As the launch date for MinistryHub.com BETA get closer we thought that we would reveal a bit more of what you will experience once inside, with screenshots and descriptions of how we think this site could really change the way you find your creative ideas for your services. This first preview is going to be a brief overview of the site and then in later posts we'll dig in to each section and begin to realize all of the possibilities.
First, why the name MinistryHub?
hub [huhb] noun
a center around which other things revolve or from which they radiate; a focus of activity
It's this definition where the name MinistryHub.com originated, we want this site to be a gathering place for those serving in ministry, where ideas, advice and insight radiate from one to another.
So how does it work?
In it's simplest form MinistryHub.com consists of 4 key areas:
- The Hub
- The Virtual Brainstorming Area
- The Results
- The Store.
Within the mainframe of these four areas there are a ton of possibilities and features that will be available to you. Over the next few weeks we'll be describing in more detail how you will be able to use MinistryHub.com to the fullest as soon as we BETA launch.
The Hub
As it's name implies this is the center of activity within MinistryHub.com. It's here you will be able to have small talk with those inside, select your topic to brainstorm, join a room already in progress or create a room that works best for you and add it to your topic queue. Go to "My Network" and leave a message for a friend, add them to your buddy list and catch them live when their online, or go to "People Search" and find others who have similar interest or backgrounds. Also within "The Hub" you will also be able to find featured products, community discussions, blogs and articles from real people about the real joy and problems that exist in ministry.
The Virtual Brainstorming Area
Once your topic has been selected and you enter a Virtual Brainstorming Room you will be able to brainstorm with either the team that you have selected or join a public room and begin networking with others in Ministry. This fun and interactive room is just like a live brainstorming session you would have at your home church, except when finished, the ideas you discover leads you to product and you can have a printed list of your ideas as well as a written transcript of all that was said. The brainstorming sessions are split into two parts, first is the discovery of ideas for Specials, Worship, Movie Clips, Media Clips, Drama and then those Out Of The Box ideas, and then next is the "Rand And Pair." Once ideas have bee submitted we want to know if you think they are good, or would you use them in your church and well as if there are any two items that work well with one another. You know a song that sets up a drama or a movie clip that sets up a song. When you feel enough ideas have been captured you can then move on to "The Results."
The Results
"The Results" is the caveat of MinistryHub.com. Once you finish a brainstorming session for your selected topic, you will not only see the brainstorming results that your team has discovered, but also the results for every idea, good and bad, that has been submitted for your selected topic. You see, every idea that has been submitted in a brainstorming sessions has been captured in the MinistryHub.com database and is available to you here in "The Results" for that topic. You will also find other featured product available for your topic, such as artwork and graphics.
The Store
Once you have found the perfect idea for your service, you can then select it in "The Results" and enter the store for that idea. It's here you will be able to find what product are available, such as charts, mp3's, media clips, dvd's and cd's. To help in finding the best product we have partnered with iTunes, Christianbooks.com, Musicnotes.com, Amazon and continue to develop new partnerships to be named later. Your going to like them though... :)
Tell A Friend!
If you are involved in the planning of services at your home church and have friends that are just like you, it's time to begin telling your friends that MinistryHub.com will soon be open. Just select the "Tell A Friend" button and email away! You will also want to sign up for our newsletter and to be part of our BETA launch team. Make sure to check back for our next preview where we will get in detail about all of the possibilities of "The Hub."
The MinistryHub.com Team
In 1995 I was in college full-time and working part-time as a worship pastor in Minnesota. My wife and I had just come home from Best Buy where I had just convinced her that we absolutely "needed" a brand new Hewlett Packard Desktop Computer. We rushed home, unpacked the boxes, set it up and familiarized ourselves with the latest release of Windows 3.0 and I remember I was terribly excited as I tied up our phone line and connected my blazing fast 14.4 modem to the AOL call center to establish my first internet account. ( I think our plan was like 300 minutes for $19.95 a month.) Getting past the loud screeching noise of the modem, I then heard that soon to be familiar sound of, "Welcome" from the AOL guy and my life has never been the same since. Although there wasn't that much content out there on the internet...I'm sorry I mean the "World Wide Web" as it was referred to then, I could see the value and potential that I believed it would someday have. Seeing the ease of connecting with others through email I began trying to find ways of emailing music charts to my band members instead of handing out music packets or driving across town to deliver charts. (Unsucsessfully I might add. This was before the .pdf file remember.) 
also allowed us to just listen to your thoughts and concerns regarding ministry and what your needs are each week. Second it allowed us to begin some great partnerships with other businesses that will bring just a ton of products available to you each week. 
Well it's official, the first trade show of MinistryHub.com is officially a success. It was so great to make many new friends this past week in San Diego at NOC 06. We had a blast talking with all of you and thanks to you for allowing us to share our vision for MinistryHub.com. We're already planning great things for next years show. 
Day 2 of the tradeshow at the NOC 2006. We have met a ton of great people and once again everyone we have talked to are excited about being able to BETA test MinistryHub.com. 
Writing here from beautiful San Diego. What an awesome day it's been here at the Pre-Conference day at NOC 2006. This afternoon MinistryHub.com partnered with Dr. Tom Clegg as he presented "Lost In America." If you haven't had a chance to participate in this workshop at a conference or have Dr. Clegg come to your home church, you really should. It will absolutely challenge and inspire you to reach those surrounding you for Christ. 
We are very excited to announce that MinistryHub.com has partnered with our good friend Tom Clegg, author of 
As you know it's our desire at MinistryHub to greatly reduce the time that it takes pastors each week to find creative service ideas for their services. But we don't want to stop there, another huge benefit of MinistryHub.com is that we want to eliminate the need for pastors to have to "wax up the ol' surfboard" (as one pastor put it during our survey) and surf the net for hours trying to find the product they need. When you become a member of MinistryHub, have signed in, selected your topic and then participated in a Virtual Brainstorming Session (TM) you will then have access to "The Results" section of the site. It's here you'll see your ideas, your groups ideas, and the top 100 ranked ideas for your topic. We've then linked those ideas to whatever product is available for each idea. To do this, first we've taken some broad strokes and have partnered with companies such as iTunes, Musicnotes.com and Amazon.com to make mp3's, charts, cd's and DVD's available to you. This alone will make a tremendous amount of product easily available, but we don't want to stop there! To give you even more of the product, that you need on a weekly basis, we have created MinistryHub Publishing and have been signing the best of music arrangers, drama writers, and graphic artists. Over the next couple of weeks we'll be introducing to you some of the talented people who have joined us in our endeavor to change the way you program your weekly services. 
We want to kick off the introductions with a fantastic arranger, musician and... well just a great guy, Wally Brath. Wally hails from LaPorte, Indiana, went to school at the University of Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music, was a worship leader at a couple of churches in the Chicago area. (One of them was named after a creek, even though there isn't a creek there?) and now resides in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, with his wife Shana (a wonderful musician herself) their son Graydon and daughter Karissa, as the Pastor of Music and Worhship at 
We ran across a blog entry that we thought helped explain some of the challenges that those of us in the performing arts ministry experience each week. Here at MinistryHub.com we state the obvious truth in ministry at the top of our website, "Sunday Comes Every Seven Days!" Brian Petak of