Can blogging help your church?

One of the guys that goes to The Journey Church asked me if I blogged and pointed me to an article at churchmarketingsucks.com. At their site they mentioned an article by Ken Gosnell where he gives four reasons why blogging can help your church. When I saw that it was a lifeway.com article, I was a bit suspect. They're not exactly on the cutting edge, ya know.

So I read the article and did a little poking around. Gosnell may be a consultant, but I'm not sure he's a veteran blogger. I'm a bit taken back that Lifeway would feature an article by a guy that, from what I can find, has been blogging for two months. Huh? Am I missing something here? Nevertheless, here's my take on Gosnell's article.

Gosnell says that: 1. Blogging will bring churches closer together as it closes a communication gap.

He speaks of this primarily as a way of communicating vision to the church that gives people the ability to share ideas and thoughts in a timely way. I think it might work if the people that participate didn't grow up in a churched setting. If churched people comment and participate, the likelihood that they'll shoot an idea out instead of shooting at the vision is pretty slim. On the other hand, if you can get unchurched or recently converted unchurched people to participate it might work. I'm still cautious about buying into this point. Blogging for vision casting might work in my context . I'm just not sure how.

Gosnell says that: 2. Blogging will help to develop sermons and classes.

I want to know how he's done this successfully. By that, I mean how has he personally gotten a broad spectrum of people to participate in the sermon building process? At the risk of sounding cynical, it seems more like a "geez, this is a great idea and it would really change how messages are prepared and delivered" more than "here are a half dozen sermons that have been developed using the process I described". I'm not buying what he's selling so far.

As for me, I've always tried to listen to people and see what their issues are in life and I would welcome a way to expand that. I think blogging could be a great way to get ideas and life stories (used with permission of course). Bottom line: I'm not from Missouri, so you'll still have to show me this one will work.

Gosnell says that: 3. Blogging will break down barriers and remove masks.

I'm totally in agreement with this one. I think it's great for people to see what I listen to, read, think (but not everything) and do. It seems like the post-modern generation values transparency highly. I've never been one to play games. I say take me for who I am, not what you want me to be. When Gosnell says, "People experience significant freedom to communicate when blogging", I say make it known that "Anonymous posters will be deleted and placing of verbal IEDs is not acceptable."

Gosnell says that: 4. Blogging will help the church to engage the culture.

Maybe. People that make up the blogosphere account for less than 4% of the American population. My guess is that many bloggers lean to the techy/geeky side. Granted, culture is being engaged, but the slice of culture you're engaging isn't that big. On our church's account, it's probably not a bad idea.

All that being said....

I'm open to exploring blogging as a tool to engage culture but I don't think it's the next big thing in breaking down communication barriers in or into the church. I do think it has a niche in the communication matrix of a church. I'm just not sure how it's going to work for The Journey Church yet.