Last week, my husband jumped out of an airplane.

For a sermon illustration.

He's done lots of things for sermon illustrations. He has used real fire and real chain saws to drive a point home. He uses the verbal illustration most often. He talks about me, his kids, and his friends in sermons all the time.  If you know him long enough, you will appear in the weekly sermon. It's an honor, actually. Well, most of the time. He once tattled on me to the whole congregation, claiming that I was a "cusser", a foul mouthed human being. The congregation laughed, because they all knew he was exaggerating,  and I had to answer a thousand questions about the incident inthe hallways after the service. In my defense, I uttered one small word (not even a really bad one) in front of my kids and they delighted in repeating it over and over. They told daddy and a sermon illustration was born. You just can't trust kids these days. I must note here that sometimes the stories in his messages are stretched the ever most teensiest bit.

Big news for the global church:  VideoTeaching.com launched this week. Here’s their reasoning:

Video teaching in the Church isn't an experiment anymore. It fuels thriving churches around the globe every weekend. And now, your church can access an online library of video messages from gifted Christian communicators…all for free. Wondering if video teaching is a good fit for your church? Many ministries enjoy video teaching for different reasons... see if these examples spark some ideas for you:

• Expand your teaching team.
• Make a smooth transition.
• Develop your ministry.
• Take a break.