Lots of Ordinary Things, Taken Together…

You Can Make Posts Here Too

I first wrote this exact blog post back in December 2022, and I’m waking it up with the springtime flowers and other signs of new life, to give this another try.

You all see and do big things and small things every week, such as what I wrote about in this little post about the stained glass windows, populating the Musical Notes blog category with starter content.

When you are doing all the things you do with Living Table and New Branches, please snap a picture with your phone. Then? Send the picture and a few words about it to anyone with an editor account on this website (i.e. you can send it to Pastor Rachael), so that it can become a blog post like the post about the stained glass windows. That’s it!

Don’t make Pastor Rachael or the other editors guess what the photo is (unless you’re messing with them). Send the photo and a few sentences as they should appear. They might edit a bit for website formatting or clarity, but otherwise they will make the post and then you will have shared something from the church. Thank you! It will come from The Office account on the website, which is the people’s work – i.e. from all of you!

Your church website is designed for all of you to be sharing the church much more publicly than you ever have before. It is ready for you to be doing this.

If you’ll actually use it, I will make a submission portal for this purpose inside the member’s dashboard area. For now, photos and the description of what is going on can be emailed to Pastor Rachael.

About Photos

For photos that show people’s likeness (i.e. if you can tell who they are in the photo), they will need to sign a photo release. So for now please only include photos of people if you have their express permission to share their photo on this website, because we will need to check in with them about that permission before sharing your photo. You can always share your own photo of yourself, and you can share photos of things like stained glass windows.

Ideas

Here are a few examples of things that would make useful posts for sharing:

• a photo of new door repair, explaining what was fixed and maybe something cute about when God closes a door
• a photo of a snow-cleared walkway, explaining how to walk in Minnesota winters like a penguin but that the New Branches walkways appear to be open to penguins and people today
• a photo of giant letters cut out from foam boards, because they are going to be decorated by a team of people and later hung in the sanctuary for Advent and so this would be the before picture and people can “wait” to see them live in Advent (wait… get it?)
• a photo of a bulb being planted in the fall, saying what it is and where, so we can look for what will spring forth
• a photo of the coffee you poured at a New Branches meet-up that you attended or helped to host, with a few words about how your time went and whether you’ll be back and want to invite folks next time to join you
• a photo of YOU bringing something to someone, or picking someone up, or delivering something, or going to a community event or protest

Get it?

I know some folks are intimidated by new technology. This website is a custom project, built for Living Table, with specifically you all in mind. It’s intentionally easy to use. And for this particular thing, you’re invited to email photos and write-ups to the pastor, about the things you are already doing, and she will make them into posts using the easy-to-use, custom-built system behind the scenes.

If you have questions about how to take a photo with your phone and email it to the pastor with your sentences, please ask someone to help you, because the wider Living Table community would love to hear from you and see what is going on.