Proposed chapters for book on online ministry

As many of you know, this year I am working on a book about online ministry strategy. It is tentatively titled God In The Tubes – you can read about the origins of that name in one of my previous posts. As I complete sections of the book, I am posting portions to my blog as a way to get some feedback on what I am writing. After my first posting, I was asked if I would post a high-level outline or table of contents so that those providing feedback would know where I was heading and could provide better feedback. Well…your wish is my command! Below is my current thoughts on the chapters in my book, complete with title and a short summary of what will be covered. This may change over time as I evolve the book, but most of what I want to cover is here.

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God in the Tubes – Proposed Chapters

1. “God in the Tubes”: this chapter will be in an introduction to the book and will cover some initial concepts, such as a history of technological innovations, an overview of the Internet’s creation, and some thoughts about how God has played a role in wiring the world.  Part of this chapter has already been published in my previous blog post.
2. “Developing a Theology of Change”: this chapter will discuss how one should view change and how we can go about integrating the Internet into our churches and ministries.  A focus here will be on how the forms of ministry should change while the functions of ministry cannot. I will then discuss the limits of these changes and discuss how you determine what is appropriate and what is not. I will refer to works by Aubrey Malphurs and Shane Hipps in this chapter.
3. “A Post-Website World”: this chapter will try to ground the reader in the concept of streams. We are now in a world where the organizational website is not the primary way that your audience will interact with you. Instead, we must determine where our audience is and go to them.
4. “The Internet Ministry Framework”: this chapter will give an overview of my Internet Ministry Framework and review the three components of it in some detail: technology, people, process.  Many of those doing Internet ministry feel that the technology is the key component to success, but it is not. It turns out that people and process are the hard part and the key to success. This chapter will also incorporate the results of my best practices research. It is possible that this may be broken into multiple chapters.
5. “Strategic Planning”: this chapter will walk the reader through the strategic planning process using my Internet Ministry Strategy Worksheet.  This may be broken into two chapters: strategic planning and implementation.
6. “Moving Forward”: this chapter will focus on what to do after you have your ministry up and running. It will discuss possible futures and how to keep your online ministry from getting stale.

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So there it is, at least as I have it right now. I have already written parts of every chapter, and much of this has been blogged about or been presented at conferences as well.  If you have feedback on these proposed chapters, please let me know!  The idea is that this book could be used by anyone in ministry: a single person, a ministry organization, a church, etc., and that the concepts and strategy used in this book could be adapted for their use. Most likely I will be including a companion website that will add tons of additional resources.

So, what is the schedule for getting this done? Well, my first draft of this should be ready in time for my summer class on this subject. I will let my students read it and give me feedback and then, this fall, I will make changes as I feel necessary. Because I have been focused on getting this done for my summer class, I have not shopped it around to any publishers yet – if any of you have a suggestion for a publisher, let me know!

God in the Tubes

As I have mentioned several times this year, I am on half-sabbatical through the end of 2010. The key project I am working on during this time is the writing of a book of the use of the Internet and social media for ministry. The book will be based on the research and experiences I have had over the last four years as I have spent much of my time focusing on Internet ministry.

I am not writing the book as a “how to” book that tells you how to create a website or Facebook page. Instead, I am aiming for a higher road: this book will talk about a philosophy (or dare I say a theology) of using the Internet for ministry.  It will cover strategy and planning.  The primary audience for the book will be anyone who wants to use the Internet or social media for ministry. It will give them an introduction to how to think and plan for doing so. Even those who already have an online presence will get value from this book as it makes them think deeper and differently about the Internet. › Continue reading