A buddy of mine working in a very sensitive field would like to know. He’ll use his VPN to watch this page directly. He wrote, “Two of the websites we made that got about 250K hits were recently blocked so we’re looking into alternatives.” Would you be able to direct him to any Facebook apps that would be useful in ministry? (Please… and this is Doug talking… no farms or any other sort of animal that you raise, no mass valentines to everyone in your address book, and especially no mafia wars.) :-) Just click into the Comment box below to give him ideas. Thanks in advance.
4) Can you Point my Buddy to anyone Using Facebook for Outreach? –
February 7th, 2010 · 12 Comments
Tags: · Facebook, web services
12 responses so far ↓
1 Tony Whittaker // Feb 15, 2010 at 5:02 am
There’s huge potential for using Facebook to share the good news, but it all depends on the context, who you want to reach tec.
Please contact me via
http://www.internetevangelismday.com/feedback
- we are involved in this for a certain area of Africa and in other ways
Blessings
Tony
2 Dave Hackett // Feb 15, 2010 at 9:13 am
A friend has blogged about his method for using Facebook for reaching a sensitive field. See
http://www.ieviafb.blogspot.com/
Dave
3 bro. thomas // Feb 15, 2010 at 12:07 pm
I am the spokesman for a web based ministry using Facebook to get people praying for changes in the hearts of people on the FBI most-wanted list for acts of “terrorism” and people who the US State Department says are sponsors of terrorism. The FB group address is: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=10866485582 and the FB cause address is: http://apps.facebook.com/causes/348319
4 Harvey Hoekstra // Feb 15, 2010 at 2:08 pm
On Facebook go to either or both of these:
Talking Bibles or Talking Bibles International
Excellent Free Bible listening many different languages.
5 Chris Sleath // Feb 15, 2010 at 2:29 pm
The guru for this at Campus Crusade for Christ is Brian Barela. Check out http://www.slideshare.net/brianbarela/slideshows
CCC has built a Facebook app for any ministry to manage Facebook based movements. Search for “Together on Mission” under Facebook apps. Make sure you spell it as above, not with a plural “Missions”.
6 Dave Hackett // Feb 15, 2010 at 10:09 pm
I got another response from a friend on this. He said,
“I’m not sure if this is exactly what your friend is looking for, but I wrote an article about using Facebook for Prayer. Depending on your Facebook Friends, this could be ministry or missions.
http://www.reachingtheonlinegeneration.com/2010/01/28/growing-closer-to-god-through-facebook-prayer/
This approach is slower than an application, but I think it is a lot more personal.
Blessings,
-Paul.”
7 Dave Hackett // Feb 15, 2010 at 10:16 pm
Another friend wrote back with this to suggest on this topic:
“On a different approach (at the worldview level in general), I just released nationwide a 13.5-minute program entitled Facing Facebook: Social Networking and Worldview. The audience we have in mind is the everyday American Christian, but there are principles here for everyone, including those doing ministry through Facebook, online. You may recognize ideas from my main source, Flickering Pixels by Shane Hipps.
See for audio link, transcript link and related materials:
http://www.probe.org/atf/cf/%7B3db354b7-83ad-49c0-95c3-d23bb106154d%7D/PROBEPODCAST02-08-10.HTML
Feel free to distribute if kept intact and credit is given to Probe Ministries with link back to the transcript page, not the homepage. Tony, please note for use in W-E-B.
Praying for wisdom and ideas for you.
Probe’s Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/probe.ministries?ref=ts
Byron Barlowe
Probe Ministries International
http://www.probe.org
Barlowe.ministryhome.org
http://www.ministeriosprobe.org
8 Tony Whittaker // Feb 16, 2010 at 7:10 am
To add to previous comments;
Things would be a bit different for, say, western teens, as I presume the http://www.onlinemissionstrip.com does. But certainly in a non-western context:
1) Have a facebook profile set up for the purpose. If you already have a facebook page full of obviously Christian friends posting all sorts of Christian thoughts on your wall, that’s a no-no. Best to set up one specifically for the purpose, with a slightly different name, perhaps even an Arabised version in that context. Eg a good friend of mine David is Daoud for the purposes of this sort of thing.
2) Having done this, refuse Christian friend requests on this profile unless they are already in on your purpose, and can be trusted to only post appropriately, and themselves do not have facebook pages plastered with Christian content.
3) Once you have such a Facebook page, you can then set up a Facebook fan page. The advantage of this is that you can invite people to join it, you have more control over what is on it too. People who become fans will have it displayed on their site. Now, whether many Ms will be prepared to do this publicly is a different matter, unless you can position your fan page as primarily cultural, history, or whatever.
Be careful how you choose to classify it. You will probably fit under ‘brand product or organization’ but then choose an item from the drop-down list, rather than leaving it at the default. Add a permanent link from your blog about it. When you have 25+ fans, you can go to
http://www.facebook.com/username
to choose a shortened username for the fan page. hre
Certainly, its title would need to be low key for most even to consider being a fan and having it therefore showing up on their own site. If it is positioned as ‘discussion’ it is more likely to be used. Your website itself has too blatant a title to be used in a fan page.
4) Facebook is all about relationships, friendship, discussion. That needs to be the level at which you approach things. It’s not an arena where you can easily do merely proclamational one-way communication.
5) When you have some friends, you can usually see, on their page, a list of all their friends, and it is possible to write to each of them via Facebook. However, note this very important caveat.
Facebook WILL block you if you write many messages to people who are not your friends. We tried this, so we know. You can probably do a few each day, but there is a limit. If you had others in your team, they could probably do a few each day too from their own, similarly not-blatant facebook pages also set up for the purpose.
6. There are all sorts of Facebook add-ons that most people are unaware of, which can put extra and different stuff in the tabs on the top of your page. (eg blogs, books, and much else)
7. If you have a Fan page, you can also then generate a discussion forum on it. From my understanding of your ministry, this would be ideal for you, providing an integrated way for people to discuss issues without leaving facebook.
8. You can also send occasional messages direct to all your Fans.
9. You can invite all your friends to join a Fan page. It is, I think, the only way you can send a direct message to all your friends in one go.
10. A fan page on which you have listed other neutral resources of interest to your target audience – eg on culture, travel, history, etc etc, is valuable because:
a) it demonstrates a sense of identification with their interests
b) to the extent that it becomes a one-stop resources that helps people find interesting resources like this, it is a bit more attractive for people to visit, become a fan of, or ask others to become fans of.
9 Paul Steinbrueck // Feb 19, 2010 at 4:17 pm
I’m not sure if this is relevant to your situation or not, but my church had great success using Facebook Ads to promote its Christmas services.
How Facebook Ads Filled My Church
http://blog.ourchurch.com/2010/01/29/how-facebook-ads-filled-my-church/
10 Editor // Feb 22, 2010 at 11:24 am
Wow — what a great discussion. I’m eager to see if this is what my friend in North African was after.
11 North Africa friend // Feb 23, 2010 at 7:43 am
Yes! Several items in this discussion are exactly what I was after. Thanks for the great resources, guys. Collaboration is fabulous.
12 Editor // Feb 25, 2010 at 12:47 am
Wooo-hoooo! :-)
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