What To Do With Your Church Website
Craig A. Smith
October 1, 1999
More than 100 million adults in North America are connected to the World Wide Web. The Internet is fast emerging as the most significant communications technology of the twenty-first century.
And it's getting harder to find churches without Internet access and their own Web sites.
But what are we doing with our little corner of the Web?
On one end of the spectrum, there's Totalechurch.com. This Internet church has no worship facilities, no buildings, no faces in the congregation—only screen names logged on from parts unknown. Sermons are delivered by streaming audio, counseling by e-mail, fellowship via chat rooms.
On the other end are the thousands of churches whose Web pages consist only of a logo with service times and directions printed beneath. It's an electronic version of a Yellow Pages ad.
And in vast middle ground between these extremes, many churches are pioneering new and intriguing uses of the Internet to lend virtual enhancement to their flesh-and-blood ministries.
Only a tiny percentage of first-time visitors are attracted solely by a Web site. However, an increasing number of visitors indicate that a Web site was part of their exposure to the church.
Clicking on any face, viewers see
that person's testimony and
get a glimpse of what God is doing.
Steve Phelps of Solid Rock Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma, used the Web to start the church. A mass mailing of 25,000 postcards invited people to visit a site (www.solid-rockchurch.com) where they could check out pictures of a service and read about the church's philosophy and vision. A high percentage of the church's initial attenders had visited the site.
First Assembly of God Family Church in Lufkin, Texas, puts members' photos on the opening page of its site (www.lufkinfirstassembly.org). ...
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