-Blogging Ministry: Setting Up A Prayer Line

Prayer Lines are some of the most popular sites on the internet. Millions of people are looking for help everyday and many turn to some kind of prayer line to register their requests.

Many churches already have prayer circles and phone lines in place to accommodate their members and friends who need prayer for various reasons. I believe that blogging platforms provide a unique tool for expanding what the church is already doing and by making it readily available to their members 24/7. Not only that, it could become an outreach ministry for the church by making the prayer line public on the World Wide Web.

-Why Blogging? -A Bible Study Example

For years I have taught Bible studies at church and in small home groups, usually to groups of from 10-50. Last year I decided to put a Bible study on the internet utilizing a blogging program. It is not a very successful site and certainly not well known nor even that impressive, but it was read by over 75 different people last week, plus more (an undetermined number) accessed it through 43 feeds. In addition, they came to the site from 9 different countries. All in the last 7 days.

Now here is the best part. Nearly every lesson that I have posted so far is read by someone every week.

-Barna: The Techno Generational Gap in the Church

Research by The Barna Group shows that there is a major divide between different generations and how they approach the new media. This seems rather intuitive for anyone with grandchildren.

But it would be helpful for church leaders and outreach folks to get a hold of in order to plan a more effective ministry to different generational groups.  Most churches are adequately reaching the Boomers and the Busters but the church technology is way behind in addressing the younger generations where they live:

-Evaluating The Effectiveness of Your Internet Ministry

Is Your Internet Ministry Effective? Have You Checked?

Here is my take on the subject:

There are many different ways to gauge whether your Internet ministry is effective or not. A lot depends on your goals, objectives, and reasons you put up a site in the first place.

-Outreach Ministry on the Internet

Here’s an interesting story about different kinds of Christian outreach and evangelism on the internet. Included is a interview of the writer of "Holy Mama" Blog.    

-Updating or Changing Posts

Have you ever read a post on your blog a couple of days later (after publishing) and found words or spelling that needed to be changed? I just make the changes and usually go on down the road unless my mistake has been pointed out in a reader’s comment.

Mostly these amount to word usage mistakes that weren’t caught by the spell check–like there or their, to and too, accept and except, effect and affect. These type of changes are usually no big deal and really don’t affect the message.

-On Blogging: “Be More Than a Blip in the Blogoshere

Here is a good article on blogging from the Washington Post, by Dan Zak. It contains some good advise for those starting out and even for bloggers who have been around for a while. Read the entire article if you want you blog to reach a greater audience. The main points in the article are elementary but useful and profound. 

-Worship on The Web

There is an interesting article in the Washington Post about Worship on the Web. It starts out talking about how religion in general has become an important part of the web experience. Here is a short quote:

” “The first wave of religion online, in the 1990s, was mainly for nerds and young people and techies,” said Morten Hojsgaard, a Danish author who has written extensively about online religion. “But now it really is a mirror of society at large. This is providing a new forum for religious seekers.”

-Increasing Visibility and Traffic to Your Blog

There are a number of things that you can do to increase the visibility of your ministry blog and the number of different people actually visiting your site.  Are numbers all that important?  Ask a Pastor if he or she would rather have a growing church or a stagnant one.

A lot depends upon the goals and reasons you started the blog in the first place. 

-Why Blogging?: As an Additional Tool For Pastors

 Why Blogging? Because God and his son Jesus Christ need equal time in the blogosphere.

Pastors have so little real time to influence their people and blogging can extend and increase the opportunity to share the Gospel and the Christian world view not only with their own congregation, but also with anyone else who happens to come across the site. Best of all, blogging can literally be done at anytime, and the time investment is minimal compared with the possible results.

-Private Blogs for Youth Ministries and Church Groups!

 Blogs can be set up to reach only a private audience like Youth ministries and church groups. WordPress.com in particular allows for private sites for free. Groups can have there own calendar, communication, message, and feedback site. Passwords to enter as a reader/subscriber can be given to members only; while leaders maintain control over the site and its content.

-Re: Internet ‘Confessional’ Sites -A Potential for Ministry?

I had no idea that thousands of people every day were confessing their sins on the internet until I ran across it. Thousands apparently sense a lack and a need in their lives and are turning to the internet for answers and absolution?

-Why Blogging? -A Ministry or A Hobby?

 Millions of people are involved in blogging, look at blogs everyday, and search the internet. There are 10s of millions of blogs that post about religion and proudly wear the title of ‘Godblogs’ and probably even more websites that can be identified as religious.

Many of those sites are produced by the writers as a hobby, and then there are other sites which are obviously designed to be an internet ministry.

-Why Ministry on the Internet and Blogging?

Soon nearly every family in America rich or poor will have a computer or access to one and/or a tablet or cell phone with access to the internet. Internationally, the internet is growing at a phenomenal rate. As a media for ministry the potential is really unlimited.

It is really amazing how many people can be reached and how many nations can be touched by a very simple ministry located on the World Wide Web.

-What is RSS? And Why is it Important?

 Among the many confusing terms that you run into when you are just starting out in the blogosphere is “RSS”. Yet this term is of prime importance to understand if you are going to expand the influence of your blogging ministry.

What is RSS? Simply defined it stands for : Really Simple Syndication.

-Youth Ministry: "Online Missions Trip"

 According to a MinistryToday article written in 2009:

“On Feb. 1 youth groups around the world will be going on a two-week missions trip—from the comfort of their homes.”

A new ministry called ‘Online Missions Trip’ is encouraging young people to evangelize via social networking Web sites like Facebook, MySpace, and World of Warcraft. Tim Schmoyer, pastor of student ministries at Evangelical Covenant Church of Alexandria in Alexandria, Minn. talks about the new online missions ministry for youth:

-Writing Titles for Your Posts–Some Good Suggestions

Here’s a good article from DailyBlogTips: “Write Your Titles CAREFULLY and AFTER the Post”

Daniel Scocco writes that titles are important and more time and effort should be given to composing the best possible headline for a post. It is a fact that most decide whether to read an article or not based upon the title alone.

-Comment Policy–Why it’s a Good Idea!"

Anyone who’s been publishing a blog for a while has received comments that are inappropriate for a Christian site–comments full of obscenities or bearing links to pornography–or comments that you would rather not have published on your blog.

There are always those Christians who consider it their mission to drop pre-written articles into the comment line of any post that comes close in anyway to their specialty issue. Mention ‘baptism’ in a post and you might receive an unsolicited 2 page teaching on "why infant baptism is a false practice"–posted on the comment line. You may even agree with the teaching but it really doesn’t respond in any way to the original post–what do you do?

-Getting Started: Choosing a Host for your Blog or Website

There are so many host sites anymore that is confusing to a beginner and even to someone like me who has been around for nearly ten years. To find the best current host for you site--'google:' 

best blog hosts or 

 best website hosts or 

top ten hosting sites.

-Searching for the Best Domain Names

 .com .net .info .org .us

The right domain name is extremely important to have yet few folks spend a lot of time coming up with the best Internet address possible for their blog or ministry site.

Remember, you have to live with the domain address and your target audience needs to be able to find you. Another aspect rarely thought about is the fact that the Internet is ‘international’ and whether you intend to reach out to the world or not folks from all around the globe will visit your site. The name should reflect well on who you are and what you intend to be doing in this international forum.

I know of one Christian who has a real popular blog site who is nevertheless considering a domain change because his address contains the word ‘naked’ as in ‘naked truth’ but ends up being blocked by some search engines as a potential porno site. The name is innovative and is easy to remember and creates attention—all of the things that you might want in a name except sometimes it gets the wrong type of attention.