Does Twitter Exist?
Recently I came across a disturbing article presenting evidence that some social networking activities, specifically Twitter, have much less of a following among the young than I was assuming. I find this disturbing because I would really prefer that all of my assumptions be proven correct. When I asked Glen Davis (Chi Alpha, Stanford University) about this article he responded this with these words: “I was just at a conference where representatives from LinkedIn and Twitter both spoke. The LinkedIn guy was asked about his demographics and he said, ‘The readership of the Wall Street Journal.’ And then the twitter guy said, ‘Our users are a lot older than people think.’ Glen concludes: “I don’t know a single student who twitters.” Now that’s…
Continue10 Reasons Why Southwest Is the Best Airline Ever
1. The Wardrobe: Flight attendants wearing shorts in March tells me everything is going to be allllllriiiiiight. 2. The Humor: When the pilot over the PA refers to the female flight attendant performing the seatbelt ritual as “my ex-wife or my girlfriend…you decide,” I know I’m flying with a crew that appreciates irony…the signature trait of an airline that gets it. The more mundane the announcement, the funnier they become. 3. The Honesty: When the crew announces that Southwest no longer accepts cash for drink and food purchases on board, they make no pretense of apologizing for this fact, or for the too-high prices of those items. Everyone knows that airline apologies are our culture’s new benchmark for insincerity. They…
ContinueLearning Communication from Children
Lots of strange things happen on the road. During the Summer, for example, we met a former Air Force sergeant who actually worked at Area 51, the desert location where secret military things happen according to the government, and salvaged alien spacecraft are hidden according to UFO researchers. Perhaps the most unusual and most helpful experience during that season was presenting our vision for a university church in Berkeley to a group of elementary age students involved in the Sunday morning childrens ministry at Elevation Church in Layton, Utah. Jan and I shared with them for about 10 minutes before speaking to the adult service. Before going to the childrens area, we cooked up a plan for our presentation. We would…
ContinueHow The Irish Saved My Civilization
In How the Irish Saved Civilization, Thomas Cahill describes the role of the island’s monks in preserving both the scriptures and the written classics of western civilization from the aftermath of the Roman Empire’s collapse. When the opportunity became available, these monks would re-introduce learning and literacy into a continent ravaged by invading tribes, disease, and despotism. Without these largely unknown scribes, no one knows what would have happened to the West after Rome succumbed. Our trip to Ireland may not save a continent, but it has certainly proven life-giving for both Janet and me. For one thing, we have learned some new (to us) vocabulary. Our friend Anne Monaghan, a counselor with an Irish AoG church, used the phrase “secular…
ContinueIrish Flashbacks
In the last two days Janet and I have been involved in chapel services and classes at Carraig Eden Theological Center and the first day’s sessions of “Mobilise,” a national ministers conference of the Assemblies of God Ireland. The Irish get into your head quickly. I can’t identify any one trait that makes them so easy to like because they are so much more than any one thing. On the first day in country (what I call an “airport day”) they looked quite homogenous to us. However, that impression unraveled quickly as one conversation after another revealed distinctions, subtle and profound, that make Ireland a wildly diverse place. Once again I am stung by how easy it is to draw conclusions…
ContinueSome Things I Like About the Irish
Having spent five days in Ireland I have found myself drawn to the people and culture of this island. Here is a list of some of the things I like about the Irish: 1. Teaching some classes today at Carraig Eden Theological College I realized that, while the Irish speak with a distinct accent (to American ears), no two of the accents ever seem to be exactly the same. 2. When we visited with the leadership team of Liberty Community Church in Dublin last night, our normally tea-drinking hosts were kind enough to make me a cup ‘a Joe! 3. After a seminar with the staff of Open Arms church in Newbridge, pastor PJ Booth an Sean Duncan took us out for an…
ContinueI Am a Racist
In the mid-1950’s I attended a segregated school system as a white, elementary-age student in West Virginia. The racism of the day was so taken for granted that it never occurred to me to ask where all the black kids were in my school. They just never seemed to attend. I came to know black people only by meeting some of the men my father hired to work on the lawn of our house in a white neighborhood. Slowly, I started to understand that these men lived in another sort of neighborhood in another part of our town. Their children had a school of there own, one that I would never see. The monstrous injustice of it all was clothed among whites with…
ContinueLook Right
On a cold, rainy Monday in Dublin, Janet and I were guided to the local shopping mall by our host, Wilma Davidson. We walked through a suburban neighborhood that surrounds a lovely park. All of this is the product of Ireland’s remarkable boom, a financial near-miracle that resulted in its new economic nickname: the Celtic Tiger. Today, the nation wrestles with the same recessionary forces that plague the US. Things are dicey, with real estate values in decline, layoffs rising, and an increasingly fragile banking system. On the walk to the mall we came to an intersection where Wilma cautioned us to “look right” before crossing. This warning seems counter-intuitive to Americans conditioned for a lifetime to “look left.” But when people…
ContinueAmong the Irish
Janet and I landed in Dublin yesterday for our first visit to Ireland. We are here at the invitation of Gary and Wilma Davidson, American missionaries to this island nation. Gary serves as the national leader of the Assemblies of God Ireland, yet he and Wilma have opened their home to host us during our week-long visit. After battling jet lag all of yesterday, we finally got some sleep last night in preparation for speaking at Liberty Community Church this morning. Pastored by Noel and Sharon Kenny, LCC is located in an inner city neighborhood of Dublin not far from the projects where they both grew up. The congregation meets in a building that has been both a slaughter house and…
ContinueExcerpt from Reverse Mentoring
My new book is called, Reverse Mentoring: How Young Leaders Can Transform the Church and Why We Should Let Them. It was published by Jossey-Bass/Leadership Network and is available on Amazon in both hardcopy and Kindle editions. Some amazing people have endorsed the book, including: John Ortberg: “This book will help satisfy a deep hunger for wisdom and guidance.” Reggie McNeal: “The richness of life sharing that is established in reverse mentoring is a largely unexplored, but promising green edge to the Christian movement. Let Earl show you how to get in on this development.” As a way of saying “thanks” for subscribing to my newsletter, I’m providing the excerpt below from the Introduction to Reverse Mentoring: ............................................... Aaron sprinted out of the darkness like…
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Earl Creps—a popular speaker and leader—is director of the Doctor of Ministry program and associate professor at the Assemblies of God Theological Seminary (AGTS) in Springfield, Missouri. He has been a pastor, ministries consultant, and university professor. Along the way, Creps earned a Ph.D. in communication at Northwestern University and a doctor of ministry degree in leadership at AGTS.
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