AUMC AV Blog

Tonight we had a special service called "Soul Cafe". The theme for tonight was "Jazz", so it was basically an hour long jazz worship session. It was a load of fun for everyone! We had some great musicians playing, lots of great music, and everyone was worshiping God.

Anywho, I had a lot of fun. This reminds me why I enjoy Church Media so much. Sure I was running around last minute like a head with my chicken cut off, but it was all worth it. The praise, the glory lifted to God was amazing.

But what really got my adrenaline pumping was that it was different. Sure, Sunday church is fun, but it has become mundane and predictable. When I am having to run around and fix all of the small problems at the last minute, that is my forte. When I was in college, taking lots of Radio, TV, and Film classes, my favorite times were always when we were in the TV studio doing live production. The "it has to get done now or we fail" really gets my blood pumping.

For example, tonight we sang the song The Summons. When I had the last minute check-over-the-PPT-file-with-Joe, he pointed out that I didn't have the lyrics to the song, so I would have to add them (from this morning's PPT, a simple copy/paste). But leave it to me, I forgot. So, we are going through the service and Joe introduces the song... and I realize that I don't have the lyrics. So, while they start playing their jazz intro, I look on the hard drive for this morning's file... it isn't there. Not in the trash, not in the normal folder, I have no idea where it went. So I grabbed my USB thumbdrive and thew it onto the computer, opened the PPT file from the morning, found the song (at the end of the file, of course), and copied and pasted the lyrics into the currently running PPT file, all in about 20 seconds. And I got the lyrics on the screen only about three words late. If I never told anyone about me forgetting to copy the lyrics over, then no one would have noticed that I had just saved the song from total disaster (or at minimum a lot of confusion).

I was able to do that (and other such feats of awesomeness) because I have been doing the sound booth for well over four years at AUMC (and a year at another church), and I have lots of practice and experience fixing problems on the go. And I have to say, being able to save the day makes me proud. I try not to be prideful, but I do have pride in the work that I do.

I also want to point out that none of this is my doing. Joe Stobaugh is always telling me what a great job I do, and how much I do for the church, and I always want to reply: "I'm not the one that deserves credit for this, it is God!" See, I totally believe that God used circumstance and coincidence to bring me to AUMC and thus for getting me into the Church Media business. Today I can't imagine not doing Church Media, whereas five years ago I had never given it a thought. It is by God's grace and guidance that he has brought me here and has groomed me into being the amazing sound guy that I am. (This is why I can call myself "an amazing sound guy" and not be prideful, because it is not by my doing that I am amazing.)

So when you see me do hard work and pull something extraordinary off, know that I do have pride in what I do, but I also fully understand that it is by God's grace and love that I am able to do the extraordinary. Don't give me credit, give it to God (although, a "thanks" to me now and then won't hurt).

Matthew

I don't want to let the cat out of the bag too soon, but here is a screen shot of a project that will be shown this weekend at church (click for larger view):



Matthew

One of the main topics in the meetings that I have been in is "When we move into the new building, what will our worship schedule be?" We knew we wanted at least one contemporary service, but we also wanted a service with a strong chancel choir. The other question was: "Do we switch to those services now, or wait for the new building?"

Well, the decisions have been made, and they were announced via e-mail this week. Here is the e-mail that I got from Joe, our "Minister of Music, Worship, and the Arts":

Greetings friends!

I hope this email finds you well! It is with great pleasure that I write you this evening announcing our new plan for the Sunday worship schedule at AUMC. Beginning Sunday, October 5th, the following will be the AUMC Worship Schedule:

8:45: The music at this service will be led by Joe, Anastasia, and various soloists. We will ask for some folks to help lead the congregational singing from time to time but the chancel choir will not be the primary worship leaders in this service. My hope is that in three years the primary choir for this service will be a youth choir.

10:00 The music at this service will be led by Joe, Anastasia, and various soloists until we move to the new building. Once we move to the new campus this service will be led primarily by Nathan Bryant and the evensong band.

11:15: The music at this service will be led by the chancel choir.

5:30: evensong (which begins Sunday, September 21st)

Occasionally all of the musical groups will sing at the various services but the primary leadership will fall as listed above.

Of course, there is no perfect decision that fits everyone's needs/desires but this schedule has been arrived at via prayer and months (literally) of discussion around the ideas of the identity of the various services, our ability to provide the highest quality worship leadership that we can, the mission of the church, and the future of the church as a whole.

If this schedule provides significant challenges to you, I would invite you to talk to me about it and we can find ways for you to participate other than in the mediums listed.

It is truly an honor and a privilege to serve as the minister of music, worship, and the arts at AUMC and I am so thankful that God has seen it fit to put us together at this point in our journey's! You are a blessing! May we all realize that we are blessed because God is going to bless others through us!

Have a wonderful weekend!

In Christ,

Joe

So, to say it again, the early service is cutting out their choir (they may keep a few people to add voice). The middle service will stand as it is for now, but in the new building will become the contemporary service, and the late service will continue to grow it's chancel choir. I think that this is the best of all worlds. Every plan that we talked about had pros and cons, and this plan had the most pros with the least cons.

I hope that come October 5th, everyone will agree that the new worship schedule will work out best for everyone.

Matthew

(I should note I wrote this over the weekend, so this information is about 5 days old.)

OK, so I teased you guys in my last post, so here is the REAL update about what is going on in the AUMC A/V world:

A few weeks ago the sound system's installation started. Granted, in the last two weeks only the speakers and some lights have been hung, but work has started! Sadly, I have a "real" job now, so my involvement in the project has become minimal (to my dismay). Oh well, life will go on.

A few pictures before we go on. The current sanctuary (from roughly the perspective of the sound booth):



The speakers (this is the right side array):



The lights (from the perspective of the pulpit):



And the sound booth (from the perspective of the door... not that the door can see things...):



Moving on...

We have been having meetings galore, which is great (I am new to meetings, so I still enjoy them). We had a meeting with the worship team about when we will be moving into the new building, and how that transition will work. We had a meeting about planning the worship services... but I had to miss that meeting (*sob*). I will be having a few more meetings in the next week to solidify some things. These meetings are not only are a wealth of information, they show me that things are starting to get interesting. I can say that our furthest projected move-in date is mid December. We hope to be in sooner than that, but that is our "we won't push past this unless something major comes up" date.

In about three weeks I will start forming the new tech team. I am throwing around ideas in my head, but I am thinking about having an open meeting for anyone who is interested. It would be at the new building after a Sunday service, and pizza should get lots of people there. I hope that we will have a nice sized group of people that are willing to become a part of our new tech team.

Over all, the ball has started rolling. Things are getting interesting, and in just a few months we should be in our new building.

Matthew

Wow, it has been a month with no update, and five months without updating the picture of the building... And now things are starting to heat up, things are happening, meetings are being met, and while the move-in date for the church has been moved back (again again again), the ball has finally started to roll.

Oh well. No one ever checks this blog, so why even post?

Which of course is not true. I get the smackling of random Google searches (who searches for "what will being a leader now do for me in the future"?), and I have one or two loyalists who check it regularly (Hi mom and Joe!). But outside of that, not many people swing by here.

And it isn't a problem, I don't mind. First, I never really update. Second, this is a very niche blog, speaking about an audio/video team at a small Texas church.

So why even post, or have the blog? Is it narcissism that keeps me posting here? (I sure hope not!)

Actually, the specific reason that I wanted to post today is two fold: A) so that I can get back into the habit of posting here, and B) so that in three months when I build up a ministry team that uses this blog, the archives won't be empty.

Anywho, I will (I hope) soon start posting about the goings on. I was going to add other updates to this post, but I wanted this post to be a random set of thoughts and musings from me, and I will get the real updates in their own post(s).

Anywho again, thanks for reading this. I hope that you will hear from me soon.

Matthew

Another random idea:

For our "new service" (IE: when we get into the new building), we could have a "Featured Ministry" video every week.

Each week we feature a different ministry of AUMC (or something in the surrounding area like the Food Bank). The video would be about a minute long, and it would include an interview with someone in the ministry which may be a testimonial about how it has changed someone's life, or how they are active in the ministry. Then it would give information about how to join/help the ministry.

I imagine this video being played after the "greet your neighbors" part of the service. It creates a nice bumper to help people get back in their seats, instead of Todd interrupting everyone's conversation.

Suggesting things like this is dangerous for me, because I will be the one doing all of the work! But I figure with a one minute video, all I need is half an hour for b-roll, half an hour for an interview, and an hour or two for editing, this could be an under-5-hours per week thing for me, and I think it would be a great ministry in and of itself.

What are your thoughts?

Matthew

Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about you... there just isn't a lot going on in the AUMC AV world. Really. The new building has been pushed back, so we aren't installing stuff yet... Don't worry, you will be the first to know when we do!

Matthew

Here is a random idea (thanks to Church Media Design):

When you want to advertise a special event, or even a normal event, use business cards! Business cards are cheap to buy ($17 for 500), and are a great handout for people.

(I am sure that I really want to say more about this, but my brain just officially shut down...)

Matthew

Fine, I will post!

There, I did it.

But, really... I think that the reason that it is hard to post here is because no one reads it. OK, two people read it, and one already knows most of what I will say, so it just seams easier to call the other person than to post here for no one. Hopefully, though, soon it won't be no one. In fact, I have great ideas for this blog. For example, it will one day be the weekly reminder as to who is working on Sunday, and if one person cannot make it, they just reply to the post.

But anywho, this blog isn't about me... OK, it really is (at least if it hasn't been, I will make it now). I am pleased to announce my new title at Argyle UMC: Director of Media Ministries! (actually, it is currently "Director of Media Ministry," and I am seeking clarification if it is "y" or "ies"... what do you think?)

But before I talk more about that, it is STORY TIME again! As I have hinted at before, the tech team at AUMC has never had a leader. It has always been a group of volunteers that stepped in when something was needed. For the small church, this was OK. But for the new church, this simply won't work. Each service will need several volunteers to help man the stations, and we need someone in charge of training and scheduling these volunteers (as well as be in charge of the well-being of the equipment).

Long story short (trust me, I could go on and on about this): Argyle UMC decided to hire me as the lead AV guy. That was about a month ago, but it was not all well. The problem is, many people in the church (volunteer and staff) are used to working without a lead AV guy. So even though I had the title, I felt that the position was not defined. I needed to sit down with someone and write out a job description, then send it to everyone so that when something needs getting done, they now know who to report to.

Therefore: I had a meeting this week with Joe, our "Associate Pastor/Minister of Music, Worship, and the Arts" (I am glad I don't have THAT as my title). (he is in charge of the entire "worship experience", and because "media" falls under that category, I report to him) We outlined the job description of the "Director of Media Ministries", as well as a discussion on where the position would be in the future. The meeting was great, and it helped me see both the great possibilities of this title, and the limitations of it.

I would love to talk about what is defined on the "job description," but it is still under review. I am sure that it still needs clarification and re-wording. Hopefully, once it gets done, I can post it here so that it will be a public declaration of what I do, so there won't be any more confusion.

Moving on...

Have you ever been interested in worship media? Have you ever been a part (volunteer or paid) of a church's media team? Have you ever been any king of leader in a church? If you answered "Yes!" to any of these questions, then you need Creative Synergy. No, this isn't a pill. It is a podcast directed to all of the leaders in churches. It is mainly about technology, but it is not only for "geeks". They try hard to make it interesting to both geeks and pastors.

For example, they had an episode devoted to copyright and copyright law. This may sound boring to some people, but it was an interesting discussion with (real) lawyers about the rights and wrongs of church using someone else's media. They talk about important issues for small churches (websites, for example) and important issues for large churches (how to go multi-campus). They even gave me the above idea to use a blog as your communication point with your volunteer team. It is an amazing listen for everyone, and I highly recommend it to everyone! (Creative Synergy homepage, iTunes link)

Well, that is about it for now. I am sure that there is more to say, but this is a big enough post as it is... after fasting for a while, you don't go eat a whole turkey, you have to eat small meals so that your body can get used to it again. Well, this is my "small meal", in hopes that I will start blogging here again.

Ta ta for now!

Matthew

Remind me one day to update you here. Oh, and remind me to update that picture up there... I have new ones, but I always forget to upload it.

Matthew

PS: I haven't been updating this because from what I can tell, there is only one regular visitor that checks this blog (hi mom!). So if you check via RSS or some such, open this actual post and surf around for a moment so I can see you on my tracker!