then you're losing more customers than you're getting or it's costing a whole lot more to get the customers in the front door. 00:45:33.700 --> 00:45:41.980 When we had Fellowship One, it was a statistic that 70% of your first-time visitors came from people inviting you. 00:45:43.600 --> 00:45:44.840 People inviting them, right? 00:45:44.880 --> 00:45:45.900 Their friends, their neighbors. 00:45:47.060 --> 00:45:48.740 How do people invite today? 00:45:50.020 --> 00:45:53.560 Would I invite you, Jeff, to my church to come through the front door? 00:45:53.660 --> 00:45:59.240 Or would I engage you with some digital content first to say, hey, here's something my pastor said the other day. 00:45:59.280 --> 00:46:00.280 I thought it was pretty interesting. 00:46:00.400 --> 00:46:01.940 We were talking about it over coffee. 00:46:01.940 --> 00:46:02.920 What do you think? 00:46:03.700 --> 00:46:04.860 That's an invitation. 00:46:06.060 --> 00:46:08.180 That's an invitation to engage. 00:46:09.320 --> 00:46:14.360 Now, one of the things that churches do very poorly is segment their congregation. 00:46:15.740 --> 00:46:21.620 But somebody who is a first-time visitor who never comes again might be part of their community. 00:46:22.200 --> 00:46:25.640 And I should drip on them digitally as part of their community. 00:46:26.620 --> 00:46:31.300 And if you use the five C's of Saddleback, right, then you have the crowd. 00:46:31.300 --> 00:46:32.420 Then you have the congregation. 00:46:33.080 --> 00:46:34.540 Then you have the core of the committed. 00:46:35.220 --> 00:46:39.280 Those different groups of people need to be taught to talk to differently. 00:46:41.320 --> 00:46:45.160 Because as a committed person, I want to know more of the details of how I can help. 00:46:45.860 --> 00:46:50.560 As a crowd, I may not even want to be part of your congregation. 00:46:50.560 --> 00:46:55.500 I may have problems at home that stop me from being part of the congregation. 00:46:55.500 --> 00:47:07.780 I love the vicar from Holy Trinity, Brompton, was talking about the alpha class and how he called himself out. 00:47:08.840 --> 00:47:12.180 Gumbel is his name, I believe. 00:47:12.700 --> 00:47:13.300 Nicky Gumbel. 00:47:13.440 --> 00:47:15.140 Yeah, called himself out and said, I was wrong. 00:47:15.900 --> 00:47:17.660 I didn't think we could do alpha digitally. 00:47:18.660 --> 00:47:21.280 But, man, there are some stories coming out of digital alpha. 00:47:21.980 --> 00:47:29.000 I think he mentioned specifically, and this was a conference probably 18 months ago, he said, some Muslim women came to alpha and accepted the Lord. 00:47:29.360 --> 00:47:31.280 They would have never set foot in our church. 00:47:32.520 --> 00:47:42.040 So what are the people saying that digital discipleship, that we don't want any part of it, what are they saying to these Muslim women or Muslim men or Hindu men? 00:47:42.520 --> 00:47:46.460 I mean, we've got a big Indian community here in Dallas. 00:47:47.060 --> 00:47:51.060 Are we saying that we're just going to not evangelize to them? 00:47:51.060 --> 00:47:52.960 Well, it's interesting to me. 00:47:53.260 --> 00:47:54.060 You know, it's funny. 00:47:54.160 --> 00:47:58.560 I was literally on a podcast 30 minutes earlier today telling the same story. 00:47:58.720 --> 00:48:07.460 I've got a friend, now a friend, a pastor I've met who's Iranian, who's literally a pastor of a church in Iran. 00:48:07.580 --> 00:48:20.220 And the only thing he can do in Iran as a pastor is disciple people, do church evangelize evangelism training digitally. 00:48:20.560 --> 00:48:24.860 Like he has broadcasts from satellite that connect with people. 00:48:25.100 --> 00:48:31.840 And through that broadcast, he pushes them, he challenges them, he drives to a WhatsApp conversation. 00:48:32.480 --> 00:48:38.560 And through that WhatsApp, he leads them to Christ, gets them to accept Christ. 00:48:38.800 --> 00:48:49.160 And now you've got a person in a household that accepts Christ being discipled by somebody, by a digital pastor, by a pastor via digital methods. 00:48:49.160 --> 00:48:58.280 And that pastor is now discipling this individual in the house to the point to share Jesus with everyone else in the house. 00:48:58.280 --> 00:49:12.960 So now the church is being transmitted via WhatsApp into this new Christian who's creating a new church community by evangelizing, sharing Jesus, talking about all this in the house. 00:49:12.960 --> 00:49:21.780 By the way, more often than not, when one person accepts Christ within the house, in Iran, the house accepts Christ. 00:49:21.920 --> 00:49:28.440 They all get on board with it, which leads to the place of baptizing within the house. 00:49:28.800 --> 00:49:38.200 And in Iran, the moment when somebody is baptized within the Christian faith is the moment that the Iranian government has the authority to kill you. 00:49:38.660 --> 00:49:46.840 So literally, we've got a pastor discipling people digitally to the point of potential death. 00:49:47.800 --> 00:49:50.740 Don't tell me digital discipleship can't work. 00:49:51.200 --> 00:49:54.580 It's taking people to the point where others can kill them. 00:49:55.300 --> 00:50:00.620 That's how strong the discipleship bonds of Jesus is happening through this technology. 00:50:01.480 --> 00:50:05.860 And in Iran, they don't question it because it's like, that's the only thing we got. 00:50:06.100 --> 00:50:08.760 If you take that away, we can't gather in physical buildings. 00:50:08.760 --> 00:50:23.220 This gentleman that I'm talking with, this pastor, he would not turn his Zoom camera on with me for about 25 minutes because he was afraid that I was a narc, that I was something, that I was somebody who I said I wasn't. 00:50:23.460 --> 00:50:25.180 And he wasn't sure he could trust me. 00:50:25.180 --> 00:50:39.200 And there's enough people in Iran that want him dead that makes him live on that much on the edge in a moment of fear, that he had to keep the camera off until he felt like I was who I said I was when I was having this conversation with him. 00:50:39.720 --> 00:50:42.380 So, yeah, discipleship works in so many different levels. 00:50:42.380 --> 00:50:45.200 But you have a battle there, right, of digital. 00:50:46.400 --> 00:50:52.780 Why not just switch over to my side, Jeff, and call it personalized discipleship or personalized ministry? 00:50:53.020 --> 00:50:55.380 And we don't care how it happens, right? 00:50:56.540 --> 00:50:59.140 Meaning, hey, it can happen in person. 00:50:59.360 --> 00:51:00.660 It can happen digitally. 00:51:01.120 --> 00:51:03.260 It's not, that's not the issue. 00:51:03.400 --> 00:51:06.880 It's personalization, meaning the woman at the well. 00:51:07.760 --> 00:51:08.900 What did Jesus do? 00:51:08.900 --> 00:51:12.320 He looked into her and said, let me tell you about you. 00:51:13.000 --> 00:51:15.200 He didn't say, let me tell you only about me. 00:51:15.360 --> 00:51:20.700 And I don't care, you know, you're, let's, we've got to get away from this cookie cutter approach. 00:51:20.860 --> 00:51:23.680 We've got to get away from this one size fits all. 00:51:23.680 --> 00:51:30.700 We can't keep feeding the mature saints the same baby milk that we give new Christians. 00:51:31.160 --> 00:51:31.680 We just can't. 00:51:33.140 --> 00:51:34.580 It's, it's stifling. 00:51:34.740 --> 00:51:35.940 Have you seen the reveal study? 00:51:36.040 --> 00:51:37.000 It's quite old now. 00:51:37.120 --> 00:51:44.260 But there are people walking away from the church because the, and they're dissatisfied with the church because the church isn't getting deep enough for them. 00:51:44.260 --> 00:51:56.560 So we had this big movement into, into, you know, being what, seeker friendly was a term, right? 00:51:56.800 --> 00:52:04.340 But a seeker friendly message isn't going to grow me deeper in my knowledge of God at my level. 00:52:04.500 --> 00:52:08.660 I've been a Christian now for, you know, 57 years. 00:52:10.060 --> 00:52:10.380 Okay. 00:52:10.860 --> 00:52:13.120 55, 55 years. 00:52:14.460 --> 00:52:15.420 Something like that. 00:52:15.640 --> 00:52:15.740 Yeah. 00:52:16.740 --> 00:52:28.560 But, but my point is I want some real meat as Paul would say, Hey, you know, if you, if you're now matured, you need some real meat, not the baby's milk. 00:52:28.940 --> 00:52:46.000 But can you imagine giving a baby Christian some of the real meat and the scariness that we might have when we're, especially if we start tossing around the nomenclature of a church around sanctification and things like that, and just spin their head going, uh, we might as well talk to them in, uh, uh, in, uh, tech speak, right? 00:52:46.660 --> 00:52:48.300 You, I mean, you're, you're right. 00:52:48.580 --> 00:52:49.920 You're, you're speaking my language. 00:52:50.580 --> 00:52:53.580 Um, I, I, you're, you're giving me a lot to think about here. 00:52:53.580 --> 00:53:01.560 The, the, the personalization, maybe moving away from digital, um, you know, I, I, I still think there are those out there that, that'll question it. 00:53:01.660 --> 00:53:12.040 Uh, you know, some of the, the gospel coalition talking about the, well, and honestly, I've been, uh, there's a lot of things within gospel coalition, at least their view of digital that I probably don't agree with. 00:53:12.040 --> 00:53:18.740 But, uh, personalization ministry does seem to feel a little, little safer in that approach. 00:53:19.160 --> 00:53:22.680 Well, Hey, this is, this has been a phenomenal conversation. 00:53:22.680 --> 00:53:24.300 And I have, I have loved it. 00:53:24.360 --> 00:53:29.860 I honestly, I don't know that there's many podcasts that I've had that I've walked away where I've said, okay, I've been challenged. 00:53:29.940 --> 00:53:33.700 Maybe I need to change my worldview a little bit here, or at least some of my terminology. 00:53:33.700 --> 00:53:37.340 So thank you for at least, you know, that sounds kind of ego, but I'm going to stick with it. 00:53:37.360 --> 00:53:37.720 It's fine. 00:53:37.720 --> 00:53:40.060 Thank you for, thank you for the opportunity. 00:53:40.380 --> 00:53:42.440 I, yeah, I've, I've loved you being on here. 00:53:42.540 --> 00:53:47.980 So if somebody wants to, yeah, follow up with you, we'll put your info in the show notes. 00:53:47.980 --> 00:53:57.280 But, um, you know, if somebody wants to get in touch and learn more about Communitas, uh, what's, what's a great way for them to get in touch and learn more about what you guys are up to? 00:53:57.500 --> 00:54:00.280 CommunitasTech.com is our website. 00:54:00.420 --> 00:54:03.040 We also have PersonalizedMinistry.com. 00:54:03.200 --> 00:54:04.960 Go Google Personalized Ministry. 00:54:05.620 --> 00:54:11.240 You'll get our website and then you'll get the opportunity to buy name tags for churches. 00:54:11.240 --> 00:54:11.700 Right? 00:54:11.800 --> 00:54:20.720 So that's, that's what Google thinks of Personalized Ministry is, oh, for church readers, their name should be on there instead of the whole concept of personalized ministry. 00:54:20.840 --> 00:54:21.340 Isn't that great? 00:54:22.000 --> 00:54:27.900 But yeah, I'm just like you, uh, have people reach out to my cell phone, 214-668-9807. 00:54:28.040 --> 00:54:31.520 As long as you're not selling any kind of, uh, drugs, right? 00:54:31.640 --> 00:54:34.520 Uh, from Franklin Pharmacy, I'm good with that. 00:54:35.640 --> 00:54:37.740 And if you are selling drugs, you can text me. 00:54:37.800 --> 00:54:38.240 No, I'm kidding. 00:54:38.320 --> 00:54:38.920 Don't do that. 00:54:39.000 --> 00:54:40.200 I don't, I don't want that either. 00:54:40.640 --> 00:54:41.340 Uh, that's awesome. 00:54:41.580 --> 00:54:44.520 It gives it a, it gives a cell phone number on the, on the air. 00:54:44.580 --> 00:54:45.060 I love that. 00:54:45.380 --> 00:54:48.980 Uh, well, Jeff, sir, thank you very much for jumping on, on this podcast. 00:54:49.120 --> 00:54:50.580 Uh, check out Communitas. 00:54:50.760 --> 00:54:51.580 Check out the show notes. 00:54:51.580 --> 00:54:54.760 We'll have, uh, all the information on there as well. 00:54:55.080 --> 00:54:56.460 Uh, but for Jeff, this is Jeff. 00:54:56.520 --> 00:54:56.940 Hey, cool. 00:54:57.320 --> 00:54:59.980 Jeff Squared, uh, with the Church Digital and with Stadia Church Planning. 00:55:00.080 --> 00:55:01.020 Thanks for jumping on the pod. 00:55:01.440 --> 00:55:02.760 We'll see you next time here at the show. 00:55:02.820 --> 00:55:03.280 Y'all have a good day.