I don’t think it is much of a secret that the sales of SUVs and pickup trucks are very low. What does surprise me is the Detroit didn’t see this coming. The pursuit of short term profits and ignoring the long term has put our domestic car makers in even more financial jeopardy.

Oil is a finite resource. Refining capacity in this country has been frozen for years and years. Guess what? The cost of gasoline is going to go up and up and up. Big surprise! An exception to the rule above is Southwest Airlines, who locked in jet fuel prices a while ago and are so far immune from the higher cost of fuel.

A direct consequence to this may be utilizing technology to do meetings and other gatherings online rather than burn more gasoline and jet fuel. Consumers are already buying more fuel efficient modes of transportation. Even I am contemplating a motorcycle. There are a growing number of software solutions to have online meetings and many them are reasonably prices. The price of a webcam is ridiculously low.

The church, who is traditionally slow to adopt new technologies, can do much to help itself by embracing these new meeting technologies. There will still be value in an occasional face to face meeting, but I believe as we get more comfortable with online meetings we will see the value of meeting face-to-face less valuable.