The Blogging Church | Brian Bailey & Terry Storch

Brian Bailey & Terry Storch. The Blogging Church. Jossey-Bass, 2007. 199 pp.

Why Blog?

During the past decade, churches have faced ever more decisions about the role technology should play in the local church. Should we have a website? Can technology help us measure the growth of your church? Can it help us decide who we are reaching and make sure no one falls through the cracks? Should we start a blog?

How does a church make these decisions? How does it decide whether to embrace a new piece of technology?

This book makes a passionate case for blogging in the local church, something we are unabashedly enthusiastic about. However, we have no illusions about the difficult questions it raises. We have seen the good and the bad of technology over the past six years; it can be an empowering tool or a band-aid that covers a much deeper problem. . . .

Is it a tool or a toy?

Let’s be honest: technology people love technology. We’ve never met someone who works in technology who doesn’t believe more of it is a good thing, and that includes ourselves! Of course, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with this. You want people on your staff and in your church who are passionate about what they do, who believe in their ministry, and who want to use their skills to make a difference. . . .

With limited resources, a church cannot afford to replace a working solution simply because a new version is available. With limited staff and little technology expertise, any new piece of technology must have a persuasive answer to the question, “Is it a tool or a toy?”

What is a toy? A toy is something that you want to play with more than you want to use. You know it’s a toy when your primary motivation for acquiring it is the fact that everyone, or every church, you know has one. When you are describing a toy, the word cool is used with unusual frequency, and little time is spent discussing alternatives.

What is a tool? A tool is something that solves a problem. A tool has a self-evident ministry application that can be described in twenty words or fewer. Tools can be fun to use and very cool, but that is the frosting, not the cake.

So, is a blog a tool or a toy? This is the question you must answer for your church, not just once but continuously. . . .

Even after you’re satisfied with the answer, make sure you don’t stop asking the question. We found that one of our blogs had stopped serving any ministry purpose, so we decided to end it.

What Problem Are You Trying to Solve?

How often do we make the mistake of saying yes to technology without asking “Why?”

How often do we purchase a product instead of a solution? How often does the cool new gadget become more important than the problem it was purchased to solve? How can we choose the right medicine if we don’t have an accurate diagnosis?

We have to ask ourselves, If blogging is the solution, what’s the problem?

In a word: communication. Blogging is all about connecting communities through conversation. Churches have traditionally excelled at one-way communication. We are more comfortable modeling our ministries after television, broadcasting our message to passive and silent viewers. There is a new generation, though, that is no longer satisfied by this one-way relationship. They have grown up in an Internet-driven culture that celebrates participation. The passive consumer has been replaced with an active, engaged, and empowered contributor.

Blogging is simply online hospitality—opening your door, inviting people inside, and sharing stories. People want to be part of something greater than themselves. They want to find common ground with others who face similar struggles and have similar questions. . . .

Through blogging, you can connect with your members in an honest, relevant way. You can engage the curious, the lost, and the tire kickers. You can greatly expand the reach of your ministry to people around the world who will never step through the doors of your church. The rest of this book is dedicated to exploring all that you can do with blogs, but at its core each solution is about communication.

A fair question to ask is whether there is an alternative to blogs that could solve the problem better. Are blogs the best technology solution available if connecting with people face-to-face isn’t an option?

Yes.

Blogging helps you quickly, effectively, easily, and cheaply reach people in a way no other tool does. A website is more expensive and complex and lacks the personal voice that makes a blog so inviting.

Mass emails and e-newsletters are increasingly irrelevant in our flooded mailboxes. Basing your communication strategy on fleeting access to someone’s inbox is dicey at best. The few messages that aren’t flagged as spam are rarely opened. A blog reaches your audience in a direct, unfiltered way, but it also reaches far beyond any mailing list, to people who are searching for answers and want to know more about what your church has to offer. . . .

What Is the Measurable Ministry Benefit of Blogging?

As with this chapter’s earlier questions, each church must come to its own conclusion. The rest of this book is dedicated to exploring the many possibilities. The ministry benefit for some is the ability to cast the vision of the church again and again. For others, the benefit is connecting volunteers with each other and with the staff. Still others reap the rewards of some serious knowledge sharing and the support of other church leaders and pastors.

For a large church, an answer to the ministry benefit question might be: blogs help make a big church small. As a church grows, it becomes an increasing challenge to connect people with one another and with the staff. People want a window into the heart of the church. How does the church remain personal and retain personality?

Blogs can enable the physical church community to extend and persist beyond the walls of the campus. By sharing stories of life change and the vision of the church, people gain a better understanding of what the church is all about. When passions, mistakes, answered prayers, and struggles are shared openly and honestly, people can connect with the church beyond the weekend services.

Blogging produces a truly phenomenal return on ministry. No other technology affords a similar benefit for such a minimal investment in training, time, and money.

A blog can be started and kept up-to-date by anyone with basic computer skills. There is no special knowledge or graduate-level instruction required; in fact, you already hold in your hands the training you need to get started.

Like most things worth doing, the more time you put into your blog the better it will be, but an investment of just one or two hours a week can reap substantial dividends. As quickly as you can type an email to your staff, you can communicate with your whole church and people around the world. A few short posts a week will produce a loyal following of the curious and the committed alike.

Finally, blogging comes with an appealing price tag: nothing, or almost nothing. It is highly unlikely that you will spend more than $200 on a blog over the course of a year, and that’s for one with brass bells and sterling silver whistles. Blogging is the holy grail of technology—a new tool with lots of buzz but without the matching price tag.

With a small investment of your time and money, blogging can pay huge dividends for your church.

Should My Church Become a Blogging Church?

We know what it’s like to be on the front lines of ministry, where every decision has the potential to affect lives for eternity. That’s why we’ve dedicated this chapter to helping you tackle the hard questions that will come your way. You may be asking many of them yourself. Is a blog a tool or a toy? What problem are we trying to solve? Is there a measurable ministry benefit?

This doubt and an aversion to risk are signs of healthy skepticism toward technology—a skepticism that’s well deserved. These tough questions deserve to be faced head on.

How is it that such a simple tool can change churches and build communities? Simply put, there is immense power in transparent communication. A blog with an honest, passionate, personal voice is worth so much more than another brochure or direct mail piece.

After all the arguments have been heard and all the questions answered, it comes down to this:

• Blogs are tools, not toys.
• Blogs help solve real problems.
• Blogs deliver a true return on ministry.

This chapter begins and ends with a simple question: “Should my church become a blogging church?”

The answer is yes.

Jump aboard and join the revolution.

Excerpted from The Blogging Church by Brian Bailey with Terry Storch (January 2007, $19.95, paper) by permission of Jossey-Bass, a Wiley Imprint.

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