BLOG 2024
SEPTEMBER 2024 | BLOG
Q&A w/ M.King: A Little Can Go Far
In this Q&A with M.King, we talk with M.King about the donation that was given to "United Food Bank" and how he believes, as Christians, we've been called to do more in our community by using the little things God has given us.
Just recently, you filmed Motivate 2024. How do you think the event went, and what do you think people gained?
M.King: To be honest with you, I think the event went well. I think people were blessed by it, I think God used and will continue to use the event to bless countless lives.
You know, when it comes down to it, this year's event theme was Soar. I talked about Elisha and Gehazi, I talked about how everyone can soar, but there are different things you have to go through to get there, and so at the end of the day, I think people got something out of it, and I think people are going to continue to be blessed by it.
For this year's event, the decision was made to donate to United Food Bank. What brought that on?
M.King: You know in years past we've done Taco Bell. We bought Taco Bell for people. We paid for people's food at Village Inn. We paid for people's food at Chick-fil-A. We bought tons of food and hydration packets for migrants coming into the country. This year I felt led by God to partner with the United Food Bank and donate through them to provide 400 meals. So I think it's funny. It seems like every year we do something involving food, and honestly, it's funny how even God recognizes that, and so this year kind of fits the motif.
You know, when it comes down to our giving, what do you think people need to remember when it comes to being a blessing to others and doing what God is calling them to do with what they have in their hands?
M.King: You know I think people really need to come to the understanding that one giving is not about you I understand that maybe you don't have a lot of money or funds right now but it's tough to comprehend this but that's the best time to give when you think about the widows might she gave out of her little but in God's kingdom she has an abundance when you think about people who lost their children in the Bible they came to the people of God and in their lack they gave everything they had emotionally right and God ended up raising their children from the dead when you think about the woman with the issue of blood right she had given everything but when she came to the Lord that's when she got everything returned to her so a lot of times when you don't have a whole lot you have to understand that the only way you're going to get from God is by giving to God right it's just like in this ministry we have to understand that sometimes we're called to make a giving and not a living and I think we all have to realize that
AUGUST 2024 | BLOG
Q&A w/ M.King: The 11th Ministry Season Comes to an End
In this Q&A with M.King we sit down and talk with M.King about the 11th ministry season what's taking place that he liked, what's taking place that he didn't like, and just what he sees for the 12th ministry season as we move forward into September 2024.
For most of 2023, you celebrated the 10th anniversary of M.King Media it seems that most of this year we've been I would say moving on from that anniversary and preparing for the next decade?
M.King: I never imagined 2023 would be the end of that first decade. It's funny how you look back and don't realize that you're celebrating the end of something. I don't think I ever imagined that this year the 11th ministry season was about changing our perspective and changing our focus. When I say that, I mean we spent, almost half of the ministry season focusing on operations behind the scenes, going from changing up the website and the language of the website to focusing on operations, changing from a more media-centric focus to a more nonprofit-centric focus, and creating a new web look. Right now, we're remodeling our store. Right now, we're looking for ways to reach out to the public and bring them closer to Christ while bringing in more income. It's interesting to see how God has shown us how to remodel the organization to help us move forward, and because of that it doesn't, put less of a fire in me; it puts more of a fire in me.
So now when you look back at the 11th ministry season what are you most proud of, what are you thanking God for behind the scenes?
M.King: You know, honest to goodness, I think when I look back on this ministry season, it's not like the 10th anniversary ministry season. This ministry season is different because I think I am thanking God for the ability to step back. I'm getting to know when to say. At the end of 2023, I started doing "Cross First News" in early winter, and God pushed me to my limit, because of that I didn't make any real media productions for a few months, but during that time God was able to have me step back and free my mind up to focus on the operations, so for that I'm thankful. Believe it or not, I'm very thankful.
So naturally when you look back at this 11th ministry season what's something that happened that you almost wish didn't happen?
M.King: One thing that caught me off guard was the computer blackout at the end of July on the 26th. It was funny because God forewarned me to start saving everything in the cloud and to try to get everything off that computer. While it ended up no longer working and technically went out because of the power button, God still made a way for me to step back and reevaluate things. It doesn't mean that everything went the way I would have hoped.
I'm currently uploading all of our videos into the cloud, and we finally got all our pictures uploaded. I'm having to go back in and redo the lower thirds graphics we had in our video editing software because everything that I thought was saved wasn't saved, in the end, it was something that happened and it was an inconvenience but at the end of the day I'm thankful for it. It gave me perspective and helped me sit back and understand that God is in control and while we got everything back and there was some time I was concerned, it has helped me to sit back and understand that for God to make all things new, all things old have to go.
JULY 2024 | BLOG
Q&A w/ M.King: M.King Media Was Temporarily in the Dark
This Q&A with M.King will talk about an unfortunate event in July that left M.King Media temporarily in the dark.
What just recently happened on July 26th that many people won't believe?
M.King: Well, I'll start the day before... July 25th. I found myself coming home from work trying to get on to my laptop, and the power button on my laptop was getting harder and harder to push, and this only happened within two or three days before the 25th. Well Lord and behold, on the 25th, I couldn't turn on my laptop and work on any media. On the 26th of July, which was a Friday, I had to buy a brand new laptop, and that meant our archives with photos and videos were still on the old laptop.
You mean to tell, me that your laptop died and there was no way for you to access projects and things that you had to do?
M.King: So it's funny, how God is because he was putting on my heart to start focusing on moving a lot of the major things over to the cloud, and bless God, we were able to get everything but the photos and videos, and the majority of what we do is photos and videos, so yeah, I didn't have access to a lot of the important stuff that I need.
So for you, how did that make you feel? I'm sure you must have felt a sense of helplessness.
M.King: I feel like helpless is an understatement, not only did I have to hear the fact that they couldn't fix my laptop because of the power button, then I had to go buy a new laptop, so it was a blessing in disguise because I had great people help me, but it was a moment where you're leaning on God, and even after the 26th after I got the laptop, I still had to lean on God because they had to transfer all the photos and videos from the laptop's motherboard into a hard drive so I could have access to it.
So I'm sure you have certainly gone through it trying to make sure projects stay on schedule and everything, so how are things looking now?
M.King: To be honest with you, when you go through the storm and you haven't had a lot of rain and you come out and you smell the air, the air smells clean. All I can say is that God is cleaning things up. He is giving me a fresh new laptop. Crystal-clear pages are loading faster. There are certain websites that I was having trouble with because of the website, It was the old laptop that I was using. So it's been a blessing in disguise, and I'm thankful for it.
JUNE 2024 | BLOG
Q&A w/ M.King: A New Platform For the Future
In this Q&A with M.King, we talk with M.King about God answering his prayer for ministry growth.
So when you prayed for growth, God gave you an answer you didn't see coming?
M.King: You know He did. It's interesting how we don't think about God answering our prayers until we have the answer, but what if God answered your prayer before you knew you needed the answer? For me, this involves running M.King Media daily. I have to keep tabs on many tasks and projects, and lately, I have been falling behind. So what intrigues me is that God directed me to start using a project management platform I heard about in August of 2023 while volunteering at church.
So what's the difference between the old way of tracking projects and the new platform you're using?
M.King: So the old way was me using a notepad to track everything, and for me, it made sense for such a long time, but it's funny how looking back at it now, it didn't give me the same big-picture perspective as the new platform does.
Now, with the new platform, which I'm still learning, I'm able to track different projects, as far as admin, operations, media projects, and even fundraising projects. It lets me see how many days until it's due; the new platform allows me to see all the plates I'm spinning at one time, unlike a notepad pad; and the coolest thing is that on our "project board," I can add different columns to fit my style of planning. It's something I wish I had had years ago.
So as M.King Media begins to move forward what's on the horizon, what is in the works?
M.King: Honestly, at the end of the day, I always saw God allowing me to go full-time into M.King Media by giving me the finances to do so, but little did I know this was the first real and important step in going full-time. I'm excited to see what God is going to do as we continue to embrace his will as he takes us into the next decade and continues to answer our prayers, even if it doesn't look like the answer we were looking for.
MAY 2024 | BLOG
Q&A w/ M.King: 11 Years of M.King Media
In this Q&A with M.King, we talk with M.King about M.King Media marking and celebrating its 11th birthday.
How does it feel to mark the 11th birthday of M.King Media?
M.King: Almost surreal, it's hard to believe that 5 months ago we wrapped up celebrating our 10th Anniversary, and here we are now celebrating our 11th birthday. I guess it goes to show you just how God is, how when you focus on what God is calling you to do and not so focused on meeting deadline after deadline, time can get away from you meeting God's deadlines instead of man-made ones.
So when you look at M.King Media marking its 11th birthday what's different about this year compared to last year?
M.King: This year I feel like we've been focusing more on the operation side. Last year by May 20th I think we were looking back at what God has done and celebrating what God can do, this year with our 11th ministry season we're focusing on what God can do but, we're putting actions behind words. We've been working more on our website, we've been working more on our website language, we're working on a few projects behind the scenes and I think it's been weird for me because I'm used to just pumping out media media media media media media media but, now God is like "hey let's take a step back and do fewer media and do more behind the scenes upgrades and maintenance so, I kind of think it's almost like a remodel in the works.
So as M.King Media begins to move forward what's on the horizon, what is in the works?
M.King: Well I can tell you for a fact, one of the things we have in the works is we are trying to wrap our head around how to bring in more income. Last year we spent a little over $7,000 running just the base operations of M.King Media and people might say that's not a whole lot of money but, again you have to remember I'm scraping money together to make this stuff happen. When you're doing that as well as trying to pay your bills personally that's a bit much and I'm not a wealthy man by any means.
So to try to increase our donations we are doing 2 projects. The first is updating our store to sell M.King Media branded items, from our logo to our title card, and even specialty stores during Easter and Christmas, we want to truly remodel our store to better fit our mission. The second thing we are doing is launching a photo project called "The Heavens Declare the Glory". The idea behind this project is to sell 24x36 exclusive framed photos that I have taken to people on social media. We'll start on Facebook Marketplace and go from there.
Note: Both projects will start in the Summer of 2024.
APRIL 2024 | BLOG
Q&A w/ M.King: A Better Brand Experience
In this Q&A with M King, we go behind the scenes and talk about what's going on operations-wise. This month we're going to talk about how M.King is studying and doing research to improve the brand that is M.King Media
So, for those who don't quite understand the definition of a brand, can you elaborate on that?
M.King: Well I think first and foremost to understand what a brand is we have to understand that a lot of people think a brand is just a logo right I think one of the things that I've had to learn is that a brand is very much an experience it's not just something that you see when you hit an organization's website it's also something that you see that's kind of behind the scenes right like we're doing Disney and Publix we're studying both of these brands to understand just how they do what they do. We're studying Disney because they are great at storytelling everything, they do all the stories they tell to captivate people. We're studying Publix because they are a brand I grew up with and their slogan for a little over 50 years give or take has always been “Where shopping is a pleasure” and I literally must tell ya I agree with that 100%.
In the end, I wanted to do research into two brands that I felt could help push M.King Media INC. into the next decade and help us become more of what God wants us to be and believe it or not, just because these two organizations are secular doesn't mean they're not applying principles that we can't use.
So one of the brands you mentioned was Disney, can you share with us what you learned doing research?
M.King: One of the things I learned is that Disney is not selling products but selling ideas. When they sell an idea then they sell countless products, for example when Disney talks about their resorts they don't talk about “ ride this ride, ride that ride”, see fireworks they talk about how it's going to make you feel, they show pictures of people laughing and they sell the emotion of being at a Disney Park. So, for me doing M.King Media I think that's something that I've always been challenged with, trying not to sell our media.
As we grow as a nonprofit organization, I need to sell the emotion, the joy of the Lord, the happiness, and the feeling you can overcome. That's what we're trying to bring to the table and promote and get people to see our media, so that's something I learned from Disney.
So, for those out there reading this wondering why this is so important to this nonprofit that just got through marking its 10th anniversary, what would you say to them?
M.King: You know I would say that it's important that we focus on not only what we offer but how we offer it to people. Don't quote me on this, but I think it’s said that people don't focus on what you said but on how you made them feel. I know that can be hard for us as believers because we know the word of God, it's just hard to show it to people and get them to feel the way God wants them to feel.
It's not always about feeling, but it's important to relate to the public and how we can help them feel the way God wants them to feel. Coming out of depression into peace, coming out of financial worry into this feeling of being financially ready. It can be hard for people to understand that God wants them to have success, but I think what we must understand is that godly success is not always money, it's not always about having everything you want. At the end of the day, I think this brand strategy is going to help our ministry project what God wants us to project and that's helping to use our media to prove that just as the heavens declare the glory of the Lord, the creativity God gives us can do the same and influence people in the process.
Note: M.King Media's brand research project should be done come the summer of 2024
MARCH 2024 | BLOG
Q&A w/ M.King: Lets Meet at the Cross
This Q&A, with M.King talks about his latest animated story being produced Meet Me at the Cross, and goes behind the scenes to tell us the story behind the story.
So what made you want to create an animated story called Meet Me at the Cross?
M.King: You know living in this day and time, where the cross is seldom looked to, I wanted to remind viewers that the cross still has meaning, sometimes (I feel) the best way to convey that is to look at things from a more personable perspective, not a condemning perspective (I.e. you need to do this and that x y z).
So your approach to this story, what were you going for, when you started crafting the narrative for this production?
M.King: When I started crafting this story I wanted to do a more old-timey narrative. During the process, I envisioned a Southern Baptist church (where my grandmother went when I was growing up) and I envisioned a male (or female) going up and simply telling a poem if you will about the good times in life and how the enemy can come against us and how we have to meet at the cross.
So the artwork you created, what was the idea behind that image?
M.King: So with the artwork, one side is a calm cool beach, and the other is a hot active volcano. My idea behind this artwork was to create an image to show the viewer that the cross can either push back the darkness and hold us in the light, or draw us from the darkness into His marvelous light but, through it all the cross is always there.
Note: Meet Me at the Cross will debut in May 2024
FEBRUARY 2024 | BLOG
Q&A w/ M.King: A Media Initiative for St. Patrick's Day
During this Q&A with M.King, we talked with M.King about the media initiative being launched in March to celebrate St Patrick's Day
So this March is St Patrick's Day, this year M King Media is launching a media initiative for people to enjoy a past media project?
M.King: Yes, well as some people may know who've been with our ministry for a while, back in 2021 we did a mini-documentary on St Patrick. For a while it was free and for some time on our website it's been behind a paywall, well for March in honor of St. Patrick's Day, I would like to release it to the public for free, to enjoy and learn about the incredible life and faith that St. Patrick lived out.
So what prompted you to do this special initiative for St. Patrick's Day?
M.King: Well, actually it was 2 things that prompted this media initiative. The 1st was that originally we were going to do this as a way to encourage those going through tough seasons in their walk of faith.
I felt impressed in my heart to do this because I just went through a season where I got in a car accident, spent a month looking for the car I now have, and for some time was dealing with my apartment complex to renew my lease, so all these things together really made me feel like I was under attack.
The 2nd thing was that we were gonna do another mini-documentary until we saw that another faith-based ministry was doing something similar for St Patrick's Day and that helped to inspire us to focus on St. Patrick as well.
Note: St Patrick: Patron Saint of the Irish is a 12-minute and 57-second mini-documentary. It will be free to stream from March 1st to the 17th.
JANUARY 2024 | BLOG
Q&A w/ M.King: Momentum to Move the Mission Forward
In this Q&A we talk with M.King about what was done to kick off 2024 and how it's helping to move M.King Media's mission forward
This year just started as a rough year for you but, it seems like there has been work going on behind the scenes to move the mission forward?
M.King: Well for starters yes the year has started off kind of rough. I unfortunately got in a car accident on the 23rd of January but, bless God I'm healing, it's not terrible terrible horrible pain it's just a little stiffness but, I'm healing. I have also been working on the website and getting it more focused on our cause and pulling the website away from our 10th Anniversary. One of the ways we're doing that is we're changing our video players to YouTube video players and, we're also really trying to get people more interested in what we do and how we do it by changing some website write-ups.
So with all these changes you're making do you feel like it's a noticeable change or do you feel like it's a significant change?
M.King: I feel like it's certainly a significant change because this is us really trying to say "hey we're a non-profit organization this is our cause". Up until now it was us really trying to emulate more streaming services and really trying to focus more on different projects but, I think now it's us trying to say "this is our cause and this is how it connects to the world and this is how you can join us".
Note: To enjoy the changes at M.King Media.com, simply head to the website and look on the homepage and media page.