Prayer, Evangelism and Worship

So we face the inevitable - online worship!  Your people are in agreement to do online worship service but will they really worship and at best serve?  Here are some ideas on how to prepare your church to worship and serve during the online worship service. TECHNOLOGY  Meaningful worship exalts God through His word, prayer, service, and fellowship.  A pastor can check the first two with ease, but the last two might be a challenge.  That is why I like FB messenger, Google Hangout, Skype and Zoom.  They facilitate an interaction that FB Live might fall short from.  However, FB Live has real-time comments that might just do the trick. PREPARATION  Not all of your congregants are techy.  So what do you do?  Prepare your people before Sunday.  Teach them how to use their smartphones, download the apps or use a computer.  If that is too much, ask their 2nd grader to help them out.   Finally, post these advice days before the event. PARTICIPATION  As noted ab

It may be a new norm but doing online worship doesn't have to be an unusual experience.   As your leaders try to put together online worship for your church.  Remember these four principles. Homogenize By definition, it means the "same likeness".  The idea is that whatever your congregation sees, try to come as close to what they usually would see.  That could be the face of the pastor to the face of the worship leader or the background of the church or a slide showing the church.  The order of worship and perks and quirks that come along with live worship. Contextualize You can't really attain the same experience with live worship so contextualize it.  Maybe you don't have to do the whole 45-minute sermon.  How about your offering?  Can't pass the bucket so figure out if you need to do an online giving, a deacon passing by this week to collect or just simply mailing it to the church.   Have you ever thought of a direct deposit?  Personalize You