There have been a number of articles recently on this subject – here’s yet another one from Houston about tweeting in church.
I love the quote from one pastor mentioned in the article:
“It’s a tweeting, Facebooking, MySpacing world,” said (Pastor Rudy) Rasmus. “For a church to ignore that is literally kind of diminishing the influence of current culture, and many churches miss that influence — and ultimately miss a demographic of possible attendees.”
So . . . you’ve heard it said:
“What happens here, stays here.” Catchy slogan for Vegas, but it makes no sense for churches.
One of the positive uses of this technology is to break down the walls of your non-church-going followers. I would assume – or at least hope – that believers who tweet also have plenty of non-believing followers. If you have a solid group of local friends following you, this pulls back the curtain a little bit about what happens behind the walls of your church building. Tweets are often remembered and talked about in other offline venues (over the phone, at our kids’ football or soccer games, or in conversations with neighbors) – you want to invite a question from your non-believing friends about your tweets during the assembly. Done right, these could lead to conversation starters.
During this discussion of tweeting during church, naysayers often point to the fact that it is “distracting” or that parishoners will not be paying attention to the sermon. I think that shows that we often have this cave-like mentality when we go into our sanctuaries as if we lose touch with what influence we have outside. And it often tells alot about the minister’s pride if the deliverer of the message is so consumed by things distracting the listeners. If that’s the case, they were distracted long before they were tweeting. Perhaps they are not good listeners, or perhaps you’re not that interesting for 35 minutes.
Remember, our church-going experience is to send us out with a fire for sharing what we know and have experienced with Jesus. If part of the assembly draws the community of faith together (rather than feeling like we’re just “individuals” in the pews) and something of our weekend experience inside the walls of church opens up a conversation during the week, then it’s a good thing.
I was reminded of a tweet I heard this morning from one pastor (sorry, no appropriate attribution):
“I’m thrilled all of you are here this morning in church. But I’ll be even more excited at the end of the service to see you leave here.” He is thinking missionally and I believe the Twitter technology can be viewed in the same light.
What happens in church needs to be shared during the week.
-Randy
Vegas image credit: Wild Snapper