Thrive 2010

Bayside and Thriving Churches International's "Thrive 2010" was another amazing conference, full of fun, learning, insight, growth, fellowship and discussion. Due to limited space (and because I know most of you don't like to read long posts ... well okay I don't like to read them when other people write them) I am going to try to be quick and to the point.

First I'm not going to talk about what all of the speakers said, if you want that, CDs are available of each general session, not sure about breakout sessions.

Second, these are the books I purchased (i.e. speakers I really liked and wanted to read more about what they had to say): "The Me I Want to Be: Becoming God's Best Version of You" by John Ortberg, "Scouting the Divine: My Search for God in Wine, Wool, and Wild Honey" by Margaret Feinberg, "Everyone Communicates, Few Connect: What the Most Effective People Do Differently" by John Maxwell, and finally a new way of reading the Bible (it takes away chapter and verse numbers) called "The Books of the Bible" published by Biblica. The book I will by when it comes out has a working title of "OPEN" and is being written by CJ Alvarado.

Third, this was the first non-social-media conference that I have been to where there was lots of tweeting going on during the conference and where the conference really embraced people using Twitter throughout the entire event. First they developed and promoted the use of a hashtag (#Thrive2010), second they had a specific Twitter user name (@thrivetweets) that posted new information and interacted with others on Twitter at the conference, third people used it and finally many people were rewarded (including me) with small prizes, I won a USB thumb drive. It turned out to be a great to find and connect with others at the conference, get additional insights into what people were thinking, learn about what some of the other break out speakers were saying and see what each person found most interesting. On a side note, during the conference I read two separate posts (one, two) about people using Twitter during church, I have to say although some may find it distracting at times, I do see merit in the practice, as long as the person doing the tweeting can pay attention to the rest of the message while typing something he/she just heard.

So what are your thoughts on using social media during church? During your company staff meeting? During an annual investors conference? During your child's soccer game (tweeting stats of course)?

Side note: I also got to see the exhibit "From the Dead Sea Scrolls to the Bible in America" currently being hosted at Bayside, if you are anywhere in the Northern California region over the next few weeks and care about the Bible and/or history you really should go see the exhibit. First it may be the only time you have to see such a large collection outside of Israel and second the display is museum quality.

Here are some pictures, many taken by Bayside's team of talented volunteer photographers.