Book Review: SimChurch
Just this weekend I completed reading SimChurch by Douglas Estes. For those of you unfamiliar with this new movement, the idea of online church is not just putting a recording of your church service online. Instead, it is actually conducting an entire live church service online, complete with worship, teaching, offering, fellowship, and possibly even communion and baptism. This can include both churches with Internet campuses and those who conduct services in virtual worlds, such as Second Life. The author tackles questions surrounding the validity of online church and asks some tough questions. He ends the book by challenging online churches to break the mold and attempt to do things that no physical-world church can.
If you have read this blog before, you know that I have been a critic of online church. However, as a lover of technology and the Internet, I am always open to thinking in new ways about things and want to see how technology can be used to share the message of Christ. But I am also a realist: I know that just because we can do church online does not mean that we should. So I read this book with an open mind and heart – looking for new ways of thinking about online church.
Book: “Church Next”
Over the past several months, I have been reviewing books for my course on Internet ministry, trying to narrow down my choices and select books that will be most appropriate for the class. My goal for these books is that they would provide a range of views on Internet ministry, with an appropriate mix of theology, philosophy, strategy, and technology. I am NOT looking for books on how to create a web site or how to blog, etc., because these are secondary to first really understanding the concepts of online ministry. I also want books that are readable by the mix of students I will have and that will foster good discussions.
I have finally settled on three primary books for my course (though I still have a couple I am thinking about adding). Over the next few weeks, I will share my selections here on this blog. The first book I have selected is Dr. Aubrey Malphurs’ Church Next. Written with his son, Michael, I found this book to give a good overview of the current state of the Church and makes a great case for why the move to the Internet is the right one. For those who do not know who Aubrey Malphurs is, he is Senior Professor of Pastoral Ministries at Dallas Theological Seminary. He is also the head of the Malphurs Group.
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Welcome to Lessons From Babel
This blog is where I share the latest thoughts on my research in the world of Internet ministry. Feel free to join the conversation by leaving a comment. For more information on what I am doing in 2010, see my first post of the year. To find out more about me, my company, and this web site, or to see what resources are available on this site, click on the images right below this.
- Dave Bourgeois
