Assignment Title: Technology In The Church: What Do Lead Pastors Need To Know?
Course: CHMN 699 - Internship
Student: Kristine Sage
Date: January 29, 2022
Professor: Dr. Mary Smith
Liberty University
Benefits of Technology in the Church
Technology has a very broad definition and touches many different parts of your ministry. The rewards
are abundant, even when they are not obvious.
Growth among youth. Older people also use technology in smaller numbers than youth. More
on this below.
Streamlined services. Your worship leader can send the music to the band and singers with a
push of a button. Your congregation can give through an app, and you can use software to count
and report on it all.
Outreach among the elderly and disabled. Bringing bed-ridden church members into your
service through technology makes them feel as though they have not been forgotten.
Lower costs. Many older sound and lighting technologies are very inefficient compared to their
modern equivalents. You might pay a little more initially, but you will make up for it in savings
for electricity and maintenance costs.
Community impact. By maintaining an online presence, you can be sure that more people
within your community will be aware of church events, even if those people are not regular
members.
Member tracking and followup. The right software allows you to see who has open prayer
requests and follow up with them. You can also track giving and pledges while generating tax
documents.
Track church finances. Church technology tracks your own expenditures and incomes. Good
church finance software reveals those places where your church is losing money.
How to Plan For and Implement Technology in Your Church
If you haven’t started using technology to its fullest extent in your church, this section is going to help
you get started with a few pointers and suggestions.
Start small. Don’t try to do too much at once. It is easy to get overwhelmed when you try new
ideas, so take things one at a time.
Start cheap. I’m a musician, and the one thing I see new players do is buy thousands of dollars
of equipment before they even know if they like the instrument. A lot of your technological
needs will be the same. Once you have a solution that works, you can replace your inexpensive
technology with more expensive tech.
The cheapest you can get is free. In this article, I teach you how to start from nothing to a
working YouTube channel. If you use your smartphone as a camera, you can stream your next
service at no cost. Finding free solutions allows you to take more risks in finding the perfect
technology for your church.
Read the manual. I know it sounds silly, but I always read the manual when I get a new device.
Many cameras, microphones, sound boards, and other equipment have hidden features that are
not obvious. By taking a few minutes, you can turn a serviceable device into an amazing piece of
machinery.
Technology is not just hardware. Smartphone apps let people give, volunteer, and more. As I
said above, there is likely a software solution to the audio troubles for our live stream. In fact,
most of the hardware you will find yourself using requires software. Some devices can be
controlled by smartphone apps. Never overlook software.
Youth and Technology In The Church
It’s no secret that young people do better with current technology than older people. According to this
Pew Research poll, most Americans get their news from their devices with the younger generations
engaging almost exclusively through social media on their smartphones. So, what does that mean for
the church?
Simply, a church that is not actively growing through outreach among young people will eventually find
itself losing more and more members to death and disability as they age. Your church’s use of
technology could mean the difference between it existing twenty years from now or being yet another
that closes its doors for good.
A few tips for engaging with youth are:
Participate in appropriate internet trends. Examples from the past include the ice bucket
challenge, video game dances, and various memes.
Know where they are. Facebook tends to be used by older people these days. Young people are
on Twitch, TikTok, and Instagram. YouTube is a middle ground that catches a little bit of
everyone.
Cater your content toward them. This does not mean changing your entire Sunday service. Your
outreach videos, however, should be shorter and punchier. 5-10 minutes is all you need to make
an impact on the internet.
Be ok with always playing catch-up. I was very young when I became a youth pastor, and I was
learning pop culture references from the youths. That’s ok. They don’t expect their pastors to be
the coolest person ever if you try. They’ll respect the effort, usually.
Talk to them. Sometimes, the most helpful advice is the most obvious. The more youth that you
talk to, the more you will understand them and their needs. You can tailor your approach once
you do.
