This episode we’re honored to talk with the organization who essentially created Church Online. Life.Church is one of the pioneering churches out there creating a movement in digital church. Having watched the Life.Church movement grow over the years, I was almost closet fanboy in this conversation, geeking out over methods and systems that Life.Church utilizes.

That being said, the thing that surprised me the most was how this megachurch, really this gigachurch, was grounded in reality of the individual. A church with dozens of physical campuses… not including over tens of thousands of people watching online across every major continent… I had imagined attending a church like Life.Church would be easy for an individual to get lost. That’s the hardest part of Church Online, right? Preventing people from attending church in isolation?

Ryan and Life.Church in general, have discovered that to grow Church Online you don’t need nameless individuals staring at video displays… The first step to Church Online is realizing that every number, in fact, has a name. Jump in the podcast and discover what’s next.

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Church Online definitely has strengths and weaknesses, but the power to train and to equip someone is unparalleled. But why do we struggle with the concept of equipping and discipling someone using Online Technologies?

Enter personal friend, Ken Schafer, into the conversation. Ken works with churches around the country helping create equipping scenarios in physical environments, as well as, online… and I (Jeff) credit Ken as being one of those guys who years ago told me, “Jeff, you’re wrong” but years later now says, “Jeff, you’re right.”

So when did Ken see the light? What got him to embrace Online? Come find out in EP024 of The Church Digital Podcast!

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Before my wife and I got married, we were praying about becoming missionaries. Challenges like learning new languages, adapting to new cultures and new food came to mind. We quickly realized that we would be on separate hemispheres from our collective families. And while God didn’t call my wife and I to move to another continent 20+ years ago, we’ve eventually become a missionary in a different context…

In EP023, we dig in with Tom Pounder, Online Pastor at New Life Christian Church and creator of Digital Bootcamp on Facebook, not only into the question of what is a “digital disciple”, but also, how can we create one? Can we create a disciple who can utilize online tools to create other disciples? Can we reach into the sub-cultures found on the Internet to meet new people who need Jesus in their lives?

I don’t know that this podcast answers all the questions… but we certainly start the conversation with you on how your church can utilize Church Online to disciple Digital Missionaries.

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I love hearing stories from people who have been impacted by Church Online. Sometimes it feels like the stuffy shirts and the academics argue about what “church” can and can’t be, meanwhile normal people are just doing it.

Thus the point of this week’s podcast. Linda has been leading online small groups for about three years now. While we’ve been sitting around whether Church Online is legitimate on this podcast, Linda’s been busy creating Biblical Community each week, Online.

Oh, did I mention that Linda is MY MOM? Proud of LINDA REED (my mom) here, and how she’s adapted to online environments to create lasting, discipleship-oriented relationships.

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The challenge before Church Online is that it is guilty of being church in isolation, allowing people to abandon biblical communities. These views are often short-sighted, not realizing that technology is capable of allowing biblical community to still happen using digital platforms, but larger than that Church Online is capable of creating communities. Potentially leaving one community to start another physical community utilizing Church Online. This is the conversation of today.

Enter Danielle Hicks, Watch Party Pastor at Elevation Church. Elevation utilizes Church Online to reach thousands and thousands of people. Their strategy doesn’t stop with just broadcasting the service, but challenging those listening to gather together in watch parties… to be missional with the broadcast and use the broadcast as a front door to…

Well, tell you what, you’re just going to have to listen to find that out. Jump on in as we explore Elevation’s Watch Parties.

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We’ve talked a lot about Church Online and the potential power that it has to be a strategic force for the church. Today’s church online has many obstacles to overcome. Arguably, in today’s culture, so does the church.

The church has an opportunity to create a new ministry model tapping into some biblical truths. After all, there’s nothing new under the sun, right? The issues of today’s Church Online, and largely the Church overall, were written a couple thousand years ago in the Bible. Create Disciples.

How do we do this today? Enter Austin Ridge’s Discipleship Pastor, Jeff Moore, as we explore Austin Ridge’s strategy for disciple-making. With Women’s Ministry, Men’s Ministry, Life Groups, Classes… Austin Ridge has a lot going on all the time, but how does disciple-making stand out among the other things? Join us as we dive into the Strategy of Discipleship.

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We’re in Week 3 of this deep dive into the Online Ministry at First Capital Christian Church. Church Anywhere, as it’s called, utilizes its Church Online broadcasts as a way to cluster people together into communities and disciple their members and attenders away from just consuming content towards literally “being” the church in the community.

Honestly, is this not the biggest challenge facing the church today? How do we move our attenders away from being consumers and get them to the place where they are disciples who are capable creating other disciples?

To that end, we set up this conversation, inviting Tyler Samson back to the podcast. Tyler’s no stranger to THE CHURCH DIGITAL PODCAST (see Episode 017: Stories from Church Anywhere & Episode 018: Randy Kirk, Church Anywhere, & Not My Kingdom) but we added to the Podcast, Jared Kirkwood, one of the Pastors at Mariners Church, as well as, the Pastor overseeing Rooted.

Rooted (experiencerooted.com) is a highly effective discipleship material that helps create disciples who in turn are capable of creating disciples… ironically, Rooted is the discipleship material First Capital Christian uses as their discipleship pathway, which made for a fascinating conversation not only on how to make a disciple online, but how to make a disciple in general.

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