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Twitter ministry

Can the Church Let Go (and let God)?

Why Social Media Is A Tough Sell to the Church

twiListen to the Church’s official press releases:

It’s all about innovation. It’s all about transforming. It’s all about reaching people.

Examine the Church’s actions:

It’s all about keeping a tight rein on the way things have been for years and years.

The Church is sluggish in adopting the evangelism tools of our era. Its failure in this regard lies in its need to control. It enjoys hierarchy. They’ve worked hard at it for so long! Therefore, people will take part in dialogue upon invitation and with appropriate monitoring only.

It’s a risk for the people in the Church to insist upon a voice. Those that make it to the Regional and National Assemblies are pretty well vetted by tradition.

The pope tweets. It’s a newsworthy event.

The pope does not follow. Now, if he did, that would be news!

The few churches adopting social media tend to be independent “non-denominational” churches. Is it a surprise that independent non-denominational churches reach young people while the mainline church has dismal statistics with the under-50 population.

Mainline churches start Facebook pages, but don’t really use them. Pastors start blogging and quit after six posts. They use LinkedIn but keep their profiles private. They don’t really want to connect. They want people to come to them. Sunday morning works . . . or call the office for an appointment.

In order to grow, the Church has to let go.

Twitter has great potential for connecting. It doesn’t have to be time-consuming—although it can become an interesting place to spend some time! The connections possible in a few months of working in this medium could be AMAZING.

The results are predictable only in that they will change the Church’s outlook. They would start to connect with the people they dream of reaching.

Here’s a fascinating experiment. A country opened a Twitter account totally run by its people.

Please watch it and think how this might transform the church.

What would happen if your congregation opened a Twitter account and your members took turns running it? (Click to Tweet!)

Ask your evangelism committee to consider it!

Make sure you get your pastor’s approval first. :-)

19 Dec 2012

A Twitter Trick That’s Easy and Extends Reach

twitter-follow-achiever-1Thinking of something to tweet can be extra work for bloggers who spend a great deal of time as it is on their posts.

There is a neat little app which takes seconds to use that can help turn your gems of wisdom into a tweet.

 

 

Click to Tweet.

Highlight your tweetable thought in your blog post and copy it.

Go to http://clicktotweet.com/home?clicktotweettabs=1

click-to-tweet

Before you forget bookmark this page so you can return to it easily and quickly.

Paste your tweetable text in the large white box. Edit it to fit if necessary.

Click Generate Link.

A short url will appear in the gray box.

Copy the url link.

Return to your blog post in editing format.

Either highlight the tweetable text or type in “Click to Tweet” at the end of the segment you want to tweet.

Add the link.

You’re done. Takes about 30 seconds.

Now if your readers agree that what you have written is worth sharing, all they have to do is click the link and off it goes.

You’ve expanded your reach to that of your readers.

14 Dec 2012

Twiitter Gently

One of the first things you will encounter when you join Twitter is the self-serving tweeter who bombards followers with sales pitches ten times a day. A real turn-off for the whole platform.

No one likes to be sold. Especially in matters of faith.

Your tweets should be a gentle and welcome presence in your followers’ online life.

twiMy early experience on Twitter was negative. I followed a couple of local people I know. Every time I opened my Twitter account there was a sea of invitations to seminars from these two people. No business tips. No inspiration. I stopped opening my Twitter account. I’m still working to overcome that aversion.

Approach Twitter with the intention of helping other people. Ask yourself what kind of message you would welcome. Peruse the messages of the people Twitter forced you to follow to get going. Which are fun and helpful? Which are shamelessly self-promotional.

I followed National Geographic as a neo-Twitter user. They don’t overdo it and their tweets link to fascinating articles that have impacted my thinking.

Inc., on the other hand, bombarded me with pop-up ads—so many that I wanted to quit the whole program. I couldn’t even see what they were about for all the ads. I will be glad to “unfollow” them, no matter how great they may be.

Some others have linked me to blogs that have been inspiring, providing plenty of fuel for my own writing. I will enjoy following them and when the relationship is built, I may do business with them.

Use your experience to imagine how your tweets will be received. If you don’t care about your readers beyond the numbers, if you don’t mind tricking and manipulating them, then copy the techniques of those that treat their followers as targets. If you want to build long-term relationships that are two-way, craft your tweets to enrich the lives of your followers — not your pocketbook.

09 Dec 2012