This is another reminder that the best method of sharing the Gospel is and has always been personal contact with those in our social networks.  It’s the same method we see in the New Testament when Andrew went to find his brother Peter (Jn. 1:41) and Philip went to find Nathaniel (Jn. 1:45).   Jesus sent the man delivered from a legion of demons back to tell his friends and neighbors what God had done for him (Mk. 5:19). Cornelius gathered his household and close friends to hear Peter share the Gospel (Acts 10:24).  We see it again and again in the Bible and in church history.

Some time ago the Billy Graham organization did a study of the people who made decisions at their evangelistic meetings.  The vast majority of them had come because of the witness of a neighbor or friend.  So even “mass evangelism” is dependent on the witness of individual Christians.

What this means for us as individual Christians is that personally sharing our faith is essential to the fulfillment of the Great Commission.  We can’t rely on media or big meetings, and we can’t expect a few Christian leaders to carry the ball on their own.  This is a job for all of us.

Your witness matters.  Get out there and let your light shine.

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The Internet makes large-scale collaboration possible, with Wikipedia as Exhibit A. Theopedia and others have tried to do something similar for theology and commentary.

But sometimes smaller-scale ideas can be just as productive, as in the area of personal or family Bible study.

This is something that I have been thinking about for quite some time. I have written numerous Bible study series for our fellowship groups, complete with leader notes. I have toyed with the idea of contacting a publisher and trying to get some of them in print, but it seems to me that that is not the best way to get them into people’s hands. Many churches are reluctant to purchase a booklet for every member and potential guest of a Bible study group. Market considerations keep the minimum price up around $7 or higher per booklet.

What I envision is a collaborative site where pastors and other Christian leaders can share studies that they have prepared. To make it useful, it seems to be that it would be good to have a basic statement of faith that covered the essentials but was broad enough to include a wide variety of Christians. Each contributor could even have a profile indicating his or her background. It would also be possible to have someone review studies before they were made available publicly to provide some basic quality control. But perhaps a ratings system could accomplish this as well. As a busy pastor, I don’t have the time to wade through hundreds of pages of junk in order to find a gem (think of YouTube). There has to be some way to zero in on well written, exegetically sound studies without sorting through a lot of garbage. A few years back I obtained a free subscription to a sermons web site. There were lots of sermons available there, but I found very little that was really useful. I have pretty high standards for preaching, and expository preaching is still pretty rare.

Another question is whether or not to charge a fee for downloads. There are two possible reasons for charging a fee: (1) to help cover the costs of running the site, and (2) to provide the contributors with a small payment when their studies are used. The costs of hosting are minimal, although setting up and maintaining the site could run into some money. I think that author payments could help provide provide some much needed additional motivation for contributors. Then I would charge a per-church fee for downloads, based on the church/fellowship size, with permission to make copies for everyone in the group. There would need to be some sort of “preview” option to check out the study, and a feedback system so that newcomers could identify the authors whose work has been the most helpful.

I have even considered setting something up at cyberpastor.net. But it would only become useful if it “took off” and enough people begin to participate, and I think that it would be fairly difficult to gain the necessary momentum. Maybe it would be easier to get one of the big Christian sites to do something like this.

What do you think? Do you see a need for something like this? Would you participate? How could it be done? (ESV article sighted on Scott Yang’s Playground)

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It is questionable whether anyone can claim that there is a new version of the church coming into being that deserves the “2.0″ moniker.  If anyone could make that claim, it would probably have to be the reformers.  We have the same Gospel, the same mission, and the same basic functions as the church in the 1st century.  Calling a new trend “Church 2.0″ is overstating things.  In fact, many of the things that are said to be “new” about “Church 2.0″ are simply a return to the model of the church in Acts.  But we live in a culture influenced by the Enlightenment that views anything “new” and “cool” as much more interesting than the “Old, old story.”

However, I do think that the web has serious implications for the methods that we use in ministry.  So maybe we should call it “Ministry 2.0,” although even that is overstating the case.  The basics of ministry are the same, only the tools that we employ are different.  So let’s look at some examples of how ministry is impacted by the Internet:

1. Evangelism 2.0?

Many people today live their social lives at least partly on-line. They meet new people, share their experiences, and seek and give encouragement through the Internet. How can we do a better job of sharing the Gospel through on-line relationships?  There are quite a few people doing “Internet evangelism,” but much of it is has little connection with a church body.  How can churches, not just individuals, do more in this area?  Should churches consider bringing a “Pastor of Internet Ministry” onto the staff?  Or, since much of this ministry can connect with people around the world, maybe we should support Internet missionaries?

2. Fellowship 2.0?

To what extent can on-line relationships fulfill the need for fellowship? How can this serve as a ministry tool?  Can we substitute an on-line group chat for a small group meeting?  What about chat prayer meetings?  Numerous articles point out that at least some “face time” is essential for healthy relationships, but how much is enough? How far can we go with cyber-fellowship before we lose something essential?

3. Sunday School 2.0?

How can we use the web to enhance our teaching and training ministries?  Here I think that we have barely scratched the surface of what could be done with today’s technology.  This is actually one of my key interests, and I will write more on this topic in the future.

Many are moving to apply Web 2.0 to the church. Turtle Interactive has a list which he calls “semi-definitive.” Kevin Hendricks wrote an article on “What Web 2.0 Means for Your Church.”

I have shared some thoughts on this topic in brainstorming mode, so none of these ideas are fully developed.  Perhaps you can think of some other areas to add to my list. I invite you to join in the conversation.

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