What a Downer Week….. October 6, 2008
Posted by Steve in : The City, Chicago, Breaking News, Church, Powerful Passages, The Cultural Conversation, Culture and Faith, Entrepreneuring, Faith at Work , add a commentStock market ….DOWN
Michigan throttled by Illinois 45-20
Cubs Lose in first round of playoffs
White Sox Bounced from playoffs
At least we got Jesus and the Promises of God below in our corner…..
The Promises of God
| REFERENCE | |
| Seeking the best investment… | Matthew 7 |
| Starting a new job… | Psalm 1; Proverbs 16; Philippians 3:7-21 |
| You have been placed in a position of responsibility… | Joshua 1:1-9; Proverbs 2; 2 Corinthians 8:1-15 |
| Making a new home… | Psalm 127; Proverbs 17; Ephesians 5; Colossians 3; 1 Peter 3:1-17; John 4 |
| Wanting to live successfully with your fellow man… | Romans 12 |
| Anxious for dear ones… | Psalm 121; Luke 17 |
| Business is poor… | Psalm 37; 92; Ecclesiastes 5 |
| Discouraged… | Psalm 23; 42; 43 |
| Everything seems to go from bad to worse… | 2 Timothy 3; |
| Friends seem to go back on you… | Matthew 5; 1 Corinthians 13 |
| Sorrow overtakes you… | Psalm 46; Matthew 28 |
| Things look “blue”… | Psalm 34; 71; Isaiah 40 |
| You seem too busy… | Ecclesiastes 3:1-15 |
| You cannot go to sleep… | Psalm 4; 56; 130 |
| You have quarreled… | Matthew 18; Ephesians 4; James 4 |
| You are weary… | Psalm 95:1-7; Matthew 11 |
| Worries oppose you… | Psalm 46; Matthew 6 |
Solar Cells Get to 20% Conversion Efficiency September 23, 2008
Posted by Steve in : Methods & Strategies, Energy Efficiency, Entrepreneuring, Sustainability , add a commentI am becoming a big fan of solar power as it begins the long march toward parity with current power supplies — I would love to get off the Commonwealth Edison grid and not have to pay that big electricity bill every month.
So I was excited to see today that Suniva Inc. announced that its R&D team has developed several silicon solar cells in its lab with more than 20% conversion efficiencies using its patented combination of cell designs and screen printing technologies.
“Our R&D team already has a solid roadmap in place to further increase our efficiencies. We are excited about Suniva’s continued momentum on the path to make solar electricity cost-competitive with conventional grid electricity.” — Dr. Ajeet Rohatgi, Founder and CTO, Suniva
These high efficiency milestones have been verified by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). The efficiency achievement closely follows Suniva’s two recent customer agreements with Germany’s Solon AG and India’s Titan Energy Systems Ltd, together worth approximately US $1 billion. “This demonstrates that Suniva’s advanced technologies in diffusion, surface passivation and contacts can increase conversion efficiency while reducing processing time and maintaining low cell cost,” said Dr. Ajeet Rohatgi, Suniva’s founder and CTO. “Our R&D team already has a solid roadmap in place to further increase our efficiencies. We are excited about Suniva’s continued momentum on the path to make solar electricity cost-competitive with conventional grid electricity.”
Solar as Alternative? June 30, 2008
Posted by Steve in : The City, Methods & Strategies, Adaptive Reuse, Tech Tips, Energy Efficiency, Entrepreneuring, Sustainability , add a commentI am beginning to look into solar options but I live in Illinois (never really known as the land of the uninterrupted sun) so I wanted to find out how to calculate whether an investment in solar makes sense in Chicago. I learned that the total solar energy available to the earth is approximately 3850 zettajoules (ZJ) per year, while worldwide energy consumption was 0.471 ZJ in 2004, according to the US Department of Energy. Even if you aren’t a solar panel installer, you can tell that there’s way more solar energy available than the world will ever need.
Doing my homework, I found FindSolar.com, a Web site sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy, the American Solar Energy Society, and the Solar Electric Power Association.
To get started, select your state and county, power company, and the type of system you’re interested in-whether it’s electric, hot water, spa/pool heating, or space heating/cooling-as well as your average utility expenditure. The online calculator then determines the average cost of a solar-electric system based on the data you’ve provided, plus any state or local rebates you qualify for. If you’re ready to start pumping out those rays, you can contact solar installers and distributors in the site’s directory for quotes or additional info.
Burma Disaster Relief: Park To Send a 10,000 gallon/day Water Purifier May 9, 2008
Posted by Steve in : Volunteers, Church, Urban Church, The Cultural Conversation, DifferenceMakers, Entrepreneuring, Faith at Work , add a commentAs many of you are already aware, last weekend Tropical cyclone Nargis claimed thousands of lives in Myanmar early Saturday morning 2:30am. By daylight, the full effect of the storm was obvious. Homes were destroyed, giant trees crashed through buildings, and were lying uprooted, blocking roads. Blackouts, water shortages and rapidly rising prices were reported in Rangoon, a city of 5 million people. The cost of gasoline has tripled since Saturday.
International news organizations are not allowed to report from Myanmar, but the news that is trickling out is horrifying. The death toll is estimated to be at least 100,000 and another 41,000 are missing.
Jackson and the elders would like to invite you to pray right now for the people of Myanmar, especially those who have lost husbands, wives and children - and those whose loved ones are still missing. And as you sit down for your lunches and dinners this week, continue to pray for this country which is in terrific need.
We will be taking a special offering during our services the next two weeks which will go directly to relief efforts in this devastated country. Hundreds of thousands of people in Myanmar are suffering in the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis. They need your help, and quickly.We will provide envelopes for you to put your donations in, so please come prepared to give.
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Here is a quick update to all our readers about where Park will be redirecting its special offerings this week for relief efforts in Myanmar. There have been many questions about how relief is going to get there with the military junta not allowing aid relief workers in and seizing aid shipments. We have been working to find a relief agency that is onsite and able to get our donations and use them in a way that will get aid to the people in Myanmar as quickly as possible.
We will be collecting donations for Water Missions International based in South Carolina. They are working with World Vision, which has had a national office in Myanmar for 40 years,and Samaritan’s Purse to provide water purification units.
Our goal is to raise $15,000 to buy a water purification unit which will provide at minimum 10,000 gallons of fresh water daily to help meet immediate needs in this devastated area. Also, this unit will be part of an ongoing community development program which will continue to help provide clean water for years to come.
Water Mission International has already deployed 12 units to Myanmar as of this morning (details here) that they knew would get through. They want to be good stewards of the donated resources and ensure that needs are being met, so units will not be sent until it is confirmed that the resources will reach the people in need. World Vision is aware of the situation and will let Water Missions know when shipments can begin.
Volunteer help will be needed upon assurance that the resources will be received, so Park will be sending a team to South Carolina to help assemble the unit we provide before it is shipped to Myanmar. Details will follow.
Continue to pray for this horrific situation, for those affected, and those working to provide aid. And please come prepared to give this weekend.
If you have additional questions about Park’s response, please email Scott Clifton.
Which Choice Do You Make? Food or Fuel? April 25, 2008
Posted by Steve in : Breaking News, Methods & Strategies, The Cultural Conversation, Entrepreneuring, Sustainability , 1 comment so farLook at this article and then reflect on which choice you would make — it is obvious what choice Al Gore would make but what would you do if you were the country’s policymaker?
NEW YORK SUN – The campaign against climate change could be set back by the global food crisis, as foreign populations turn against measures to use foodstuffs as substitutes for fossil fuels. With prices for rice, wheat, and corn soaring, food-related unrest has broken out in places such as Haiti, Indonesia, and Afghanistan. Several countries have blocked the export of grain. There is even talk that governments could fall if they cannot bring food costs down.
One factor being blamed for the price hikes is the use of government subsidies to promote the use of corn for ethanol production. An estimated 30% of America’s corn crop now goes to fuel, not food. “I don’t think anybody knows precisely how much ethanol contributes to the run-up in food prices, but the contribution is clearly substantial,” a professor of applied economics and law at the University of Minnesota, C. Ford Runge, said. A study by a Washington think tank, the International Food Policy Research Institute, indicated that between a quarter and a third of the recent hike in commodities prices is attributable to biofuels. Last year, Mr. Runge and a colleague, Benjamin Senauer, wrote an article in Foreign Affairs, “How Biofuels Could Starve the Poor.” “We were criticized for being alarmist at the time,” Mr. Runge said. “I think our views, looking back a year, were probably too conservative.” Ethanol was initially promoted as a vehicle for America to cut back on foreign oil. In recent years, biofuels have also been touted as a way to fight climate change, but the food crisis does not augur well for ethanol’s prospects.
“It takes around 400 pounds of corn to make 25 gallons of ethanol,” Mr. Senauer, also an applied economics professor at Minnesota, said. “It’s not going to be a very good diet but that’s roughly enough to keep an adult person alive for a year.” Mr. Senauer said climate change advocates, such as Vice President Gore, need to distance themselves from ethanol to avoid tarnishing the effort against global warming. “Crop-based biofuels are not part of the solution. They, in fact, add to the problem. Whether Al Gore has caught up with that, somebody ought to ask him,” the professor said. “There are lots of solutions, real solutions to climate change. We need to get to those.” Mr. Gore was not available for an interview yesterday on the food crisis, according to his spokeswoman. A spokesman for Mr. Gore’s public campaign to address climate change, the Alliance for Climate Protection, declined to comment for this article. (more…)
Easter Creativity - God is at Work! March 31, 2008
Posted by Steve in : The City, Sunday Services, Church, Powerful Passages, Methods & Strategies, Missional, The Cultural Conversation, The Arts in the City, DifferenceMakers, Culture and Faith, Entrepreneuring , 1 comment so farIt’s now a week after Easter and I am checking out the blogs and news to see how God used people this Easter weekend and what drew people in to hear the Word of God on Easter. Wow! There is lots of creativity out there and that affirms that God is working His plan with the churches here in the United States and new creative thinkers are bringing the Gospel to the folks. I love God’s verse on creativity in the church — in Luke 14:23 (NASB) it says:
23“And the master said to the slave, ‘Go out into the highways and along the hedges, and compel them to come in, so that my house may be filled.
“COMPEL THEM TO COME IN” –
Here are my “Sweet Sixteen” creative teams who I found that did a lot of brainstorming, planning, hard work and execution with excellent creative ideas to COMPEL PEOPLE TO COME IN this Easter — To God be the Glory!:
1. The Elevation Church in Charlotte, North Carolina that is just over two years old celebrated as 4,800 people showed up for services for an excellent start to a series called “Breakout” and over 500 people gave their lives to Christ! Check it out here.
2. Oak Leaf Church, less than 19 months old, did a message on TATTOO and left their mark by giving tattoos live on stage for all three services. The point of the message was that external marks are meant to point to internal life change. The point isn’t the mark, it’s the story and the meaning. In the same way, external behavior modification is never enough…what makes us Christians are our changed hearts. They were praying for 1,000 people but had 1,350 with 60 people accepting Christ (read about it here)
3. Craig Groeschel and the folks at multi-site Lifechurch.tv Started a new series on Easter and handed out fortune cookies with a note inside of them inviting people to the series entitled “The Warrior.” They placed huge barrels of fortune cookies outside and asked people to give them to their friends. More than a grand total of 31,000 people attended all 13 LifeChurch.tv campuses this Easter weekend with 479 hands raised during altar calls.
4. Scott Hodge and his team from Orchard Church in Aurora, Illinois dropped Easter eggs from a helicopter. 20,000 eggs and thousands of people (see pictures here)
5. National Community Church in DC also celebrated with 20,000 eggs and a baptism service on Saturday (read about it here)
6. Gary Lamb and the folks at Revolution Church in Canton Georgia also dropped Easter eggs from a helicopter. I love this idea from all three of these churches! Check out the story and pictures.
7. Eric Bramlett and his team in Naperville IL at Community Christian in Naperville have a really funny video as they debuted their series called “Losing My Religion” which started Easter Weekend. Check it out HERE.
8. High Desert Church in CA continued their series called “The Most Spectacular Show on Earth” and had more than 6,000 attend and over 100 people come to Christ after battling spiritual warfare with everything going wrong on their sound systems at their various locations.
9. Travis Johnson and the crew at Life Point Church in Homestead FL held a Moonlight Easter Egg Hunt (7-9pm) and had 7,000+ people show up. How creative is that idea? A moonlight Easter Egg Hunt!? They had a great turnout on Sunday with many coming from the community who attended that Easter Egg hunt.
10. Cross Point Church in Nashville had an amazing Easter at their two campuses locally (read a great letter from someone who was greatly impacted here) and at their new church start-up in the Dominican Republic. A team of 20 from Cross Point spent their week working on the church building and while the building was far from being completed, the pastor led their first service in the new church on Easter Sunday. How cool is that?
11. Check out the things Granger Community Church had people hold in their hands during the service. HERE are the pics. Read about it here and here.
12. NewSpring Church saw 12,000 people attend their services and over 120 people receive Christ (read here) and held a great service in their Man Series called “Ultimate Fighter”
13. The team at Seacoast Church launched a new campus on Easter in one of the most crime-ridden areas of the country. HERE is the story.
14. Connexus had more than 1,300 at their two compuses with some moving stories.
15. Jordan Creek Church played the Upside Down Video.
16. A worship leader in Atlanta experienced what true worship is really all about (read this moving story here)
PS…BONUS COVERAGE I just found out that Saddleback Church opened two new sites on Easter and their San Clemente site celebrated its one year anniversary! The first service of Saddleback Corona gathered 490 attenders and 43 accepted Christ. That’s almost 10 % of those who attended! The first service at Saddleback Irvine gathered 1,826 attenders and 34 accepted Christ! The service at Saddleback San Clemente (open one year) gathered 1,550 attenders and 39 accepted Christ!
The First Mobile Hotel Room March 28, 2008
Posted by Steve in : Technology, Photos, Culture and Faith, Entrepreneuring, Sustainability , add a commentFan attending any of the big festivals this summer might wish they have access to one of these - the “world’s first mobile hotel room”. The Travelodge hotel chain recently announced that its Travelpod would soon be available at events such as music festivals and sporting competitions. Designed to be set up anywhere you might put up a tent, it’s cheering news for anyone who books into B&Bs at music festivals or panics about camping holidays.
The pod is sealed in a polycarbonate glass box, but includes features offered in conventional hotel rooms such as TV and air conditioning. Leigh McCarron, Travelodge’s director of sleep, called it “a ground-breaker in outdoor accommodation”. The Travelpod, which measures 6 metres by 2.4, includes a double bed, bedside lights, carpeted floors, and dressing table - plus blinds. A spokeswoman for Travelodge said: “The Travelpod is a ground-breaker in outdoor accommodation.” She added, “With the popularity of outdoor sleeping we saw a definite niche in the market for something a bit more up-market”. When asked who will be hiring this glamorous answer to a tent, she replied “One woman wanted 20 of them for the guests at her garden wedding to sleep in.”
5 Rules with a Mentor March 24, 2008
Posted by Steve in : Methods & Strategies, Leader Zone, DifferenceMakers, Entrepreneuring, Faith at Work , 2commentsAs a serial entrepreneur, I love to spend time with folks who are getting their own company going. I remember the days when I was getting started and I was searching for people who knew more than me that would take time to meet with me and impart some wisdom into my situation. I tell everyone who asks — get a mentor…get someone who will help you as you grow as an entrepreneur.
I recently came across a great post by Perry Noble about the “5 Rules with a Mentor”. Here is what he said:
I have had the privilege of being mentored by some incredible leaders, some you would know, others you might not–but nonetheless, God has used them to teach me SO MUCH about life and ministry. Over the years I have developed five rules for meeting with a mentor that I would love to share here today…you may agree or disagree, all I know is that they have worked for me.
#1 - I Always Adjust To Their Schedule–ALWAYS!
When I am attempting to set up an appointment with someone I want to meet with–I always ask them (or their assistant) to throw two or three dates at me that is most convenient for them…and then I adjust my schedule to make the meeting happen. I NEVER send them the times I want and then ask them to adjust their schedules. I am the one who wants the meeting…and if they are available to me I will bend over backwards to hang out with them.
#2 - I Am Always Early For The Appointment
If I am driving from out of town I always make sure I arrive around (more…)
Most Innovative Companies in the World March 23, 2008
Posted by Steve in : Methods & Strategies, Entrepreneuring , add a commentThe March 2008 issue of Fast Company magazine profiles their view of most innovative companies in the world. It’s an eye-opening and interesting read, in particular that the companies named hail from all industries: automobile, high technology, airlines, retail, attire. I have listed the top 10 below, and I like the selection of Google and Nike, but don’t get P&G and WalMart and especially CurrentTV, which doesn’t really have a business plan or an audience. What do you think of this list?
#1 GOOGLE
Google is different, even on a list of distinctive companies. Here, more than a dozen describe what life is like at a place where no goal is too audacious, agility means more than power, and even cafeteria food represents an opportunity to change the world.
#2 APPLE
Careful readers of this magazine may be scratching their heads right now, in light of our recent cover story laying out the many challenges facing Apple. But the company has had, indisputably, one hell of a run. In the past year alone, three major new products — iPhone, iPod Touch, and Leopard OS — fueled triple-digit revenue growth. So while analysts forecast a more earthbound Apple in 2008, it deserves praise. And extra points for style.
#3 FACEBOOK
In 2007, the social-networking juggernaut had variously impressed with its ability to reinvent the wheel (opening its platform to outside developers) and drawn cyberpickets with its boneheaded missteps (trying to sell advertising by telegraphing its users’ every move). But after a year lived dangerously, Facebook is officially A-list, with a $15 billion valuation to boot, thanks to Microsoft’s $240 million investment. That’s nothing to throw (more…)
Faith at Work March 21, 2008
Posted by Steve in : Internet Resources, DifferenceMakers, Entrepreneuring, Fanfuego.com, Faith at Work , add a commentAs I get ready to transition out of Park with the soon-to-open new ministry center, I am reflecting a lot on my new role as the CEO of a new company FanFuego.com, the leading multi-sport social network for sports fans, and my leadership style and faith at work. I came across a great article in the New York Times from a while back that looks at the issue of faith in the marketplace, including an interesting inside look at Christians working at Intel.
The article talks about many examples of faith in the marketplace and has a seciton on the reporter’s visit where sixteen engineers and programmers sat around a table during lunch hour, eating pizza and sandwiches from the company cafeteria and discussing the Book of Ruth. William McSpadden, a 43-year-old design engineer, father of five and hardcore weekend soccer coach, led the Bible study. He describes the 200 or so local participants in the Intel Bible-Based Christian Network as ”about half conservative Christians, even fundamentalists, with the rest being Presbyterians, Methodists, Catholics and the like.”
Intel has been in the forefront of public corporations that brought religion into the mix of their employee groups, thanks in part to the fact that one of its corporate heads, Patrick Gelsinger, its chief technology officer, is an evangelical Christian who has written a book on faith and work. The Bible network became an authorized company affinity group in 1997. There are four Bible-study sessions per week at the Intel - Jones Farm campus, where 4,700 of the company’s 15,000 employees work, plus special events and a monthly faith-at-work community-outreach gathering at a local Borders. ”When I started at Intel in 1983, we had an informal Bible-study group,” McSpadden says after the Bible-study meeting as he erases the whiteboard and his colleagues head back to work. ”The company probably didn’t even know it was going on. Its being formalized basically makes life easier. It means I can book a conference room without feeling I’m going against company wishes.”
Take a read here.
Of Church and Steak: Farming for the Soul March 8, 2008
Posted by Steve in : Culture and Faith, Entrepreneuring , 1 comment so farMany of you know that I am a serial entrepreneur and I am in the process of getting my fifth company, Fanfuego.com, a multi-sport network for sports fans, off the ground. Prior to joining Park Community Church 2 years ago as the Executive Pastor, I invested in and helped co-found Dakota Beef LLC with Scott Lively (who met his wife while attending Park).
Dakota Beef is now the country’s largest organic beef company and you can buy our products at Costco’s all over the country (I am excited about that as I am still an investor!).
Or you can ORDER ONLINE HERE and have it delivered right to your door
Dakota Beef was recently featured in an article in the New York Times about the symbiotic relationship between Scott Lively, an evangelical, and two Hasidic Jews, who are customers of Dakota Beef. It also features a reference to Hope Egan of Park, who published an excellent book called “Holy Cow! Does God Care About What We Eat?”.
For those who do not have access to the NYT story, here is the reprint:
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NEAR a prairie dotted with cattle and green with soy beans, barley, corn and oats, two bearded Hasidic men dressed in black pray outside a slaughterhouse here that is managed by an evangelical Christian. What brought these men together could easily have kept them apart: religion.
The two Hasidim oversee shehitah, the Jewish ritual slaughtering of meat according to the Book of Leviticus. The meat is then shipped to Wise Organic Pastures, a kosher food company in Brooklyn owned by Issac Wiesenfeld and his family. When Mr. Wiesenfeld sought an organic processor that used humane methods five years ago, he found Scott Lively, who was just beginning Dakota Beef, now one of the largest organic meat processors in the country.
Mr. Lively adheres to a diet he believes Jesus followed. Like Mr. Wiesenfeld, he says the Bible prescribes that he use organic methods to respect the earth, treat his workers decently and treat the cattle that enter his slaughterhouse as humanely as possible. “We learn everything from the Old Testament,” Mr. Lively said, “from keeping kosher to responsible capitalism.” (more…)
Now Get 20 Million Minutes By Email! March 6, 2008
Posted by Steve in : Breaking News, Internet Resources, Entrepreneuring , add a comment
Are you flying around all week at work and would rather have any new posts from 20 Million Minutes sent directly to you by email or RSS? After a number of requests, we have now added both of those options to the 20 Million Minutes blog! All of our feeds have been migrated to Feedburner, which provides better options for you.
EMAIL:You can get an email sent to you whenever there is a new post. Just click here to go the the Feedburner feed and put in your email to get 20 Million Minutes delivered by email. Then, whenever a post is made to this blog, you will receive an email, right to your desktop once a day. It is that simple!
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For those of you who are more tech-savvy, and are using a newsreader program to aggregate your information feeds, you can add this manually to your RSS news reader with the following URL: http://feeds.feedburner.com/stevelavey or click here to go to the feed page and just click on the graphic of your new reader for easy, one-touch adding of this feed to any of the popular newsreaders (yahoo, google, newsgator, etc).
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