Internet ministry curriculum

So I have confirmed that I will have enough students to go forward with my course on Internet ministry next semester. So far I have five business students and four Talbot seminary students. I expect to get a few students from the Christian Ministries department and maybe a couple Intercultural Studies. The cap on my course is 16, so I have may have to turn some away.

I am beginning to work through exactly what should go into my course on Internet ministry. I am hoping that whatever work gets done in this course will be a first step toward a more comprehensive Internet ministry program here at Biola. My plans at the moment are for the course to follow a high-level format similar to this:

1. What is ministry?
2. The Internet as a tool for ministry.
3. How does the Internet change ministry?
4. Case studies: who is doing it successfully?
5. Developing a philosophy of Internet ministry.
6. Hands-on projects: doing it ourselves (runs concurrently throughout semester).

The folks at the Internet Evangelism Coalition (IEC) have put out a call to Bible colleges to teach Internet evangelism, which is one form of Internet ministry. They envision some sort of online course directed towards graduate students. They include a long list of topics the course would cover, such as:

• A Theology of Cyber-Space
• Cross-cultural Communication and Cultural Sensitivity
• Communicating with Post-modern Culture
• Incorporate Web Outreach Within a Wider Strategy
• Counseling In Cyber-Space
• Issues in Cyber-Ethics
• Email/Web Security for Missions

I like much of what the IEC has to say here and will incorporate some of it into my course. I will also bring in much of what I have learned teaching my “E-Business Strategies” and other Internet-related courses here at Biola.

What do you think should go into a course on Internet ministry? My goal is to find topics that are not going to be affected by every new technology that comes along but are instead strategic and longer-lasting.

Tags: Biola, internet evangelism coalition, internet ministry course, talbot

My next project

After I was done speaking at the Internet Ministry Conference last week, several people came up to me and asked “what is your next research project?” Several people suggested different areas of research, including a couple who offered up their own ministries as research subjects.

So, what is next? Well, there are two answers to that. First, my next big project is planning and teaching my course in Internet Ministry here at Biola.  This course is being advertised for students at the seminary (Talbot), the School of Intercultural Studies, and here in the School of Business. Here is the course description:

The Internet is the greatest communication technology ever developed by man. It is imperative that the Church learns how to use it to its fullest potential. This course will study the use of the Internet as a tool for ministry using a combination of lectures, case studies, and hands-on laboratory work.  Special attention will be paid to the effectiveness and limits of using the Internet as a ministry tool.

The course could take many directions and my hope is that several more research ideas will come from the course. Additionally, I may develop a textbook for these kinds of courses as there does not seem to be any yet. As I develop and teach the course I plan on blogging about it – so stay tuned.

The second answer to “what is your next project?” is that I will probably continue to dissect the data from my Internet ministry survey and continue to break down the results. These will also be posted to my blog.  If you have any ideas on what sorts of data analysis you would like to see, please let me know by commenting on this post or sending me an email!

Tags: internet ministry course, research