FredMcKinnon.Com

Hey Ya’ll,

As you may have read, I was “home alone” last week. Joy and the kids went up to Gainesville, GA and enjoyed some time with Joy’s parents and I stayed home and did a lot of “catching up” on a mile-long “to do” list.

While they were gone, I took advantage of the free nights and checked in on some other ministries that happen at SSCC during the week. Jay Sellers and Ben Harrell did an awesome job leading worship at the Young Adult’s group, Elevate. Jay led the song “Healer”, as recorded on the Planetshakers CD.

I fell in love with this powerful song, and have since listened to it dozens of times. Now I’ve learned (ht. thetoneguru) that this song will be included on the upcoming release from Hillsong, “This is Our God”.

The video promo for this recording is amazing … but the promo is really more about this song, “Healer”. There is a powerful interview with the songwriter, currently in the middle of an intense battle with cancer. He led the song, complete with an oxygen tank on the stage.

Checkout the video below. I think you’ll agree this is incredibly powerful.

Are your eyes wet?

Fred

• Comments (8)

Hello Everyone,

A couple of days ago I posted “Effective Leading” and asked for your comments on two words:
1 - communication
2- leadership

Your comments were incredible and continue to come in.

I’d like to further discuss these as we dive deeper into this discussion about Effective Leadership. These comments are inspired by the time we had in staff meeting and the notes I took from Pastor David’s discussion with us.

Communication:

This is critical. We cannot expect people to follow our leadership if we do not clearly communicate. It’s far easier to under-communicate than to over-communicate. Think about your role as a leader. What are the non-negotiable aspects of your ministry? These need to be communicated over and over to those who are following. As you define your mission and vision statement, find ways to continually communicate this.

As a church, we have asked ourselves these important questions:
1 - Who are we?
2 - Why do we do what we do?

Answering these questions gives some good direction in finding a vision statement to clearly communicate this to others.

Our response at SSCC:

Our mission is to help people discover God’s purpose for their lives as fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ. We seek to create environments where people are encouraged and equipped to reach up, reach in, and reach out.

As leaders, it’s easy for us to focus on the “big communication” - like our church vision, our business model, our strategy, etc. Let’s not forget how critical basic communication is with those who serve with us.

As a Worship Leader:
1 - communicate your gratitude to your team OFTEN
2 - communicate your gratitude to your tech team OFTEN
3 - communicate your thoughts and vision for introducing a particular song, or flow
4 - communicate the vision behind actions.

For example, we’re encouraging our singers to make every effort to memorize their lyrics each week so that we can get rid of our music stands. Just giving them instruction without communicating vision is critical here. I have to explain to them WHY it’s important, and the BENEFIT that we’ll have in doing so - both on an individual basis and a corporate basis.

What are some examples of good (or bad) communication that you’re experiencing. Feel free to share your business, church, or personal mission statement that you are communicating as well. Let’s discuss.

For the Kingdom,

Fred

• Comments (5)

Hey Everybody,

So we’ve just completed Day 2 of Arise, the Willow Creek Arts Conference. Overall, it’s been a blast. As I mentioned yesterday, Chris has been keeping a good stream of blog posts and pictures from the event, so rather than rehashing all the details, just check out his blog.

Today was a bit different, as we had breakout sessions all day … so our team was separated.

My first session was called “Putting Music Technology to Work In Your Church”, taught by Steve Young. I walked away extremely disappointed in this session, mostly because it was like Pre-K basic. The first hour was spent talking about the most basic of basic stuff … different types of keyboards, guitar modules, and electronic drums. I’d hoped to jump into some serious stuff about virtual synths, loops, click tracks, Ableton Live, etc … we barely scratched that stuff in the last 10 minutes of the class. It was a bummer.

The other 3 classes that I took were called “Conversations” - these were very small-group breakouts that you could choose as an alternative to the bigger classes. Each “conversations” was led by someone and there would be 5-8 people at the table, just all having a “conversation” about the topic.

“Developing Your Worship Leading” by Joe Horness (previously WC’s Worship Director for 25 years). This was a great class and we tackled some issues head-on that we’re confronting right now at SSCC.

“Building Health Relationships with your Musicians, Singers, and Tech Team” was also a great experience. We talked about ways to keep unity across your music, vocal, band, and tech team - how to empower volunteers, earn and build respect, etc. Some great insights, and well worth the time.

“The Church as Music Publisher and Record Producer” - this was taught my a long-time friend, Susan Fontaine Godwin of ChurchCA.com, and was very enjoyable. As an artist, I’m constantly trying to learn what other churches are doing to empower their songwriters, artists, and other forms or art, while protecting them (and the church) from future copyright, ownership, and liability issues.

Towards the end of Session 3 I got a direct message via Twitter from Lee McDerment, the Worship Leader at NewSpring in Anderson, SC (with Perry Noble and Tony Morgan) … “yo dawg, you in the building, I’m in the coffee shop until 3:15″. Lee and I have spoken on the phone (re: recording in church, etc) and via email several times, but it was my first chance to just hang out w/ the guy. Kudos .. he’s super cool, super humble, and 100% genuine. Glad to make that relationship … and after hearing his rock-out album, I had no clue he studied classical piano like I did!

After the final session, I headed back to the hotel where the Vendor’s Expo is happening - I made a b-line straight for the Sensaphonics booth where they had one of their audiologists on hand doing full in-ear impressions. I got full impressions made of both ears, and in 4-5 weeks I’ll some groovey silicone custom-fit sleeves for my Shure E5 IEMs. I’d had substantial surgery done in my left ear years ago, and the audiologist noticed right away, which was funny - she was like “what happened in there!”.

Chris, Travis, and Bo were in the Expo when I arrived so Chris (always with cam in hand) captured some video of that moment which I’ll post soon. In the meantime, here’s a pic he shot yesterday while we were at lunch …

Would you say we’ve drunk the Steve Jobs Kool-Aid?

More later!
Fred

• Comments (9)

Hey Gang,

Day 1 of Willow Creek’s Arts Conference, “Arise” was awesome. I’d like to recap everything, but it’s after midnight - we enjoyed the full day, had some steaks tonight, and headed into the city - just got back. My morning starts very early, so I’m crashing.

My Twitter feed is updated throughout the day w/ the details … and my roommate and co-worker, Chris Moncus, is doing a great job taking photos, uploading, and blogging the details, so see his site for today’s updates.

I miss my family!

More tomorrow.

Fred

• Comments (1)