Thanks Dave, bless you. Very glad to hear of this development. These look like very valuable subject areas. I have also mentioned this to the
http://www.yahoogroups.com/group/guide-network
list – which you are very welcome to join, and maybe one or two will comment on your blog, or within the list.

The sorts of things I think Christians as a whole don’t really understand about the Web/digital stuff:

- it is not just another medium, to be left to a few specialists who want to use it (like, eg radio)
- it really does change everything, the way we communicate and think
- it’s not brochure-ware – another way of getting printed material out to people
- it’s a pull medium, not a push medium
- it can integrate incredibly with other mediums (print, SMS, dvd, and, specially, people on the ground). The use of the web by the Obama campaign is a valuable case study of how a deep understanding of the web, and its bottom-up grassroots social networking properties, can be harnessed. No doubt someone is going to write a book about the Obama campaign use of web/sms, which will be very interesting!

In terms of philosophy of web ministry, I see a range of opinions. There are some people who believe the web does not fit with evangelism because evangelism should be face-to-face relationships. At the opposite end, others think that a web evangelism site will just automatically preach to people without needing to establish any sort of relationships at all.

To me, I think that:
a) the web is all about establishing relationships
b) the ‘anonymous intimacy’ of the web enables people to ask questions
c) most web-mediated testimonies (like indeed most testimonies of any sort) demonstrate a long period of relationship and asking questions with email mentors (or integration with real peple on the ground. Increasingly, there are followup software packages enabling web minsitries to integrate email mentors and followup to face-to-face ministry, both in the West and the non-West.

Where I feel most opportunities are being missed in web evangelism is the ‘bridge strategy’ – creating pages of interest to non-seekers on topics that actually interest them.

If you have a basic gospel presentation website, then either you need adverting strategies for people to find it (adwords, or offline, tshirts, flyers etc) which eg everystudent.com and connaitredieu.com go for. Or else you need to create material ‘further out’ to engage with anyone who is not actively seeking. Ie by definition, most people.

Most Christians who want to do some web ministry seem to stick in a Christian default mode, whereby they preach to the choir.

Just some random thoughts!

Bless you

Tony

[...] I am working on planning my course in Internet ministry, I am spending quite a bit of time reviewing possible books and other supporting materials. One [...]

Hi Dave,
I would encourage you to address what small to medium-sized churches can do on-line other than advertising. I think covering Web evangelism is really important, but I think there is also a component of Web ministry that the church is really missing. Most of the info I see is for parachurch ministries or individuals. How does all this apply to the local church in a practical way?
Blessings,
Lisa

[...] I prepare to teach my course in Internet ministry next semester, I have been meeting with several different individuals to try to get a diversity of [...]