Thanks to a generous gift from Rebecca’s PawPaw, she is the proud owner of a new Dell Inspiron 1521 laptop computer. This is a graduation gift for college. She has even been generous and let me use it to post in the evenings.

To help ease congestion at the family computer, we also bought a router. I decided on a Netgear Wireless N router to give us faster speed and more distance. As I write this the girls are downstair watching TV and I’m upstairs working on the computer in the kitchen. What’s really cool is that if I wanted to go to the bedroom and surf the ‘net or write my blog, I could do that.

It is amazing to me how far networking and wireless technology has come. To think that 15 years ago, when I was at Daytimers, networks were something only professionals and technical people had. I remember installing a network while, I was at First Wesleyan Church in Flint. It was no small task. Yesterday, in the matter of less than an hour, we now have a full-fledged wireless network in our home. I find that amazing, especially since I have “grown-up” with it.

I’ve found out that our technology grant money is on its way, so before long, I will be shopping for another laptop and a video projector for the church. Thanks to the internet and various companies, it’s really amazing what even a small church can do.

Here’s what technology has allowed us to do to build the Kingdom:

• Our church has a website – provided by American Bible Society — This gives us a presence that even bigger churches in our city and area don’t have.
• I have a blog which is provided by Google/Blogger — If they choose, the congregation can get to know me better and I have a way of sharing ideas with others (literally around the world.) In addition I check several blogs regularly to gather ideas.
• We have a CD burner and tape deck to record our services. The audio from the sermon is uploaded each week, and again if the congregation chooses they can listen to it again for several weeks. This also allows others to experience our church, without attending.
• I have toyed with a Flickr account, but I really need someone else to take care of that.

Is there anything I would like to enhance our technology? (This is my wish list…some of these things will have to wait awhile and I’ll explain that tomorrow.

• We are in the process of obtaining a new laptop and video projector as well as a laser printer and new congregational database software (I can’t wait) I really don’t like our current software.
• I would really love if we could figure a way to get internet at the church without paying more. That could proved to be a trick!
• A digital video camera. Rebecca’s new laptop has a IEEE 1394 port on it (which allows you to transfer digital video to the laptop. I would love to be able to provide a video or audio of our sermons. (Especially since we live in a visual culture.)
• I would like eventually upgrade parts of our sound system and completely revamp our downstairs system to better minister to Mosaic.

Yes, I know very little of this has to do with being missional per se. This would fall into the attractional model. I believe God has placed a desire to do both. I know there are those who say it can’t be done and yet I believe there are churches who are both and it’s working. I really have a desire to reach our community with the gospel, however, we need to do it.