Storytelling is very popular currently. Just today I got yet another promotion of a

Though storytelling is perennially popular, our Bible is made up of stories, after all, we must also be aware of some cautions in it—and that’s what this podcast is all about….

Hi, I’m Yvon Prehn with Effective Church Communications and today I’m in my role as a curmudgeon and want to share some cautions and advice concerning stories, that we in the church more often refer to as “testimonies.”

For the blog that goes with this and many more resources for Church Communicators, go to https://www.effectivechurchcom.com

There are many useful resources available online to help you in your work as a church communicator. Considering that I was recently thinking about what makes my ministry of Effective Church Communications useful for you—what to expect from me that is unique or different from what is available from other sources.

Though I’ll break it into practical parts for you shortly, overall, I realized a good label for me would be Your Chaplain of Church Communications. This covers what I do, as a chaplain is defined as one—

Caring for your spiritual needs and providing resources for you as a church communicator is foundational to what I do for two reasons:

The podcast will go into these topics in more depth. For the blog post and links related to it, go to: https://wp.me/pDky9-9Ey

Halloween—it has become such a contentious time in the church. Even mentioning the term "Halloween" upsets some because of its pagan origins.

In response to that, many churches have switched from calling "Halloween" events to "Fall Festivals." I get it; I totally understand but bear with me a minute and consider that changing the name in this way takes away some of the potentials for using this holiday as an evangelism outreach time.

What follows is not another Christian justification as to why you should let your kids go trick or treating, but an attempt to help you see how Halloween can be used as a significant time for evangelism. It really doesn't matter ultimately if you change the name or not but I want you to understand why I even bring up this point. The Apostle Paul said we should be all things to all people that we might win some and my contemporary paraphrase of his imperative of evangelism is that we need to use EVERY opportunity, every holiday, every time that we can to introduce people to Jesus.

Please consider what I'm about to share in this podcast and I hope you'll agree that Halloween can be one of the best times of the year to motivate people to consider the gospel.

To download FREE copies of the materials mentioned in the podcast on the Effective Church Communications website, CLICK HERE.

This topic  is incredibly important for you to understand before you do ANY more outreach advertising, encouragement, or communications creation of any kind if you want the maximum number of people in your church and community to be able to read them.

The reason for my urgent message is the realization that many people today cannot read cursive writing and that includes ALL the wonderful script fonts we like to use so much in our designs for church communications. That includes the group of templates I had ready to send out to you that I need to update. (Sigh.)

This is not a happy post for me to write. I don't like change any more than the average person and to have to change something as basic and natural to me as writing cursive and using wonderful script fonts in communication design just seems like a bit much to deal with.

When I am feeling grumpy like this I remind myself that the communication I do isn't about me, but about a world that needs Jesus and NOTHING should be too much to do, little or big if it can help us reach them. So I slap myself, ask for forgiveness and create a podcast, blog, and video about it.

First I'll give you a little background on how I became aware of the loss of the ability to read cursive and then some very practical steps on what to do about it. Please go to the link here on the Effective Church Communications website for a printed version of this podcast and for the link to the video I did illustrating how you can make changes in response: https://wp.me/pDky9-9BJ

A few weeks ago, I did a survey to find out more about what church communicators are using currently and what they need to do their work more effectively.

In today’s podcast, I’ll talk about the Results of the Church Communications Survey Summary, I'll give you some comments on it and what we'll be doing in response to it in the Effective Church Communications Ministry.

For a transcript of the podcast, go to the link here: https://wp.me/pDky9-9zZ

To sign up for the Effective Church Communications ministry newsletter and get notifications of the new free templates, training and related materials CLICK HERE.

Seasonal events are an easy and natural way to invite guests to church—that begins the process

They are ALSO a way to grow your congregation as disciples—that helps complete the process

This podcast will go through each step and illustrate how to practically accomplish each step with Easter communications--keeping in mind that the same processes will work with every holiday or special event.

For more resources, training, inspiration, and free templates to help you become a more effective church communicator, go to https://www.effectivechurchcom.com.

Churches often have a great turnout for a special event or holiday, but few have the same number returning the following week. This podcast will show you how to change that and make holidays and celebrations time to grow your church in numbers and your people in spiritual maturity.

For more resources, training, inspiration, and free templates to help you become a more effective church communicator, go to https://www.effectivechurchcom.com.

Why do you do all the hard work you do in church communications?

In the podcast today I want to inspire you with a practical strategy to create communications that will help your church fully fulfill

All churches work hard to communicate their message and events to the people in the church and those outside the church they want to reach. However, most church communicators would agree that they are not as successful as they wish they were.

They try new tools, new designs, new media campaigns, and still many churches are not growing in numbers, and even more disappointing for church leadership, many in the church are not maturing in their faith.

What you need isn't another media campaign, new technology, or catchy design. You need a strategy—a strategic plan that will work no matter what your denomination, budget, or the media preferences of your church that will grow your church in numbers and your people in spiritual maturity.

The Five Steps of Effective Church Communication and Marketing will give you that strategy.

CLICK here to go to the Effective Church Communications website where there are links to a chart and downloadable video that will further illustrate this strategy any church can implement to take people from outside the church and grow them into mature disciples.

Church Communicators do an extraordinary job and often with little training for their demanding work. In this episode, I want to introduce you to an exciting new resource for you--the Effective Church Communications Library.

In the podcast, I'll share what motivated me to put this resource together and some specific areas it can help you with. 

Here is the link to go to the Effective Church Communications Library: https://yvonprehn.podia.com/ecclibrary

For many more resources to help you in church communications, go to: https://www.effectivechurchcom.com.

To meet the challenge of how to keep donations coming into churches when they can't meet together is to emphasize or launch online giving. And though it's a great solution, it isn't realistic for every church, either financially or because a number of people in the church simply will not use it.

To solve that challenge this podcast proposes an idea that will not only keep needed financial donations coming in, but that will minister to the scattered members, some of whom may be lonely and afraid.

Technology is wonderful, but sometimes non-tech solutions can be solved in simple ways.

For more information on church communications, and for the links mentioned in the podcast, go to https://wp.me/pDky9-8OO