Welcome to January's issue of The Decapolis Review.

Prepare a Highway for Our God

Developing a successful church website that aims to ‘reach out’ to the community at large, whether they are churchgoers or not is indeed a complex task. Is it a painful process? Absolutely not! Is it worthwhile? Absolutely, yes!

The Church Website Design Project was established with the express intent of helping churches to recognise the changing trends in the way people communicate in the twenty-first century.

The internet is one of the primary modes of communication in today’s fast moving world so it is no surprise that an increasing number of people now turn to the internet when seeking information about the work of the Church and the Christian faith. Indeed, many outside the Christian community appear more comfortable going to the internet than to their local church to find out about what the Christian faith is.

Our work is based on:

1. over 18 months of research;

2. learning by experience;

3. working through a process of what works and what doesn’t;

4. filtering and refining the process of what works well into a model of ‘best practice’, which we aim to use to support all Christian churches, whatever their style of ministry.

When talking about developing a ‘modern’ church website I have been saddened to hear sometimes the words ‘We are not that kind of church’! One of the greatest strengths of the Christian Church is its variety, both in styles of worship and in community support.  To engage with the community a church has to be part of the community – and in the modern world of internet communication, this has become a key player in communicating with the world outside the Church.

Posters in town halls are fine, so are banners above church doors – all these things can help complement the work of a church’s online ‘web ministry’, but to exclude one of the primary modes of communication in the twenty-first century is, I feel, a mistake.

Many churches that we support come to us with a website already in place and are looking to improve what was 10 years ago an excellent website. These are usually no more than a handful of pages of service events and directions on how to get to the church. How does this information help support those in your community who do not attend your church? It is my belief that Jesus did not intend for us to minister only to those who come to our church doors. Jesus sent his Apostles out on an evangelistic mission – I strongly believe that we are all ‘apostles in training’ or ‘saints in training’; each of us has the capacity to take Jesus’ teachings into our daily lives. In the twenty-first century the internet lends itself perfectly to spreading the Word and Christian teaching and to be an extension of the early evangelistic mission to those that, in a very real sense, need the support of God’s love and the church physical, but do not know how to connect with that in a physical or spiritual way.  

I recently had the opportunity to meet with a group of dedicated and enthusiastic individuals from Fakenham Church in Norfolk who are working towards establishing a website editorial team, using the lay church ministry to complement the work of the clergy whose sermons will be published on the website on a weekly basis. These workshops are a way for us to get across the message to the church membership that the internet can be used to great effect to extend the work of the church into the wider community.

Not only has Christianity lost its grip upon British society as the main form of community building, but, so many people seem to be so eager to refer to themselves as “not religious.”  It seems everywhere I go people are quick to say to me, “I’m not religious.” It sometimes feels as though being “religious” is only for some, that having “faith” makes you mentally unstable. I despaired recently when I heard Tony Blair talk about his decision not to ‘advertise’ publicly his Christian faith whilst he was Prime Minister for fear of being labelled a “nutter”. So is the statement from our government leaders to be that it’s okay to have faith in God or be a Christian, as long as you don’t actually tell anyone?

As a Christian I remain open minded about most things related to the Christian faith, I refer to myself as a Christian first and an Anglican second. I enjoy talking to clergy about theological issues (albeit from my limited knowledge and experience), I don’t always profess to understand all that I hear, but I make a good attempt at doing so.  I still enjoy the process of listening to other points of view.  I find myself on most Sundays when I attend church thinking about ‘old ideas’ in ‘new ways’ because as a society we are changing rapidly and the way we interpret our faith is often as a direct result of the guidance of those around us as well as the way society is changing.

Therefore, the role we take in supporting churches is not simply to ‘advertise’ the work of the church, but to engage non-church-goers (as well as those who sit in the pews on a Sunday) to help prepare them and to bring them into the care and support of the church family.  We can be strongest together than alone. The process of self reflection is something none of us likes to consider. If we were to stand before God on the day of judgment and were asked the question: “Did you do your utmost in bringing others to me?”, think about the answer in the context of what I have written above and think about how, right now, you can allow us to help you make a difference to those in your community who you can help bring into the care of God’s love.

I am not an ordained priest, nor do I hold any qualifications in theology.  I also believe it is not my place to tell ordained ministers how to minister to those within their parish. I do, however, feel I have a calling as a Christian lay person to work for the benefit of God’s kingdom and it is through our research and understanding of the ways people communicate in the twenty-first century that we can support clergy and other church leaders to mould and shape their own method of communicating with the peoples of the world.

I was asked recently “Why should we consider helping those in other countries through the work we do on our website?” When a church has a website, parish boundaries dissolve, geographical borders fade away – leaving a united family under one God.

My answer to the person who posed the above question was simple. Show me in the Bible where we are told to only minister to those within our own immediate circle of people. Websites by their very nature are international and a church that has a website is an international church that has the capacity to minister to over 1 billion internet users worldwide. The ‘Highway’ referred to in the title of this month’s Decapolis Review is quite simply the ‘Information Super-Highway’ - the internet. Consider how an interactive, relevant and supportive church website of your own can help engage people across the globe with their own faith and relationship with God.

   
Daniel T. Gibbins
Operations Manager & Senior Project Leader