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Social Media Strategies for Today's Church

Mark Forrester

• Publisher: Salubris Resources
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781680671841
• eBook ISBN: 9781680671858
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Church

Every church has a story that can change the course of people's lives—but how do you share that story beyond your four walls? Throughout these pages, you'll find simple strategies for creating powerful content that can connect your church to the people who need the life-changing story of Christ. Leading church communications specialists break down complex social media themes, providing accessible, practical answers to questions that all churches face, such as:

• What should I be posting based on my goals?
• How do I use social media as a tool to foster community?
• How do I get the people I'm trying to reach with social media?

With this book, your church will be ready to reach one of the biggest missions fields today: the billions of active users on social media. Topics include:

• Why Social Media?
• Content Strategy
• Story: Your Church's Story & God's Story
• Connecting with Your Church
• Reaching Your Community

Includes recommended books, websites, blogs, and other tools to help you develop your social media presence.

Chapter 1
Why Social Media?

YEARS AGO, I REMEMBER VISITING THE NATION OF ENGLAND’S website after I heard that the engagement of Prince William and Kate Middleton had been announced on Twitter. The website’s front-and-center call to action was to become a fan of England’s Facebook page.

In 2011, some 3,400 miles away in the Middle East, Facebook reportedly played a key role in stirring up the 2011 revolution and subsequent overthrow of the government in Egypt. When the government there shut down Facebook to keep people from exposing its atrocities, people took to the streets for weeks until the government and its leaders were toppled. Facebook has been so influential in giving people a voice and mobilizing protests that people in the Middle East have even named their children Facebook! Don’t believe me? Check it out at www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1358876. In America, headlines often break on Twitter before the major news outlets can announce them.

Social media has not only changed our daily routine, relationships, and the way we relate to the world, it has also, quite literally, changed our world.

So when we ask, “Why social media?” we have to first realize the powerful force it has become and then ask, “How can the church leverage this power for the gospel?” How can we take the most creative and dynamic innovation of the twenty-first century and use this technology to tell the greatest story ever told in fresh new ways?

Social media offers tools to share your church’s news, but more importantly it gives you the potential to reach hundreds or even thousands of people who may never step foot inside the doors of your church. Not only is social media a mind-boggling opportunity, I and my friends who share in this book believe it is a sacred responsibility: “From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded” (Luke 12:48).

In this chapter, we’ll ask and answer some questions to help you make decisions about how (or if) your church will engage in social media by exploring its impact on the church and communication thus far. Here’s a quick overview of the questions we’ll answer:

•Has social media been destructive or constructive for the church? (Todd Adkins)

•How is social media changing the way we communicate in our churches? (Brian Orme)

•Should my church be on social media? (David Drury)

—Matt Brown

HAS SOCIAL MEDIA BEEN DESTRUCTIVE OR CONSTRUCTIVE FOR THE CHURCH?

Todd Adkins, director of the Leadership Division, LifeWay Christian Resources

In the fifteenth century, Johannes Gutenberg invented a new technology that introduced the era of “mass communication” and ushered in a complete restructure of the society of the day. The printing press disrupted everything. For the first time, the circulation of information and ideas could move unrestricted across the boundaries of geography and social class. Within a decade, this free flow of information rapidly changed socioeconomics, religion, and cultures, not to mention toppling a few governments and institutions along the way.

Does this sound familiar?

Prior to the printing press, books were expensive and primarily owned by churches and educational institutions as nearly every book was painstakingly produced by hand. The creation of a book could take years—a process primarily reserved for scribes who lived in monasteries with a special room called a scriptorium. Books were considered precious objects containing special knowledge that was guarded by the church and educational institutions. If you wanted to get this special knowledge, you needed to show up when the doors were open.

Does this sound familiar?

It just so happened that the invention of the printing press occurred around the same time a radical cleric named Martin Luther penned his Ninety-five Theses railing against the established church. Thanks to the printing press, his writings could now be widely distributed, leading to a little thing we call the Reformation. Don’t miss the fact that the printing press used to print indulgences was the same one used to print Luther’s broadsheets opposing indulgences, which ultimately ushered in the Reformation. Was the invention of the printing press good or evil? The answer, of course, is neither. We should never confuse the medium with the message.

You might wonder if social media has been destructive for the contemporary church because of stories you’ve heard. You may be asking: Isn’t social media just full of garbage and the worst parts of our society? The reality is that Christ called us to be salt and light, going into all of the world to meet people where they are and to share the gospel message of Jesus Christ.

Today, we face a stark reality that “where they are” is on their smartphones. According to the most recent Total Audience Report¹ from Neilson, well over 80 percent of consumers use smartphones, and those smartphone users are checking their phones almost 150 times a day! What are they checking the first thing in the morning, the last thing at night, between lunch breaks, bathroom breaks, and commercial breaks? Social media.

When the apostle Paul came to a new place, he immediately went to wherever the people were: the town square, the synagogues, the local Mars Hill. Consider his words in his first letter to the church of Corinth: “To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people, so that by all possible means I might save some. I do all of this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings” (1 Corinthians 9:22–23).

As someone who’s passionate about developing leaders and equipping the church to be the church, I see a huge need for engaging the culture where it is today. We must raise the cross once again at the center of the conversation, wherever that may be. Is it safe and constructive to engage in social media? Is it a clean environment? Can I fully control it? No, actually it’s sometimes extremely destructive, dark with porn, gambling, and other unpleasant things. However, let’s remember that the gospel wasn’t manifested in Pleasantville or Mayberry. Our Lord and Savior was hung on a tree between cursing thieves by men who mocked Him and gambled for His clothes. He gave His life in that kind of place for that kind of people.

Ultimately, Jesus and His followers were about reaching people—and people are what today’s church should be about as well.

HOW HAS SOCIAL MEDIA CHANGED COMMUNICATION?

Brian Orme, content director, Outreach, Inc.

“What are you doing?” I asked my teenage son, Noah, in the car on the way to school. He was fidgeting with his phone, and it looked like he was hiding something.

“Nothing, Dad,” he said.

I put on my parenting face and asked, again. “Noah, tell me what you’re doing, right now! Who are you Snapchatting?”

“All right! Sometimes I send a verse to my friends in the morning to encourage them; that’s all.”

“Oh, uh … carry on.”

As a parent, this was one of those cool, “we-did-something-right” moments. My teenage son was using social media to lift up others with the life-giving words of Scripture. A small parenting win! It’s also a poignant example of the way social media has changed the communication game.

As the content director at Outreach, Inc., I oversee numerous websites and social media communities. Through Facebook, our primary publishing platform, we share stories and build relationships with millions of people across the world. We see men and women give their lives to Christ, recommit to their marriages, decide to adopt or foster kids, and engage important issues like ending extreme global poverty or sex trafficking—all through the vehicle of social media. It’s humbling and inspiring at the same time.

Yet, social media is often messy, too. The conversations don’t always go as planned. Sometimes readers misunderstand our intent. Sometimes we do a poor job of communicating, and other times people are just, well, mean. Just like real life.

Social media is far from a communication utopia, but it’s radically changing the way we communicate with each other. How, exactly, is the rise of social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and Periscope changing the way we connect and communicate in our churches? Glad you asked.

•Social media is amplifying our voice to reach more people than ever before in history.

Just as the printing press revolutionized the way people communicated in culture-shifting ways, social media is expanding our reach today on a scale like no other in history.

Marshall McLuhan, writer, professor, and philosopher of communication theory, believed all technology is an extension of the human body: Wheels are an extension of the feet; radio an extension of voice; the printing press, the hands; guns, the fist.² I agree with McLuhan, and I would suggest social media is an extension of both voice and community. The potential for the church to amplify the most important message in history through social media is epic. Think about this: One billion people are active on Facebook, and one hundred million people use Instagram every month. Tom Webster, vice president of strategy at Edison Research, says 54 percent of all Americans have a profile on a social media site, and 23 percent of Facebook users check their account five or more times a day.³

Today, you have the opportunity to extend the gospel to more people than your physical ministry could ever do on its own. Why not leverage this tool to amplify the message of Christ—reaching out to the farthest corners of the world to extend the truth, mission, and love of God?

In his book, Flickering Pixels, Shane Hipps writes, “Christianity is fundamentally a communication event.… God wants to communicate with us, and His media are many: angels, burning bushes, stone tablets, scrolls, donkeys, prophets, mighty voices, still whispers, and shapes traced in the dirt.”⁴

If God used donkeys and dirt to communicate, I’m confident He can use social media.

Tip: Find out where the majority of the people in your church are already engaged on social media and begin there. Start with one platform relevant to your church and do it well. Don’t overload your church with every available social media platform

•Social media is accelerating the speed at which we communicate.

Early in world history, it took years for news to travel across the globe. Through technology, that gap was shortened to months, then days, then hours, and now it only takes a nanosecond. Today, disasters, world events, uprisings, and downfalls are relayed around the globe through Twitter, Facebook, and Periscope in real time. We can reach more people and reach them faster than ever before in history.

Tip: Using social media is not just about transferring information, but cultivating relational equity. Don’t look at it as another church program—or an extension of your weekly bulletin. Instead, invest in your people, listen to them, and learn to share amazing stories together.

•Social media is changing the way we see the world.

According to the Pew Research Center, about 71 percent of eighteen- to twenty-nine-year-olds cite the Internet as their central news source.⁵ We’re no longer waiting for local or national news broadcasts to tell us what’s happening in the world today. Instead, we’re using our mobile phones and social media. And, in doing this, social media platforms like Facebook are shaping the algorithms based on our behaviors—letting us select the most important stories in the world today through our clicks and engagement. The result? Social media is becoming the psychological stomping grounds for human beings to express what they love, hate, fear, and cherish.

We’re standing at such a unique time in history. In the coming years, we’ll see the impact of social media like never before, and if we use this tool wisely, our work for the gospel could hit a tipping point that changes history, once again, for the kingdom.

I hope your church will be a part of it.

SHOULD MY CHURCH BE ON SOCIAL MEDIA?

David Drury, chief of staff, The Wesleyan Church

Whether you lead a church or an organization that serves the church, ministry is complicated with cultural challenges our grandparents could never have seen coming. So why should we pay attention to social media in the middle of all this change?

I get it. I’ve been there. I’ve been a founding pastor of a small church plant where my cell phone was the only “church phone.” I’ve been in the middle of church fights and conflicts. Apparently, so have most church leaders. In a recent survey of U.S. pastors, 84 percent said they are “on call twenty-four hours a day.” Some 80 percent say they “expect conflict in their church” on a routine basis, more than h...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Foreword by Brad Lomenick
• Foreword by Justina Chen
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Why Social Media?
• Chapter 2: Content Strategy
• Chapter 3: Story: Your Church’s Story & God’s Story
• Chapter 4: Connecting with Your Church
• Chapter 5: Reaching Your Community
• Endnotes
• Resources Appendix
• Contributors
• Acknowledgements