Our Goals
2023 Goals
Create Lessons for Module 2
We have already completed a lot of the work for the first two Bible study lessons for Module 2, so we should be able to complete these two lessons, as well as a third lesson in this module and hopefully some of the initial work on the fourth lesson. We also plan to create a Module 1 Review lesson. This review lesson will provide a quick overview of the seven lessons that make up Module 1. Before study groups begin Module 2, they can use this review lesson as a quick refresher course on Module 1.
The reason we believe we will only be able to create three lessons this year is because the creation process is very time consuming. It takes at least 700 hours of work to create a single lesson. This is due to all of the research, creating, writing, and configuring that goes into each lesson. It also takes time to update the lessons based on user feedback.
Finish Leader's Guide
We believe a leader’s guide for the lessons in Module 1 can be very helpful as new groups begin to use these lessons. Although we worked on this leader’s guide in 2022, we did not come close to getting it done. Our plan for this year is to create a guide that provides some basic instructions for group leaders. We will then continue to enhance this guide in the future based on feedback we receive from the leaders who use it.
After we complete the leader’s guide, we will create a page on our website dedicated to study group leaders. On this page, leaders will be able to access this guide and any other materials that we create for them.
To access this page, a study group leader will need to set up an account. These accounts will make it possible for us to know how many study group leaders are using our materials. It will also give us access to their email address so that we can reach out to them with additional information and encourage them to send us any ideas they have for improving the leader’s guide or any of our completed lessons.
Get User Feedback
In 2022, we completed Module 1 of our lessons for the Gospel of John, which covers the first five chapters of the gospel. This year we want to enlist at least five study groups to work through the lessons in this module and to provide us with feedback. This feedback will help us improve these lessons as well as all future lessons that we create.
We also want to do video interviews with users who provide positive feedback. Our goal is to create at least six interview recordings this year. We will then use these videos to create Facebook posts. We will also add them to our website’s User Feedback page. We believe these videos will help us enlist the support of major donors. They should also help us get other study groups to work through the lessons in Module 1.
Get Bible Scholar Feedback
In addition to getting user feedback concerning our lessons, we also want to have at least three Bible scholars to review at least one of our lessons this year and to give us their feedback. We believe the insights of such scholars can help us make the lessons even better. We will also be able to use any positive feedback we receive from credible scholars to help convince major donors and foundations to support our ministry.
Once we get a few scholars to review our lessons, it should be easier to get other scholars to review them and provide us with their feedback. Hopefully, we can eventually find one or more Bible scholars who will be willing to review all the lessons that we create. The scholars, who are willing to review our lessons, may also know students who would be interested in being part of our ministry. Developing this scholarly network could be very helpful once we raise the financial support needed to add new members to our staff.
Increase Facebook Followers
In the fall of 2022, we began creating posts for our Facebook page. Currently, we have 113 followers and our goal for 2023 is to increase this to 200 followers. The ultimate goal of having Facebook followers is to get them to go to our website and then to begin using the Bible study lessons that we have created. As we expand the number of followers, it should also expand the number of people who use our lessons.
Create Promotional Materials
In 2022, we created a flyer to give to the small group leaders at Keystone Church in Saline, Michigan. In 2023, we want to create additional flyers and promotional materials that can be used to recruit study groups to use our Bible study lessons. We plan to create a page on our website where we will post these promotional materials so that anyone can access them. If a study group leader discovers our lessons and wants to convince his group to use them, the leader can then download any of these materials and share them with their group.
Build Financial Support
Our financial support goal for 2023 is to raise $40,000, which would cover most of our projected expenses. We would like to have 10 major donors with a major donor being someone who donates between $2,000 and $5,000.
Long-Term Goals
In addition to the goals for 2023, we also have the following long-term goals:
Increase Financial Support
While our current financial goal is to raise enough money to meet most of our annual expenses, our long-term goal is to raise enough money so that we can add members to our team. We need to add team members so that we can increase the number of lessons that we create each year. Ideally, we would like to create 2 modules each year with each module containing 6 or 7 Bible study lessons.
When a study group begins to study a book of the Bible, we want them to be able to complete the study of the entire book without having to wait for us to complete the next module. Once we are able to create two modules each year, a study group should never have to interrupt their study because the next module is not complete.
To raise the financial support needed to add team members, we will have to find major donors who believe our ministry is effectively addressing the problem of biblical illiteracy. These donors could be individuals or foundations. Eventually, when we have completed enough lessons and have enough people using them, we should then be able to support our ministry primarily through small individual donations.
Add Team Members
Once we have significantly increased our financial support, we will be able to add members to our team. We would like to have a development team with at least four members. Two or more team members would focus on determining the correct interpretation of the text for each Bible study lesson. They would then create a detailed blueprint for each study including the content for the homework, teaching, and application sections.
Another team member would take the blueprint created by the other team members and use it to configure each eLearning Bible study lesson. As each lesson is being created, other members of the team would thoroughly test it to make sure everything is working correctly.
Develop Bible Study Lessons for Additional Books of the Bible
We are currently creating Bible study lessons for the Gospel of John. In the future, we want to create lessons for Genesis, Romans, Isaiah, and Revelation. We believe these books provide a good introduction to the Bible and a solid foundation for further study of the Bible. They also expose the user to several of the important genres that are used in the Bible. When we finish creating lessons for these books of the Bible, we would then continue to develop lessons for other books of the Bible.
Update Existing Lessons
In addition to creating new Bible study lessons, we also want to update the lessons we have already created. For example, we want to increase the quality of the audio in the lessons. Currently, we do all the audio recording in-house, but we would like to have it done professionally. We believe using a professional voiceover actor to create our audio will definitely enhance the quality of the lessons.
We also have a long list of other updates we would like to make to the lessons in Module 1, but since most of these updates are cosmetic, we do not consider them to be a high priority at this time. In addition to this list of updates, we plan to update our existing lessons based on user feedback, insights that we discover, and advances in technology. We will gather these ideas for updating our lessons, and then in the future implement them when we think they will significantly improve a lesson.
Increase Lesson Accessibility
The lessons we have created are not accessible to the hearing impaired or to anyone who is not fluent in English. The software we use to create the lessons include the ability to make them accessible to the hearing impaired. We would like to add this functionality to the lessons in the near future.
Eventually, we would also like to localize the lessons. Localization involves translating the text and audio into other languages. It also involves modifying the lessons so that they communicate clearly in the end-user’s culture. Localization is a major undertaking, but it is definitely something we would like to do, especially for languages that are spoken by significantly large numbers of people.