Living Stones Updates

Thanks to Juan Carlos for pointing me to the Spanish translation La Biblia Reina Valera at HTML Bible and thanks to John Hurt for making the HTML version freely available. I’ve uploaded this version into the Seek First database and it is now available via web services (using version=LBRV) and through the Seek First Bible interface.

A new version of the Sermons package is now available. Some of the changes will be relatively transparent to users (e.g. switching from the Yahoo UI library to jQuery) although they do make the user interface slightly more usable. This version has eliminated the need for setting up all of the church management components just to add sermons to the church website.

Features include:

• Support for a sermon title, date, pastor, brief summary, attachments (pictures, handouts, audio, presentations, etc.), sermon text, sermon series, topic categories associated with each sermon.
• Listing sermons by date, pastor, sermon text, sermon series, or topic category.
• Search for sermons by a word or phrase.

This package, like most Living Stones software, uses PHP and MySQL.

Oak Hills Presbyterian is using this software - see it here.

The User Management package is now available for download.

The package provides a security framework that is foundational to all other Living Stones dynamic content building blocks. It is critical that only authorized administrators be able to update the content on your site, but who is allowed to do what is likely to vary across different sections of your site, so this is not a simple on/off switch. To enable that level of security control without requiring a PhD in computer science, the User Management package provides a straightforward framework for managing user access to various Living Stones building blocks.

Included in this package are the overall Living Stones administration interface, the User management component, the People management component, a login page, and a user registration page. This package, like most Living Stones software, uses PHP and MySQL.

This package simplifies and replaces the prior Living Stones Starter Kit.

In addition to the building block previously available supporting six public domain translations of the Bible, our re-designed website also features a new building block making it easy for churches to add the English Standard Version of the Bible to their website using the ESV web service provided by the publishers of the ESV.  Note that the ESV is NOT in the public domain and therefore there are restrictions on how the text can be used.

Find both building blocks here.

Oak Hills Presbyterian is using the new ESV building block on their website here.

The Christian Homeschool Network is using the original Bible building block on their website here.

This weekend we are launching the website redesign.

In the first phase, we are focused on presentation - dramatically improving how the site looks.

In the second phase, we will be focused on developer interaction - how church website developers interact with Living Stones. As part of that effort, this updates web log is becoming the main way that developers will be informed of updates to Living Stones software.

Activity on this blog will be very limited - just updates to our software and services - and since our staffing is light, those will be relatively infrequent.

Therefore, we encourage everyone using Living Stones software to subscribe to this feed - either through an RSS reader or through the e-mail subscription (e-mails are only sent when there are new posts - meaning new software updates).

Thanks and Blessings!

The Christian Post is reporting on a study by Ellison Research that reports that churches aren’t taking full advantage of the power of the Internet.

Here are some interesting stats:

• Relatively few Protestant churches use e-mail prayer chains, have an e-mail church newsletter, or have an online member directory (only four percent)
• The study found that church website content is usually static rather than interactive. Content usually consists of a map or directions to the church, a calendar of upcoming events, a statement of beliefs, and pages for specific ministry departments. Half of the church websites list staff emails.
• Less likely to appear are Bible study material or helps, sermon transcripts, upcoming sermon titles or topics, sermons available in streaming audio, a bulletin board, forum, or chat room, sermons in streaming video, testimonies, and a way to donate online (two percent).
• Larger churches are dramatically more likely to have a website and their sites tend to be more sophisticated, with far more content. For example, 60 percent of large churches with a Web site provide special pages for youth or teens, compared to only 25 percent of small churches.

The new report from Barna I referenced in my last post pointed me back to this previous report.

Here are some interesting stats:

• Nearly six out of every ten Protestant churches (57%) now have a website. That is up from just one-third of all Protestant churches in 2000, an increase of 68%.
• Surprisingly, a majority of churches sends e-mail blasts to their congregations. Such technology was relatively inaccessible to churches at the start of the millennium, but 56% now rely on the process for reaching their people. Less than half of all small churches use this technology (44%) compared to two-thirds of all churches that attract more than 100 adults.
• The number of churches that provide pew Bibles has rapidly declined, from 86% in 2000 to 80% today.

The article closes with this quote from George Barna: “During the next half of this decade,” the researcher commented, “we expect increased broadband access, podcasting, and ubiquitous adoption of handheld mobile computing devices by consumers to further alter the way churches conduct ministry.”

The Barna Group has a new study out on the use of technology by Americans with breakdowns by faith categories.

Here are some of the interesting quotes:

“The research also points out that born again Christians account for a significant slice – 40%, to be exact – of the consumer technology market. In fact, evangelical Christians – who are a subset of the born again segment – are more likely than the norm to have cell phones, desktop computers, and Internet access.”

“The lure of the Internet is one major reason why Americans have integrated computers into their lives. Currently, two-thirds of adults have Internet access from home (67%), up 34% since 2000. In fact, among the fastest-growing technologies in America is high-speed Internet access, which has nearly doubled since 2003. Overall, 41% of Americans have such robust Internet hookups, split virtually down the middle between those using DSL and those relying upon cable for their high-speed connection.”

“Kinnaman also commented on the role of technology in shaping the faith of Americans. ‘Families should pay particular attention to how they use technology and how it shapes their children’s lifestyles and attitudes. Congregational leaders should strive to integrate media and technology into the efforts of the church – but within the boundaries of their ministry vision and values. Because technology is so diverse and is changing so quickly, no church can be all things technological to all people. America is now a nation of many mission fields – that is, a country filled with divergent micro-audiences, each using different media and technologies to make their lives work. Church leaders would benefit from having a clear sense about what audiences they reach, how they can use technology to deepen ministry relevance, and how they can help congregants develop biblical perspectives about the ever-changing world of technology.’”

This is why Living Stones exists.

Don’t you hate it when the trivial gets in the way of the important… The last couple of days I’ve been plagued with trying to resolve a bug with how Internet Explorer deals with CSS. For some reason, in IE, text runs off the right side of the page, while it works fine in Mozilla.

I don’t really want to come up with some kludgy fix that is likely to break again when IE 7 comes out, so I’ve basically gone back to redesign the whole framework in a way that hopefully will work in all browsers. Right now, my test pages are generally looking a whole lot better (but not perfect). I might have to go with it for now and get back to real work.

I’m scheduled to meet with the pastors at my church this Wednesday. They’ve asked a few times if I could help with organizing the way they upload sermons to the church website. In preparation for that, I spent a fair amount of time this weekend organizing my thoughts (and building some prototypes) for how sermons would fit into the whole building block/portal/web services model. I’m pretty pumped about the possibilities… I’m still hoping that I’ll get the Starter Kit out late this month, and then I think Sermons becomes a great candidate for the next package