I am a tech-loving guy, and when new technology rolls onto the market, I'm always interested to see how it will impact what I do and how I live. This week, I'm looking at the concept of video church. As it is presenting itself in the church world today, video church is essentially a multi-site duplicate of a central, main campus.
The best known video church in America is LifeChurch.tv, which has a dozen physical locations (a thirteenth will be added soon) in five different states, and a virtual, Internet campus. Pastor Craig Groeschel heads up this tech-savvy church that has used technology in ways that no one dreamt possible a decade ago. And, this church gets results, lots of them. LifeChurch.tv has used the multi-site, video strategy to reach tens of thousands more people for Jesus than a single campus could ever reach.
I point to LifeChurch.tv as probably the best example of video church in America today. They are the standard bearer.
But, one of the biggest arguments against video church is that video campuses prevent churches, or at least inhibits them, from developing and sending new pastors out into their communities. Yesterday, I quoted from this article with Rob Bell, one of the most innovative pastors in our country today. He isn't keen on video campuses, and in regards to the video vs. sending-them-out argument, he offers,
There is something more powerful than simply beaming yourself into other
locations, and that is raising up disciples. Over time that will go farther and
faster, but right now it will be more work and slower. With technology today
it's easy to spend all of your energies reproducing your own voice, but there is
a longer view that says, what if instead of beaming video to those ten
locations, we train ten people who can go there and lead? That's a very basic
question that should be in the mix somewhere.
And, that is a very valid point that needs to be discussed. It also goes back to the point yesterday that we don't yet know what the long-term impact of video campuses will be on the church.
I think in the end we will discover that both points of view are correct, and a church that does video campuses should also send out disciples to start new churches in their communities. I believe there are instances when a video campus would be better suited for a community, and there are situations where sending out new pastors will be the better option. Churches need to be open to both possibilities.
Tell me what you think. Tomorrow, I'll present an idea for video churches that I believe would be a winner, but it will take some guts and lots of patience.
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