Online Worship

1. Convenience Lowers the Bar of CommitmentCommitment... 2. Convenience Reduces the Power of Presence.... 3. Convenience Creates Spectators Instead of Participants.... 4. Convenience Weakens Accountability.... 5. Convenience Replaces Meaning with Ease. " - Baptist Press

“The new front door to your church is probably your online worship service. For many, the first time they encounter your congregation will be through a video.” - Lifeway

“Two years into the pandemic, more religious institutions are asking themselves what a hybrid approach can and should look like.” - RNS

“While online worship allows us to truly worship the living God, it ruptures our common sense [input from the five senses] in a way that doesn’t happen with in-person worship …. This is not to deny the real value of online worship… however, it does offer us a way to understand how it differs from in-person worship.” - TGC

“According to a new study from Nashville-based Lifeway Research, 45% of Americans say they have watched a Christian church service online during the COVID-19 pandemic, including some who say they don’t normally physically attend.” - Lifeway

“This year, the majority of pastors (80%) [are] excited to celebrate Easter with congregants inside their church buildings with COVID-19 precautions in place. Another one in five (22%) [are] meeting outdoors to accommodate social distancing during the worship service.” - Barna

“A study of 1,000 Protestant churchgoers in the U.S. from Lifeway Research found, when COVID-19 is no longer an active threat to people’s health, 91 percent plan to attend in-person worship services at least as often as they did before the coronavirus pandemic. That includes almost a quarter (23 percent) who plan to attend more than they did previously.” - LifeWay

“I sometimes enjoy the conveniences of our new Sunday morning routine, but there are pangs of sadness every week when my daughter hears music, turns to the screen, and almost immediately loses interest. I recall how engaged she was in the sounds, sights, and vibrations of congregational worship during the ‘before times.’” - C.Today

“In the new journal Five Questions Every Church Leader Should Ask About Digital Prayer, Barna, partnering with Alpha, reveals that more than two-thirds (68 percent) of Christians express openness to participating in prayer time during online worship. Yet only 28 percent report actually being involved with a digital prayer service during the pandemic” - C.Leaders

“…you need to set up, with great detail, how your members will prepare and submit their videos. In this example, I first prepared a video of me conducting the song with the original track (including voices) that would be a guide for participants.” - Kenny Lamm