How Widespread Are Video Sermons?

I saw a write-up about video sermons in yesterday’s newspaper. With the title “Growing Churches Opt for Tele-Communication,” writer Yonat Shimron describes the rapid rise in the Raleigh-Durham area of North Carolina of recording a pastor's message and then streaming live or hand-delivering it on a DVD to an ancillary site where it's played for a different audience. As she explains: “Though there are varying methods to the satellite concept, they share many of the same characteristics. Each satellite has a live praise and worship band and a local ‘campus pastor’ who makes announcements, leads in prayer and tends to the needs of the congregants throughout the week.”

So what’s new about that?

1. It’s becoming widely practiced, and I agree. “Over the past five years, nearly every megachurch” in the Raleigh-Durham triangle has gone to this teaching model, according to the article. So have many other churches.

2. It’s not limited to megachurches. The article tells of a recently launched church without a preaching pastor. Living Word Family Church, a non-denominational church in Wake Forest, is a congregation with about 1,000 people attending each Sunday. It opted to grow by duplication. When an older pastor in nearby Garner with strong ties to Living Word decided to retire, he turned over his congregation to the Wake Forest church. It became the Living Word South Campus. "I definitely think if Jesus was walking the earth today, he'd be using all this technology," said Steve Caronna, pastor of Living Word Family Church. "Jesus was the master storyteller and taught everything by illustration."

If you’re a multisite church, is that what your church is experiencing? Whether yes or no, please tell us by participating in our multisite survey now at http://tiny.cc/multisite2010 (and definitely before the survey closes on day’s end May 21). Thanks!

 

posted by Warren Bird, Ph.D., co-author with Geoff Surratt and Greg Ligon of Multi-Site Church Revolution and Multi-Site Church Roadtrip. Warren also blogs on Leadership Network’s Learnings and Books.

Comments

[Dave Baldwin]

I started in ministry back in 1975. That's when I graduated from seminary. Had a great seminary experience by the way at Denver Sem. I really started in ministry the summer of 1967 when I was on the staff at Camp of the Woods in the Adirondacks of NY. All I can say is what a privilege God has given me to live at this hinge point in church history. I've seen the transition from traditional to contemporary expressions of worship and ministry to now a technological revolution in making excellent God-honoring ministry available to so many more! Thank you God, and thank you Warren and others for making best practices in this next step forward in the Kingdom more accessible to us all.
Blessings,
Dave Baldwin