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Web-Empowered Ministry

Connecting with People through Websites, Social Media, and More

Abingdon Press

Getting Started

Getting past the excuses and setting out to web empower your mission

Wow! I am excited! A website opens up so many possibilities for our church. And, as a person who loves to play with computers, I can't imagine anything more fun than doing computer stuff for the Kingdom. It is a match made in heaven. This is going to be awesome!

With these thoughts in mind, I practically skipped into the office of the director of communications at our church to tell him my exciting plans for creating an internet ministry for our church. He told me that although it sounded interesting, someone else had already been working on it, and he suggested that I might be able to help after that person got it started. I needed to wait, which was not fun, but at least I knew I would still get to work on the website. So I waited for a few months and exchanged emails now and then to monitor the apparent lack of progress. I also took that time to learn more about building church websites because I really had no clue how to do it. I had never even created a webpage. After I sent multiple emails and made a couple more visits, it became clear to me that having a church website was far from a priority at our church. After all, our church had been around for more than one hundred years without a website. Although our communications ministry did not come out and say it, the feeling was that although a website is a good thing, other ministries are much more important. To me, the future possibilities for web ministry seemed endless and had the potential to amplify the impact of most all the other ministries in the church. To our communications ministry, at best, a website was good as long as it did not take significant time away from the other ministry activities.

I prayed often and continued reading and learning. Then I did something that might not serve as wise advice for you. I decided to build our website myself, without any help from the church. I found a church brochure and typed it into my computer. I scanned the church logo from the brochure and spent hours trying to doctor it up so it didn't look like I scanned it from the brochure. For that time and my skill level, the website looked OK, though I'd be embarrassed to show it to you now. I then met again with the director of communications. I told him I had created the initial website on my own and was about to register Ginghamsburg.org and post the website. I needed to know if the church was with me. The good news is that he chose to be with me and, in fact, helped me build a team to start the CyberMinistry. Neither of us knew the impact our website would have. Over the years, our church has become increasingly web empowered and has expanded to use additional web technologies (podcasting, blogging, social networking, instant messaging, phone apps, and so on) to the point that few ministry activities happen without some sort of web component. We are a web-empowered church and would not think of doing church any other way.

Perhaps you feel the same as I once did. You may be a pastor, a staff member, or (like I was) an unpaid church attendee attempting to help and serve. You see the critical need and amazing potential for web ministry, yet the decision makers, partners, and content providers see it as low priority or even a hassle. From my experience, I have learned that most of these people are busy with important ministry activities they understand well and that their knowledge of internet ministry is limited. This is a difficult combination to overcome. They might even be tech savvy and skilled internet users, but doing ministry with web technology is foreign to them. As one pastor told me, "They don't teach this stuff in seminary." And that is probably true for most pastors today. So, first, it is important to help educate your future partners in web ministry on this exciting opportunity to expand your ministry impact. Second, it is vital to be prayerfully and respectfully persistent. Unlike many other ministries, internet ministry is not easily accepted by everyone. Most other ministries in the church have been around for hundreds of years. Using the internet to expand and conduct ministry is often new and unknown, or even scary. But we must persist, even when we are not understood or fully supported. Please don't let naysayers stop you. The opportunity is too important. And it is really fun, too.

Internet Ministry Power

The internet is a powerful communications tool that you can use to dramatically increase the impact of your ministries. As you will learn throughout this book, most of the ministries in your church can be web empowered in some way to improve effectiveness and efficiency. With the internet, you can:

1. improve your church's communication quickly, easily, and inexpensively;

2. empower lay volunteers for active participation;

3. minister to people at any time and in any place;

4. connect people in caring community;

5. allow your sermons, devotions, and Bible studies to continue to minister for years to come; and

6. expand your ministry to reach people around the world.

It is time for us to fully harness the power of the internet for the kingdom of God. The result is likely to exceed your expectations and maybe mine, too. For example, we decided to put our church's sermons online. We began by recording, transcribing, editing, and then posting the sermon text and presentation graphics on our church website. Some months later, we were reviewing the website statistics provided by our hosting company. Among other things, website statistics can show the location of the internet service providers for the people who browse a website. As we examined the statistics, we were surprised to see that people were viewing our sermons from most every state in the union and from approximately twenty-five other countries. Wow, what a God moment! This surprise gave us our first glimpse of what might be possible through internet ministry. Now we commonly get visitors from more than eighty different countries each month, and thousands of people view our sermons each week. In fact, we estimate that more people view our sermons online than the 4,000-plus who hear them at our church each week. The web has allowed a church located in a rural, hundred-acre cornfield in Tipp City, Ohio, to minister to thousands of people all around the world. The same ministry power of the internet is available to your organization as well.

This book is based mainly on our church's practical experiences with the initiation and development of the main Ginghamsburg Church website (www.Ginghamsburg.org) and a few smaller websites created for our other ministries. Our main website went online in January 1997. The website continues to grow several pages every day. Most of the size is due to our posting online sermons, devotions, and Bible studies. The website also includes multiple years' worth of weekly sermons in video and audio format. Now the entire website occupies more than eighty gigabytes of disk space and receives more than fifty thousand visits each month. We also have many visitors who receive emails and text messages from our internet ministry. These statistics make Ginghamsburg.org one of the more visited "local church" websites in the world.

In this book, I'd like to share with you some of what we on the CyberMinistry team at Ginghamsburg have learned on our journey to create this exciting ministry, and also while working with other exciting web ministries around the world. You may be feeling intimidated or overwhelmed, but this book is made for organizations with limited time, limited funds, and limited experience. That's where we came from, too. When our CyberMinistry started, we weren't professional web developers. We were unpaid church attendees with busy lives and fulltime non-web-related day jobs. We didn't hire a company or consultant to help us. When our website went live, our church budget for this ministry was about $25 per month. We learned on our own, making plenty of mistakes along the way. Even with the mistakes, we created a powerful internet ministry; you can create one, too.

Ten Excuses for Why Organizations Don't Have Web Ministries

Even as the internet has grown in popularity and importance in daily life, many churches and other Christian organizations remain hesitant to start a real internet ministry. Fortunately, most organizations now understand the need for at least an informational website. That is helpful, but it is a bit like driving a car around and never taking it out of first gear. It helps some, but it is far from utilizing its full potential. Below are ten common reasons cited for not having a web ministry. Each excuse includes a response that may be helpful to you as you advocate for and educate the organization's leaders about internet ministry.

1. We Don't Need to Do Ministry Online.

It is correct that our churches and Christian organizations do not need web ministries to function. But they do need web ministries to be more effective and to reach more people, which we all should want to do according to our missions and capabilities. God has allowed us access to this powerful communication tool, so we should apply it appropriately to enhance our mission. Just as Jesus stood in a boat or on a hillside to help people see and hear him better, we should use available resources to help others see God and hear God speak and minister through our organizations.

Also, since the internet has become an integral part of life for many people, they now expect organizations to have websites. In most cases, not having at least a simple website is like not listing your organization in the telephone book or not having a sign in front of your building. We commonly hear from people whose first exposure to our church was through our church's website. More people every day look to the internet as their primary source of all information, and that includes looking for a church. Your website is quite likely the first view people will have of your organization and should give them a taste of what they can expect when they visit.

Here is one example: A husband and wife were making plans to move to Ohio. As they searched the web for information on communities and churches, they found our church website. Based on the information and features on our website, they made the decision to move into our area just so they could attend our church. We assumed that they initially read the basic information about our church that should be on any church website- location, worship times, pastor's biography, and so on. But they told us that, instead of these, they began looking at our ministry features. They began viewing our video sermons each week and digging deeper. They also saw event information, prayer requests, Bible studies, and daily devotions. By the time they arrived at the door of our church, many of the common barriers that newcomers face in assimilating into the church were gone. Participating in our church online made them feel as though they had already attended our church even before they arrived in our area. It was the online ministry that ministered to them and led them to attend in person.

2. The Internet Is Filled with Sin.

For many people, the issue is fear of the unknown and the dark side of the internet. Through newspapers and television, we hear of an internet filled with pornography, hate groups, computer viruses, spam, and scams. Sin abounds on the public internet just as it does in other forms of public communication. The sin and evil found on the internet are all the more reason for every church to have a website. Jesus hung out with those who sinned and who did not believe. Each church should be where the needy people are found. We want our web ministry to be right in the midst of the sin-filled websites that we hear about. For example, we want our church webpages intermingled with links to the sin-filled webpages because people who go to an internet search engine looking for meaning or answers or fun will perhaps click our website link instead of others. We ought to be where people in need are, and many of them are on the internet.

3. It's Just Not Our Thing.

Clearly, not every church is called to produce a huge, fully web-empowered online ministry. Some organizations are called to transport hundreds of children to church in a bus ministry; others to set up a large shelter for the homeless; others to set up mission trips; and others to help young, unwed mothers. Different organizations are called to different missions based on their gifts and resources as well as the people they serve. I conducted web-ministry training in North Carolina, and afterward a pastor came up to me. He told me they have no indoor bathroom at his church and only recently got electricity to their building. Based on his situation and the people he serves, we both agreed that the bathroom was far more important than a website at this point. I was also blessed to correspond via email with a pastor in Africa. None of the people he serves have a computer or internet access. But, in my view, his ministry is web empowered. He has internet access and uses the internet to learn and grow in Bible knowledge and leadership. He also uses the internet to communicate with mission groups who come to his community to serve. These situations are less common circumstances for those reading this book; however, they do illustrate and remind us that we should use internet features when and where they fit. For most of you, a website is essential, and a web ministry is valuable.

4. We Can't Keep the Website Up-to-Date.

Far too often, I hear things like, "We created our website a long time ago, but it is totally out of date and we don't look at it," or "The person who built the website left the church and we can't even change it." I have literally seen Christmas Eve announcements on church websites many months after Christmas. Not good. Unfortunately, if the website is online, people have probably looked at it; and they may have been turned off or misled by it. The only thing worse than not having a church website is having a website that is obviously out of date. An incorrect website is not only misleading, it is a negative reflection on your organization. One key point to remember when creating a web ministry is that a web ministry is not a project to be completed. Instead, it is an ongoing ministry that requires attention and commitment-just like other forms of communication and other ministries. If your website is not up-to-date, then your organization is missing a ministry opportunity. And ministry opportunities matter to us, to those we serve, and to God.

5. The Internet Is Only for the Rich.

Certainly there is a cost to owning a computer and to having internet access. More and more people have internet access at home, at work, or in public facilities such as libraries, but it is unlikely that everyone you serve has access, and some of those who do have access may have poorly equipped computers or slow internet connections. To help people without internet access, we added kiosks at the church so people can visit our website there. Perhaps a ministry opportunity exists in your organization to equip and train people to use computers and the internet.

In any case, it is wise to make important information available in both electronic and nonelectronic formats. This allows people without easy internet access or people who prefer or need paper versions to receive the information. For example, our church has offered our newsletter in both electronic format (by email) and paper format. We asked that people volunteer to receive only the electronic copy; otherwise, they received a paper copy.

6. It's Too Expensive to Maintain a Web Ministry.

Of all the ministries in the church, an internet ministry is usually one of the most cost effective. The internet gives your organization access to the world. The potential of internet ministry is huge. To have a web ministry, you don't need expensive internet connections or the latest computers. You may be able to use free services for some features, host your website for free or at a reduced rate with a local hosting company, or use your denomination's hosting services. Otherwise, for most organizations, you can usually purchase hosting from a web hosting company for less than $30 per month. In most cases, the computers and internet connection you have access to are sufficient to create a web ministry. Internet ministry is worth the modest cost, and it can save money in reduced printing and mailing costs. In fact, our church can host its website for a year for less than the cost of one major printing and the postage to mail it. Finally, before you halt efforts to create an internet ministry because your leadership is taking a long time to approve its funding, please consider funding it yourself or in partnership with others who know the possibilities. Before you let cost stop you, please consider the cost to your ministry impact.

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Excerpted from Web-Empowered Ministry by Mark M. Stephenson. Copyright © 2011 Mark M. Stephenson. Excerpted by permission of Abingdon Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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