I love this sarcastic and satiricle site, WorshipJV. (Maybe making fun of WorshipVJ, our friend Stephen Proctor?) Though the site hasn’t been updated in a while, this is probably my favorite post: the top 10 worst worship songs. Enjoy the sarcasm!

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Admit it, there are some horrible worship songs out there. I cringe every time I visit other churches and hear them singing. So I thought it would be expedient of me to make a list of the worst worship songs in hopes you’ll see what I see – and perhaps the church will be a bit better for hearing this. So without further adieu…

1. Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone) – First of all, what’s up with the parenthesis? I just call it Amazing Grace. Secondly, the verses suck! They sound so outdated. The chorus is alright, but what the heck is a wretch? You might as well just sing a hymn if you’re going to sing a song with such outdated lyrics.
2. Marvelous Light – So maybe this isn’t a horrible song. But congregations everywhere are ruining it – especially the bridge. If I see one more person lift their hands and spin around during the bridge, I might have to kick them in the face.
3. You Never Let Go – Um…Titanic rip off?
4. Forever, I Could Sing of Your Love Forever, and Glory to God Forever – I get it, it’s clever to repeat the word “forever” over and over. But enough already!
5. Open the Eyes of My Heart – Besides being the oldest song known to man, what a creepy visual. A heart with eyes? Try to get that image out of your head.
6. Your Grace is Enough – Every single bass player that plays this song makes it sound more like “I’m in the Lord’s Army”. No sir!
7. How Great is Our God – There’s only really one reason I hate this song. It’s needy. “Sing with me…” It’s like a a comedian telling his audience to laugh.
8. Everlasting God – That line, “You’re the defender of the weak.” I get it, but it sounds like a football award. Defender of the week. Weird.

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While this is definitely a joke, I can’t help but agree at times with this list. How about you?

Tons of great sponsors help Echo happen each year. They allow us to keep registration prices down and provide valuable resources for our attendees. Today I want to introduce you to Moody Collective.

They’re basically the branch of Moody Publishers that house some of our favorite writers: Scott McClellan, Jeff Goins, Allison Vesterfelt, and Sarah Cunningham. Be sure to check out their lineup of books and fill the gaps in your library. There’s good stuff here.

You can also subscribe to their monthly newsletter for updates on their authors as well as the chance to win their monthly giveaways. (This month they gave away three great books and a DQ gift card – for an ice cream cake, of course.)

While feverishly working on preparations for Echo Conference this year, we have a secret project brewing. It’s the branding and preparation for Echo Conference 2014. Besides just working on themes, main session speakers, venue options, and worship choices, we’re crafting a story. It has both a history and a future. It has characters and conflict. Yes, it’s an actual story.

But the 2014 attendees will never get the full thing. They’ll never experience the full story. They’re coming for a three day event with specific goals in mind. To them, our story will seem like great branding. It’ll seem like a really fun theme. They’ll never see all the thought and planning we poured into the 2014 theme. However I guarantee it will be better because of it.

The same’s true for this year.

But that’s the deal with telling stories in our churches and in our conferences. There is so much detail that never makes it to the eyes and hearts of the ones we’re ministering to.

Think about Lord of the Rings. Harry Potter. Star Wars. The writers of these stories have so many charts, diagrams, languages that we never got to see as the reader/watcher. There is so much more depth to the story than what we consume.

It’s even more true for an hour long service or a three day conference.

And that’s why I believe we shy away from telling a story. It’s a lot of work to create a massive story that we know people will never fully appreciate.

So we’re content to go with Kurt Vonnegut’s main story premise: “Man falls into a hole; man struggles to get out of the hole.” But we don’t bother to fill in the rest of the details.

I want to encourage you, don’t shy away from telling a big story. Sure, people might not fully appreciate the work. But it will come across. Great stories always come across even if they’re never fully fathomed.

Jonathan Malm is the director of Echo Conference. He surrounds himself with other people’s amazing ideas and voices through his projects Sunday| Magazine and ChurchStageDesignIdeas.com.

First up, a video using perspective to make the moon part of everyday objects.

I love this creative animation.

IBM’s brilliant marketing campaign. Turning ads into good ideas.

The Force is closer than we think – we can now control flying machines with our minds.

And finally, your cinemagraph of the week.

We wanted to introduce you to another of our great sponsors. These companies help us keep the cost of tickets down and let us jam Echo full of surprises and fun. Today’s sponsor: Church Community Builder.

Church Community Builder is a fully web-based (the first ever) Church Management System. All your church’s data is stored in the Cloud ready to be accessed from anywhere you need it. That’s a really great thing for portable churches or church staffs that like to work at Starbucks.

They founded the company in 1999 and hit the market in 2002. Since then they’ve developed a user base of 3,000 churches currently using their product.

They’ve designed the service to be friendly for all your staff, volunteers, and even congregation members (including your first-time visitors).

If you don’t already have a good Church Management System or are unhappy with your current one, you should definitely check out Church Community Builder. You can even test it out!

Here are some points from the company:

• “We believe Data should be used to equip church leaders and pastors to encourage people to grow deeper in their faith and their walk with Christ. Click here for more.”
• “We believe technology should help church leaders improve their ability to invest in people. Click here for more.“
• “We believe that all technology decisions should be strategic and begin with process. Click here for more.“

Check out all the photos on Instagram by searching “#echo13″.

As Echo Conference approaches, we begin to seriously appreciate the folks who help us make it happen. We have a few great sponsors that help us keep the cost of registration lower and allow us to be generous with surprises and fun for all our attendees.

One of our awesome sponsors is Salem Church Products. You’re probably aware of most of their products. I know I’ve used Worship House Media for as long as I can remember. But I wanted to give you a glimpse at everything they do and encourage you to check them out!

Their goal is to equip pastors and church leaders to ministry and spread the Gospel. They do this by offering resources in the areas of church media, children’s ministry, youth ministry, preaching and teaching, and employment.

• WorshipHouseMedia.com: The one-stop shop for all things church media.
• SermonSpice.com: The original source of church media, sermon illustration videos, worship backgrounds and more.
• VideosForYouth.com: Their brand new site featuring videos specifically for youth and student ministries.
• WorshipHouseKids.com: Get kids engaged in worship with fun and interactive videos for KidMin.
• ChurchStaffing.com: The top online job site for church jobs providing job search and hiring assistance.
• SermonSearch.com: Helping pastors study, create, and proclaim God’s Word with sermon preparation help.
• ChristianJobs.com: A job search site for Christian businesses and ministries helping to connect believers in the workplace.
• PastorDeals.com: Offers the best in free and discounted ministry resources for pastors and church leaders.

Salem Church Products, meet our echo attendee. Echo attendee, meet Salem Church Products. Have a happy new friendship!

You’re the lonely artist. You’re the island in the vast blue sea – surrounded by seeming nothingness.

You feel like no one else relates to you – to how you’re wired, how you think, and what you value.

You may be the only one at your church with a creative bent. And that makes you to feel beat down and undervalued.

But there’s still something stirring inside you. A voice that needs to get out. You feel it trying to burst within you – to reach out and express itself. It’s a light inside. A fire burning. It’s a passion for beauty that you can’t quite explain.

It was put there by God. It’s good and true and right.

Don’t let that fire die. Let it grow. Let it seep into everything you do. Let it change you and change others.

And know this. You aren’t the only one with that passion. You aren’t the only one aching to express beauty in everything you do. There are thousands across this country, across this world that feel the same way as you.

As each of us express that God-given light we’re creating something beautiful. We’re reaching into spaces where darkness has dwelt for far too long.

Shine like a light. Let your light shine before men. You aren’t the only candle in the dark. There are more.

And that’s why we exist. Echo. We want to reach into the lives of all the lights in every church in every city, state, and nation. We want to stoke that flame and encourage that passion and remind you: You are not alone.

First up, I love any craftsmen that work with amazing passion and diligence.

Not sure how I missed this biodome experiment and its failures/lessons.

An animated GIF polaroid camera? Make your own animated flip book? I need!

And finally, your cinemagraph of the week.