5 Online Trends for the Future of Faith
Thank you for those who attended my Internet Strategy: What does the gospel have to do with Social Media? at CWC/09. In this session we discussed several of the trends that we need to think through with Christian distinction. I appreciated your participation, thanks Tim Challies, Cynthia Ware, Dave Bourgeois, Kevin Ring, Rhett Smith, Paul Watson, DJ Chuang amongst others for your participation!
Here are five trends that as pastors, leaders and Christians you should be aware of and determine how you will speak about these:
1. Doing the Sacraments Online: Churches will begin to offer communion and baptism over the Internet. This will be done where individuals at home can dunk themselves into a bath tub (see picture) or while watching a screen joining with others to take communion (as suggested by this Cyber-Church website or this one on Receiving Online Internet Holy Communion) “In order to celebrat (sic) the Lord’s Supper you will need some wine or grape juice, and bread or some sort of cracker. If you cannot procure these, using whatever your staple foods are – such as rice and fruit juice, or even simply water, should be fine.” Here you can watch Flamingo Road Church do it’s first Internet baptism.
2. The Rapid Growth of the Internet Church: More people will opt out of showing up to church ‘physically’ and decide to attend online. At the Echo Church Media conference I called this virtual Church but was corrected by an Internet Campus pastor who said ‘virtual’ implied not real so I should call it Internet church. As people blur their sense of presence (with things like mobile apps that constantly tether you to distant places) the idea of having to be somewhere in person for it to be ‘real’ will be lost in a digital generation. Already there are fully packed online services for churches to launch their own Internet campus.
3. Rise of Online Participatory Biblical Hermeneutics: 
With the rise of Wiki, social media and an increasingly participatory value the Bible will be read more through a communal lens. This will lead to a greater democratization of the interpretation of Scripture as an authoritative process. Often technological advances (such as YouVersion) cannot predict the consequences of these advancements. Further, there will be a deterioration of Biblical memorization and study because people with persistent technological access will be able to ‘Google the answer’ rather than feeling a need to do the hard work of ongoing study of God’s Word.
4. Gospel Inoculation through Online Evangelism Spam: Several leading ministries will become enamored with the ‘conversion successes’ of numbers. Quantity over quality will be too attractive and the message of Jesus will be so watered down that it could end up with a ‘click here’ if you want to go to heaven and not hell. The masses will be exposed to just enough (and particular bent) of Christianity to determine it’s not for them.
5. Increased Persecution of Christians for their Beliefs: For those of us who live in California and experienced the voting and subsequent recourse of Proposition 8 we have only seen just the beginning. Supporters of Prop 8 were identified through their donations and boycotted, persecuted and some even had their life threatened. In the future data centers will be able to scrape the Internet to find any comments or positions you hold, match this to your business, cell phone or other identifiable postings to target you for your beliefs. If you come out in a post for or against something others disagree with, you could find your business added to mobile apps where people will be able to see your stance and boycott your business or restaurant. Your neighbors would be informed and told about your intolerance and bigotry to isolate you from the community and ostracize you for your personal beliefs because they are not in line with the agenda of these activist groups. The future of persecution will be immediate and the loss of anonymity on cultural sensitive topics will scare many to no longer stand-up for their beliefs.
What is Gospel Intentionality within a Church Community?
Today I received an email from a pastor on Gospel Intentionality. In this email he requested help for his church family to gain a better understanding of what gospel intentionality looks like. What exactly is gospel intentionality?
Steve Timmis posted a series of Tweets on this: Living ordinary life with gospel intentionality means …
… buying from local shops.
… frequenting a local coffee shop or pub.
… playing for a local sports team.
… always tipping generously in local restaurants.
… being the kind of neighbor everyone wants to have as a neighbor.
… volunteering at a local charity shop along with a couple of others from church.
… doing ordinary things in community.
… opening your home to, and sharing your food with others.
… walking the same route to work at the same time or catching the same train each day.
… we do EVERYTHING for the sake of the gospel!
These ideas are fleshed out more in the book Total Church. “Total church” is their way of capturing the idea that church is not one activity in our lives. Church isn’t a meeting you attend or a building your enter. It’s our identity, our community, our family. It’s the context for the totality of the Christian life.
In a post on this gospel intentionality at Edwards blog, Jonathan Dodson comments: “We need not only to do these things, but also understand how they are an expression of the gospel‚Ķor they will devolve into meaningless practices or legalistic works.”
This is the ‘stuff’ we go through at Kaleo. Recently, in our missional community we have had two families begin the process of searching for a home. Both were considering a location farther away from the community where they could get more home for the money. In our gospel intentional way we asked them what were the motivations behind this. If we are called to be a community on mission with the gospel at the center of everything we do, wouldn’t our decision of where we live profoundly be impacted by this? If we are gospel intentional we make decisions with what is best in mind for our witness, our faith and God’s glory. What motivates us to move outside the city to buy a bigger home? Comfort? Investment? Safety? If the answer isn’t calling than ultimately this decision is not being made with the gospel at the core. The good news of who God is tells us our comfort, value and protection reside in Him not in our home. We ultimately need to get down to the heart issues of what motivates people in all our decisions, because if we are not walking in line with the gospel we are worshiping something other than God.
These two families have begun to re-consider what they want to prioritize. They recognize that if they moved 20 minutes away it would impact their ability to be gospel intentional. Certainly, if God was calling them to move and their motivation was the gospel at the center, we would embrace this and help them move but our missional community doesn’t see this as the case. These people have been willing to submit this decision and heed the counsel of the community because of the gospel intentionality they desire. (Note: This is not gospel ‘intensity’ these conversations are not heavy-handed or us trying to make decisions for them.) All of us seek to expose our lives to each other and the community around us so that when any decision or circumstance is brought up we examine it through the idea of God’s calling on our life to live as a redemptive people who are servants of our great King. To the world this may sound crazy but to us it is a beautiful mess of sinners celebrating a life under the reign of a God who loves us and has adopted us as His.
We are calling our community to process this in how they dress, where they live, what activities they participate in and how we interact. It is all of life. For us this is Gospel Intentionality.
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Developing a Personal Social Media Strategy: Blogs, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter…who am I?
How many social networks and web 2.0 apps can a person use? What do you do with each of these? I read an article recently about a phenomenon where people who had 100′s of friends on Facebook were committing “Facebook Suicide“. Some ‘killed their virtual self’ because of their loss of privacy and others from a sense of ‘how can I really be friends with 500+ people?’ Some start over with a new identity to do a reboot of who they connect with. Others just go through and unfriend vast numbers of people hoping they wont’ notice.
If I could do it all over again, here’s how I would have executed my personal social media plan:
1. BLOGGING: I would have picked a more singular voice for my blog Goodmanson.com. Right now I step between Church Planting, Missional Ecclesiology, Culture, Church Technology, a bit about my work at Monk Development and a very limited level of personal posts. I hope because there is a unifying factor in seeing all these as part of a calling/mission that it still works. I wonder if church planters who read my blog wish I would do more posting on that and less tech related posts and vice versa. Ultimately, I’ve tried not to create a ‘Cat Blog‘ or a ‘Boss Blog‘ but a Viral Blog that spreads ideas online. This means I don’t really blog personal stuff and reserve those postings to other apps.
2. FACEBOOK:
If I could do this over again I would friend only those that I am close with on Facebook. I’m closing in on 700 friends and I know that most are acquaintances and some I don’t even know at all. One challenge with this number is that people I’m close to get lost in the stream of the crowd. I continue to post pictures of my friends & family and update my status with things that I imagine are entirely uninteresting to people who aren’t close to me. If people decide to un-friend me because of that I don’t take it personal. If fact, I wish I had early on used LinkedIn for more of the people I know through work.
3. TWITTER: 
Twitter is an unstoppable force that I haven’t done much with. UPDATED: After I made this post I began to use Twitter primarily to communicate about what we are doing at Monk, church technology and church planting. In this month Twitter became the third highest referral source to my blog. I now use Twitter as a tool to communicate what I am doing in these areas and other links/ideas that my followers may be interested in.
4. LinkedIn: 
As I stated in #2, If I could do it over again I would have connected with more people through LinkedIn. It has a more professional, networking focus that I would use to connect with acquaintances I meet at conferences or through work. I am fine with anyone Linking in with me and hope to expand that network rather than Facebook.
5. OTHERS: As of yet I don’t see a need to join any ‘Christian’ social networking sites just like I don’t go to ‘Christian’ malls. I am a part of a few online community sites that are private and allow me to discuss very specific topics with others who are swimming in similar streams. These include private threads for people to discuss leadership, church planting, technology, etc. These niche sites are helpful and allow us to resource others who have experience in areas important to me.
These are just a few of the ways I would re-do my social networking, what would you do different?
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Accessible Missional Ecclesiology by Michael Goheen
Michael Goheen did his dissertation on Newbigin’s Missional Ecclesiology and now he is writing this as a book that is accessible to those who are missional leaders in their community. David Fairchild and I are going with a group to Big Bear to discuss what he has put together so far and it’s practical application. David and I just were agreeing how blessed we are to be in relationship with godly thinkers who have a heart for the local church that is gospel-centered and missional!
Keep your eyes out for Goheen’s book on Missional Ecclesiology. Also, don’t forget his Living at the Crossroads: An Introduction to Christian Worldview which will be a must buy!
Read MoreTotal Church Conference Audio
The Audio for The Total Church North America Conference 2008 have now been uploaded. Total church is a way of thinking about church and mission in the 21st century which sees the local Christian community as integral to Christian living and Christian mission. The Christian life is ‘total church’ – our identity is communal. View all at the Session Archive or browse the Main & Breakout sessions below:
Main Sessions
A Community-centered Gospel – Steve Timmis
The gospel is about a King who died to rescue a people who would reveal his character by their shared lives. In keeping with who I am ‘in Adam’, I individualize and privatize the gospel so that church is reduced to a necessary but often intrusive addendum. The gospel calls us to live ‘in Christ’ corporately and so show the power of the cross to reconcile and create community. (A Community-Centered Gospel Q&A)
A Gospel-centered Community – Steve Timmis
The gospel is that which creates, sustains, nurtures and perfects the church. To achieve this, the gospel needs to be at the center of all we are and do as the people of God. The gospel needs to be taken out of our pulpits and meetings and applied into the mundane and routine of our corporate and personal lives. (A Gospel-Centered Community Q&A)
Rethinking Attractional Church – Tim Chester
Attractional church (‘come to us’) and missional church (‘go to them’) are often set up as alternatives, yet throughout the Scriptures God calls his people to a life that attracts the nations. We can bring attractional and missional approaches together by re-conceiving church as a community rather than an event. (Rethinking Q&A Session)
Remodeling Attractional Church – Steve Timmis
As we focus more on the quality of our lives together rather than the slick performance of our Sunday meetings we will see how a gospel community is an integral and indispensable piece of the evangelism jigsaw. In fact, people won’t be able to fully understand the magnitude of what God has done in Christ without it. (Remodeling Q&A Session)
Making Disciples for Missional Church – Tim Chester
‘I’m free and belong to no man’ could be the slogan of our age. But Paul continues: ‘I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible.’ What kind of people are going to sustain a church planting movement? This session explores how the cross and resurrection should shape our lives. (Making Disciples Q&A)
Making Disciples in Missional Church – Tim Chester
This session looks at how we train and pastor one another in the context of ordinary life and the context of Christian community.
Breakout Sessions
Being Neighbors: a Gospel Strategy (Steve Timmis)
When so much emphasis is placed on being missional and incarnational, contextual and radical it’s easy to forget the simplicity and significance of the truth that gospel makes us into lovers, of both God and others. Instead of trying to send out edgy, hardcore dudes with body piercing and tattoos, we should be satisfied with sending people who will be the neighbors everyone wants to have as a neighbor.
Forming a Gospel Community (Jeff Vanderstelt)
Now that many are aware of the need to form gospel communities, how do we move from theology and theory to actual forming and leading them? This session will explore the process and the specifics of moving an individualistic group of people toward a gospel-centered community on mission.
One-Anothering: A Communal Gospel (David Fairchild)
Why are so many Christians detached and isolated from one another? How can we experience a radically reshaped community? What kind of social ethic does the Gospel produce? What would it look like if we lived lives together as if the Gospel were true? Join us as we unpack the various “one another” passages in a quest to answer these questions together.
Evangelising the Urban Poor (Tim Chester)
We have endless resources on reaching postmoderns, most of which in fact address student and professional culture. In comparison there’s very little on understanding and reaching the urban poor. Drawing on insights from biblical counselling, this session suggests some ways forward for evangelizing and discipling the urban poor. Join the work-in-progress!
Story & Rhythm of Soma Community (Caesar Kalinowski)
Reading Cultural Texts (Mike Gunn)
This is a missional gaze at pop culture. We will be taking a look at the “Other” gospels in our culture (Media, film, books, etc.), and how to read them in a way that can help propel you to a better understanding of them for the sake of the gospel. We will look at the reason why this is important to our mission, as well as, some help for understanding and engaging pop culture in authentic ways.
Out of the Frying Pan… (David Fairchild & Mark Moore)
Is God calling your church out of Ur? How do you get your church to move from traditional to missional? Both Mark Moore and David Fairchild are practicing church planters that initially planted relatively traditional churches built around the Sunday gathering. As they labored to develop deep community as a gospel display people for their cities, they realized things needed to change. Come and hear their stories and insights as they share what pitfalls to avoid and what challenges to accept as missional leaders. This breakout is intended for anyone looking to turn the corner missionwards!
Beyond Total Church – Sowing the Seeds of a Movement (Tim Chester)
How can we plant churches that plant churches? What can we learn from church planting movements? How can we build in reproducibility?
Communication in a Post-Christian World (Drew Goodmanson & Caesar Kalinowski)
The culture is changing and it requires new thought in communication. This session will help you learn how to effectively minister in a post-Christian context. Come learn the 1) five values of this Post-Christian generation, the 2) ten idols that enslave them and 3) effective ways to communicate the eternal and unchanging gospel message.
The Everyday Rhythms of a Gospel Display People (Jeff Vanderstelt)
The gospel community is called to be a display of the gospel in everyday ways of life so that others might see what their life would look like in the gospel. In order to do this, the church needs to lead their people to identify everyday practices and then lead them to live out their identity in Christ within them. This session will identify some of those everyday rhythms and and then explore how we can display the gospel through them.
True Gospel Community in a Truly Big Metroplex (Mark Moore)
Being a gospel community that does life and mission together is sometimes easier said than done. This is especially the case in large cities that are characterized by sprawl as well as population. This session will concentrate on leading your people to make missionary decisions in their everyday lives in response to the gospel. Specific challenges to this way of life in a metroplex setting will be examined.
Reaching the Domains of Society (Drew Goodmanson & Caesar Kalinowski)
How do we bring gospel renewal to our cities in the 7 pillars of society… Business, Education, Healthcare, Government, Media, Social Services [including other churches] & Marginalized? We believe the gospel informs all of life and this good news helps shape how we view the world and our involvement in it. How do we equip Christians to engage in redemptive work in science, politics, art, culture, business, economics, education, local concerns, mercy ministries, social justice, environmentalism, law, media, social concerns and spirituality.
Wrapping up Total Church (Tim Chester)
This session will be built around the questions of those attending, especially concerning the application and implications for the issues Tim raised during his main sessions.
Developing Missional Leaders (Jeff Vanderstelt)
There is plenty of opportunity to hear and learn about being a gospel-centered church on mission. And, after a few days at a conference, the tendency of teachers and preachers is to go home and tell our people to get going. If we are going to lead a gospel-centered church on mission we must do more than that. During this session we will explore some ways to identify, equip and support a group of gospel-centered leaders to share in leading the mission with us.
Urban Discipleship (Mike Gunn)
The city holds more than 50% of of the world’s population, and is growing rapidly toward a world-wide megalopolis, while the church continues to migrate to the suburbs. The city also holds both the keys to the culture, and abyss of brokenness. In America our cities are becoming multi-ethnic/racial posing unique challenges and opportunities for our churches. In this session we will take a look at the role of the church (Make disciples), what it looks like to make disciples, and why we should be doing it in the cities of West and the world!
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Drew Goodmanson
CEO of Monk Development creators of Ekklesia 360. Co-Founder of Kaleo Church where I served as Pastor for 8+ years and helped coach several church plants in San Diego. Co-Founder of the GCM Collective, President of the Board at the Center for Church Communication, Board Member of the Entrepreneurship Organization, Internet/Technology Advisory Chair at the Christian Leadership Alliance. Connect
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