Its been a good, hard, long, joyous, and trying 2012 for so many people. Given that we’ve been good at looking at a few set items, let’s take a look at a few of these and see how we’ve kept to those resolutions, and what that means for MMM and mobile ministry (#mobmin) going forward.

Resolution #1: An app is not a strategy
It sounds like a statement more than a resolution, but given the impulse that many have had towards mobile, its a resolve more than anything else. Many of those coming up to speed with mobile, either through acquiring a mobile device or being astounded at the number of mobile worldwide really have had a challenge of where to start with mobile. Unfortunately, that start has been with the perspective of smartphones and applications. Which is good in part, but so small towards the rest of the picture of mobile, that we made this stance with the hope of helping folks know the entire picture of mobile/mobile ministry.

Were we successful? Possibly. At the same time, such a stance is something that gets proved over time. Which is what we hoped with many of this year’s presentations. It was only the first one, perhaps the other resolutions better prove or disown us from such positions.

Resolution #2: Specifically Define Mobile in Education
We started off this year at making a point to not just define what mobile ministry looks like, but make sure that the focus wasn’t just on the technology, but on how its used to engage, empower, and transform people/communities. Essentially, what does mobile ministry look like when the context is education (and to some extent, discipleship).

I think we’ve got a bit of a road ahead of us, and not just MMM but all who do mobile ministry, in making that point clear. Yes, its clear that there are some advancing processes and lessons in mobile ministry developing, but how these are influencing, changing, and even challenging educational constructs is still unclear and not well defined. We’ll see movement on this front in 2013 with the lessons learned from initiatives like the Mobile Ministry Course and others to be announced in the coming months.

Concerning these two areas, what has mobile ministry opened, closed, revealed, or challenged for you in 2012? Does it matter that the visibility of this space has grown such that these count? Or, is there something more to be done and uncovered?

That’s just two of five. Stay tuned as we look to point out what we’ve done with the other 2012 resolutions in the next article.