About

Short-Third-Person

Josh Burns is a video production & communications assistant at Park Community Church in Chicago, IL. He has several years of experience in video, and new media production. He also has a passion to see these mediums implemented within the church in order to better communicate the gospel. Here at JoshBurns.net you will find his thoughts on all things involving media and communications in church.

Long-First-Person

I am currently serving as a video production & communications assistant at Park Community Church, a faith community that is committed to reaching the city of Chicago for Christ. I believe in order to better reach the people of this city we must use the mediums that are available to us, and that others are using as well, whether that be, the internet, video, print, etc. So this is part of my job at Park.

So how did I get started?

I started shooting and editing video when I was in middle school. I used a handycam and Windows Movie Maker (everyone has to start somewhere). I quickly maxed out the potential of Windows Movie Maker, and I bought my first Macintosh in my senior year of high school, and I loaded it with Final Cut Pro editing software, and it was all downhill from there.

Throughout these years I started to volunteer and serve in my youth group at Church (Calvary Baptist Church), overseeing audio & video, and creating videos with a friend for different youth group events. From there I realized that my passion for media & communications could and should be used in the church.

All while this is happening I decided to pursue my other passion in life, sports. I was studying Sports Ministry at Moody Bible Institute. Sports have always been a huge part of my life. From the age of 4 I have played organized soccer, and I played at Moody for 4 years. I have always had these two passions in my life (sports & media), and it has always been a struggle to balance them. I realized about 3 years into my career at Moody that I needed to pursue my passion for media & communications more.

While serving at Calvary I saw many mistakes made, and much money squandered on media. This caused me to propose a couple new things that I thought I needed to be implemented into Calvary’s communications strategy. Little did I know this would lead to them hiring for a summer to do communications consultant work, which actually spring-boarded me to where I am today. I was able to gain quite a bit of knowledge and insight into what it takes to actually work in a church.

Following that summer I came back to Chicago reenergized and more equipped to pursue church media & communications as a career. I had attended Park Community Church for 3 years and served as a media volunteer there. Through some connections with Tim Schraeder and Jason Widney, God blessed me with a job at Park upon graduation from Moody.

And that brings me to today. I have been working there for 3 months. I have learned so much, and I am looking forward to learning even more about church media & communications.

I love living in the city of Chicago, and I love Park’s passion for reaching this city.

I love riding my bike along lakeshore, drinking tea with friends (you like any good teas? let me know), and relaxing in coffeeshops.

Wanna contact me? Email me at jkburns (at) gmail (dot) com