Reaching People Who Think We Are Irrelevant
I have a different vision than most of how church websites can/should be used. When churches started jumping on the web bandwagon a few years ago, we saw a lot of sites which were not well-designed, to say the last. Sadly, we still see plenty of poorly designed church websites.
Now days, though, we are at least seeing more and more well-designed sites in the church arena. Some of that is due to church webmasters becoming more proficient at their craft. Some of it is due to the proliferation of companies offering template-based solutions to churches and ministries (while some may decry the “cookie cutter” approach of those companies, at least they don’t offer templates with spinning crosses and blinking text!).
As church websites become more and more usable and attractive, I believe that the next question we need to ask ourselves as a “community” of church webmasters is, “How can our websites be used most effectively?” Personally, I see very few church websites that make me think that the people responsible for the church’s web presence have spent much time considering that question.
My vision is for a cyberspace version of Romans 15:20-21:
And thus I aspired to preach the gospel, not where Christ was already named, that I might not build upon another man’s foundation; but as it is written, ‘They who had no news of Him shall see, and they who have not heard shall understand.’
I guess it’s natural that the majority of a church website’s visitors will be people from within the congregation. Putting that audience aside for a moment, however, I ask myself who I want to see visiting the church website. Who do I want to make up that additional audience? I recognize that other people see things differently, but for me, if them majority of that additional audience is made up of people looking for a church, then I’ve failed. I want the majority of that additional audience to be people who don’t have any particular interest in the church, at least at first.
To draw those people to the website, I want to present information that I believe they will be interested in. That’s why I think a church’s website should have as its primary content in-depth profiles of the people in the congregation. The overwhelming majority of people who convert to Christ do so, not as a result of the church’s programs or attending a service, but as a result of relationship with real people. So I ask myself, “Since the overwhelming majority of people who convert to Christ do so as a result of their relationships with believers, how can a church website be used to introduce unbelievers to believers and facilitate relationships that may eventually lead to the unbeliever considering the claims of Christ?”
I don’t want to settle for reaching only people who are interested in finding a church. I want to reach people who think we are irrelevant.
As always, comments are very welcome.
I believe that the internet provides today's church with a historic opportunity .... to tell the old, old story of Jesus and His love in ways which could only have been imagined in times past. The objective of this website is to explore the various ways in which today's technology can be used to spread the gospel around the world.
