Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 In today's episode, we discuss seven reasons why your church needs to keep doing online services. We hope this conversation helps your church reach more people and grow. This is the reach right podcast.
Speaker 1 00:00:22 You're listening to the right podcast. The show dedicated to helping pastors and church leaders reach people the right way, hosted by me, Thomas Costello. And with me as always is my cohost Ian Hyatt. We're here to help you your church see more visitors and grow.
Speaker 0 00:00:50 Hey guys, welcome to the retrial podcast. Episode number 49. I am your host Thomas Costello. And with me as always is my cohost. I need you to hire you so used to saying that here I am. Hey, there he is, got a good topic today, and we're going to be talking about seven reasons why your church should keep doing online services. We think it's important for churches to keep doing them. And we have seven reasons why we think that's the case. Um, you know, I full disclosure, my church has to keep doing online services because we still can't meet in person. Uh, so that's the way things are here. Uh, you're a rare, you're a rarity right now. I would say. Yeah. You talk to a lot of churches. How many, I mean, are you still talking to some that aren't meeting at all in person I'd say
Speaker 2 00:01:37 In the last few weeks, about 90% are in person? Yeah, I would think, and then there's still a small handful that are waiting, but, uh, but yeah, 90%. So that's why I say you're a rarity. Yeah. So
Speaker 0 00:01:50 Yeah, for us, it's not a necessarily a legal issue. Like we're not under a mandate to not meet. There are churches meeting at partial capacity here in Hawaii. Uh, but um, if you know anything about the evangelical church landscape here in Hawaii, uh, property has been so expensive here for so long that churches for decades have been meeting mostly in schools here. Uh, so, uh, our church medium-sized church and it meets in schools and, uh, we have been kicked out of our school for over a year at this point. And, uh, we have occasional Friday night services at a sister church of ours that we're able to meet there, but yeah, having regular Sunday morning services has not been able to happen. We expect and look forward to getting back to having Sunday morning options. Uh, but even when we do, I suspect that we'll continue our online service, a system that we've been doing here. And so, uh, it's been really, um, it's been really good, I think for our church. Uh, it's not for everybody. I know, like, uh, I don't know what your thoughts are, but I certainly miss online our in-person services at my church. I'm sure you preferred in person over online, is that right? Oh,
Speaker 2 00:03:02 Absolutely. And we've talked about that before of course, but yeah, absolutely. Thomas, I definitely am old school that way. I guess, if you want to call it that way, I prefer in-person services. And as you know, we've been back in person for a while now at our church, just for, we have the luxury of owning our own building and all of that, and don't have the same challenge there, but I'm, I'm, I prefer the assembly of the saints.
Speaker 0 00:03:31 Yeah, I'm right there with you. So I, I, I personally prefer that, but I will say that I'm warming to the idea that it could be acceptable, that other people don't prefer that, uh, and there may be, and we'll talk more about this in some of our seven reasons here today. Uh, there is a good reason that we can possibly think of online services as being a co-equal if you will, uh, to in-person services. Uh I'm I guess you could say I'm on the fence on that. I think that there's all kinds of challenges that, that poses of how we disciple people in these ways. And if it's as if it's as easy to disciple people in online formats, as it is in in-person formats, but that's for another podcast, we'll tackle that then why don't I kick it off here? I'll hit the first reason why you should keep doing your church services online.
Speaker 0 00:04:20 Uh, even if you're doing in-person services, number one is you've already made the financial investment. Um, I think that that's not getting back, uh, you're not getting that money back. You're not, you can't sell it for what you paid for. It. You've put out probably a lot of money when the pandemic started out in kind of what we've seen is that most churches at the start of the pandemic, they made a big investment in video equipment, audio equipment, lighting equipment for making a studio, uh, in lots of cases, it's tens of thousands of dollars that we're talking about that churches have invested in this year. And I just hate the idea of that being something that was used for 10, 12 months, and then it just kind of goes away and doesn't serve a purpose anymore. So I think that you've made the investment. It makes sense to keep on going with this here, there is value to it, a value in it to some people, for sure. Uh, so yeah, the investment's already been made, so it's a sunk cost. So keep doing it. What do you have to add? Totally
Speaker 2 00:05:19 Agree. And I think the thing to also keep in mind is even pre pandemic streaming and better production was already getting church's results. So that was something that was already working. And actually, even when churches were fully in person, we've heard this over the years, Thomas, right? How many stories of someone watching online, maybe even for a month. And then they finally, because the teaching was speaking to them and they felt comfortable. They finally came in person. So it's something that was already getting churches results, but yeah, absolutely. You've already made the investment. I talked to a church a couple of weeks ago that told me, and this was a small mainline older church that spent $90,000 in yeah, just a tech upgrades for all of the things that you just mentioned. And so why would you want to throw that away? You may as well keep doing a great job of that. It's going to only, it's going to enhance your virtual only experience, but also your in-person experience for the example I just
Speaker 0 00:06:22 Gave you. Yeah, absolutely. And I think, um, all I'd say, I think it probably makes sense for most churches to continue to invest in this area because we think that, uh, the online is just as valuable today as it was, uh, during the pandemic. I think that there's this new world that we're living in. We talk about the, uh, digital default church, uh, where this is where people will always encounter you first, if you don't think that they're watching part of your service before they show up for the first time in person, even for those that will show up in person, I think you have another thing coming. This is something that we probably ought to keep, keep investing in. Not just, uh, because it's already been sunk, I think is something we keep going on. Yeah. And
Speaker 2 00:07:03 That's a good segue to the second one, all tackle that that results tend to snowball over time. So the reason to keep doing it is to measure things over an extended period of time. We've been preaching this to churches for a while, with all things marketing and web, you know, it is a marathon and not a sprint. The same thing will be said for your online services is that even if you've seen a drop off, because we've, we've seen over the last, you know, I guess even a little over a month, as churches have started to meet more in person that their online viewing has gone down. But that doesn't mean it's not going to spike at another time and continue to grow. And like you said, snowball, so this is, this is something that you want to measure over an extended time, just like all things, right? I mean, all things that you're tracking, whether or not that's baptisms, salvation, whatever it is, it's not something that you just want to look at for only the weekend of Easter, how many baptisms you had or new members or whatever. So, yeah, I think that's, that's one thing to keep in mind,
Speaker 0 00:08:10 I think, yeah, a really the perfect storm with the pandemic. So what happened for so many churches is that they had this huge influx of people watching online for the first time. And that's never really happened before in the history of like doing online content creation of any kind. So like the normal process is you put out a video YouTube, or you put out video content, you put out blog, any kind of content creation, you put it out and like three people watch it. Usually, you know, you have two people read this, your, your mom and your friends are the ones that are looking at this stuff because you ask them to, and then you're after you do it consistently for 10 weeks, maybe five people watch it. And then after you do it consistently for six, maybe a hundred people are watching it or 40 people are watching it and that's all wins.
Speaker 0 00:09:00 But what happened with churches during the pandemic is that we got this huge influxes week one, they're doing it for the first time. They have 150 people watching their, their services right out of the gate when this is their first time ever doing online services. And that's a huge win. But what was so disheartening is that we had to go from that the first time you did it, you have your highest numbers in a lot of cases. And then we saw the slow dwindle and my encouragement to pastors and church leaders listening to this right now is that don't let that get you down. I think this is something that, that is, um, that was a weird phenomenon. That was God ordained. And I believe God had his hand all over that. But the, the reality is they were always going to come down when, uh, when in-person options weren't available and people had to watch online.
Speaker 0 00:09:48 And so expect, now that now you're gonna have to do the hard part. You're gonna have to do the consistency where your numbers don't really change. Like even this podcast, it's something where the first couple of episodes we did, we had like, you know, five people listen the first week. And now we have hundreds of people listen every week. And it's something that, uh, it makes a really big impact. It's kind of a consistency thing. They used to keep taking place here. So, um, if you're one of those hundreds of people, thank you for being part of the retreat family. That means a lot to us, but yeah, stay encouraged with this. Your results will snowball, but this is not, we're not talking about weeks. We're talking about you. Can't just look at three months and see how it went. I plan on doing this for the next 3, 4, 5 years, and then take a big picture measurement of how things have gone. And I am very confident and you'll see growth over time in those things. If the content is good. Of course. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:10:40 That's what really matters. Definitely. So,
Speaker 0 00:10:45 Yeah, we'll get that. Um, number three is you need to keep doing online services because you will reach people. You would never reach in person. I can tell you, uh, just about every church tells us a story of someone who lives in another country or, um, hundreds of miles away that has been consistently and faithfully watching, uh, weekend and week out to their church services. These are people that would never have been reached, uh, if you were not doing online services, and this is something that has always been true, nothing to do with the pandemic. We've heard these stories for, for years and years. And I think it's really powerful. I I'm convinced that when we have this great commission to go into all the world and preach the gospel, I feel like this is the way that we'll be able to do that. I'm all for world missions and actually going to third world countries. But I can't tell you how many times I hear people from third world countries are hearing the gospel sometimes for the first time, because they're getting onto a church's website here in the United States or some English speaking country that we serve here. So it's pretty amazing to see that. So what do you have to add? Or you just reminded
Speaker 2 00:11:54 Me of what I heard years ago. We're talking, I heard this probably eight years ago from a pastor that was so excited about getting his sermons on his website and getting video up there. He said that a guy wrote in from Afghanistan saying that a thank you so much for your messages. We I've was watching the last two weeks and in my apartment and my friend who was a Christian ended up baptizing me in the bath tub so that he didn't get stoned or put to death out in public because obviously he was in a heart. He was an area that was very anti Christianity and so on. But that was like the biggest news. That was the biggest blessing to that. Pastor was even though this guy had never be a physical member, he accepted Christ. And that happened because of doing online services. So, so you think about those guys, you think about people out of state maybe. And then you think about like that shut in person. Of course, we've seen that for years, you know, that older person that just can't physically come and, and then people that will continue to, you know, like you said, remain virtual and maybe prefer that. So I
Speaker 0 00:13:02 Think there was, maybe you remember this, I think there was a time where we were worried that shut-ins, wouldn't be able to, to handle the technology that goes along with this. I think that's kind of, I think that, uh, the generation now that is becoming, we getting older, getting up there in the years, maybe not as don't have the kind of mobility, uh, that they used to have. They are kind of people that still use technology in the workplace, uh, at the end of their careers and a lot of times. And so, I don't know, I think we've been doing this for so long and that like 12 years ago, you know, people that were were shut-ins, they needed to have them cassette tapes delivered to them and that kind of stuff, but that's not the case anymore. Would you agree? Yeah, my father-in-law
Speaker 2 00:13:45 Has a smartphone now. He had a flip phone up until about a year and a half ago, and then my wife taught him how to use his smartphone. And now not only is he doing all sorts of stuff on his smartphone, he follows my son's baseball games when he can't physically come see that from an app, an app that talks to it gives the score in play by play. So he's, he's religiously following that on an app. So, and he's in his late seventies.
Speaker 0 00:14:10 Oh yeah. I think everybody, yeah, there you go. Anybody can do it that day. That's good. So pick number four. Yeah. The next generation
Speaker 2 00:14:17 Wants online options. So let's just transition from the older demographic. We were just talking about to the younger one. I mean, we know that it still is the case that the younger generation will rely upon technology more than the older generation, for sure. And so that's, that's definitely, hasn't changed even though the older demographics following much more and doing much more online, but they are going to want that option. You know, they're used to media at the, from the fingertips on their phone all day long, whether or not it's social media, what and so on. So I think they're going to want them prefer this. We also know now the younger generation does not attend physical church regularly, and this was pre pandemic again, you know, maybe twice a month, which was considered a committed member. And a lot of that would be the millennials and gen Z ears that maybe came that often. And they're going to want to catch that message maybe from their phone on the weekend. They couldn't make it or
Speaker 0 00:15:15 Whatever. Yeah. I caught an episode of church pulse, weekly, a great podcast out there. Um, I caught an episode a couple of weeks ago, uh, where they talked about there was a, uh, the younger, the generation, the less likely they are to attend church in person. We knew that already, that was, uh, you know, the boomers attend more than gen X attends more than the millennials attends more than gen Z. Uh, and it was the exact inverse when they talked about openness to online services, to going to church online, gen Z was very open to it. Millennials were somewhat gen X-ers were kind of open to it. Boomers generally, not very open to the idea of going to, uh, online services there. So, uh, I think that, um, there is a, if you're serious about reaching the next generation, uh, having options for them to connect and make connections online, I think that really makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 0 00:16:10 Now we will be the first to tell you that if your experience is completely online, uh, then you know, you, you need to give people options. I think gen Z, especially millennials, they are looking for places to connect with real people a lot of times in smaller groups. So you need to have these things in place for them, but an online Sunday morning experience. I really think there's nothing wrong with that. It's something we should pursue for people. So they're very open to it. Yeah, that's good. That's good. That's good. Number five. Let me hit that one. Um, in-person attenders want options when they're away. Uh, in person I'd like, so people that would normally come, uh, they would want to be there on Sunday mornings. Uh, they are traveling more and more nowadays. Uh, you and I both have kids that are in sports that used to be when we were kids sports didn't happen on Sundays.
Speaker 0 00:17:00 It was for church and not the case anymore. Right. So especially when you been in this weekend on Sunday. Exactly. Yeah. So same kind of stuff that we're experiencing. Well, when sports come back post pandemic for us here in Hawaii, but we expect to be back in that place soon. Uh, but you know, there's all kinds of reasons for it. Uh, I've seen people kind of suggest that while good attendance used to be missing maybe one or two weeks a year, uh, missing one or two weeks a month is still good attendance. If you're only showing up two or three times a month, that's a great attendance for a lot of people in churches nowadays, because of all the options and commitments and things that happen and travel and all that stuff there. So what is great is online options, lets people stay connected when they cannot be there for whatever reason that is. And I think that's just becoming and more valuable. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:17:51 And not much more to add there. Just that I think that just giving the option is good. People are traveling we're in the summertime right now, right? So there's there's vacations pre pandemic years ago, we would have churches that would really want to get online services going particularly in the summer and getting their website up to date because that's when people are traveling. And so there's all kinds of reasons and why not have the flexibility and the options. I mean, to be able to give people that because they need it, they need it for convenience and everything else. And I can't see there being any harm and in that, so absolutely good. So six here I'll, I'll get to and that's that people can have a genuine life giving relationship online. And so here's where we're going to, we could get a little bit, you know, I don't know if controversial is the right.
Speaker 2 00:18:42 I could, there could be a lot of difference in opinion on this. And I am, I'm considered, I consider myself more old school, like I said, and want to be, you know, I would love to fellowship in person. I like to go to church in person, even though I use technology regularly. And I think you and I both would prefer that. And you know, there's just more to that, but I mean, I've made friends online. That's completely normal now to where, if someone finds me through a friend of a friend on Facebook or whatever, and I've communicated with them online and maintain some closeness, even though I consider it, probably not the same as a personal relationship. How long has it been since you and I have seen each other in person
Speaker 0 00:19:29 Four years, maybe something like that we've been face to face. It's been a while. It would
Speaker 2 00:19:33 Have been a year less had the pandemic not hit, but we, yeah, that's right. We live in different states and we had a lot of EBIT, but we have these kind of zoom and slack meetings on a regular basis. And I can tell you, I still feel just as close to you as I did when we were living in the same city and neighborhoods that backed up against one another. Yeah,
Speaker 0 00:19:55 Yeah, absolutely. I'm with you on that. I think that there is this idea that I will say that it's harder. Probably we have to think more outside of the box. I think to get people connected and get them into life-changing life-giving relationships online, but they're happening all the time and this, this may sound weird and I'm, you know, this is, uh, we're evangelical Christians. So take that into consideration when we say this, but I look at all of the, um, the growth that we've seen in the, uh, um, in the LGBT community and people, I I've noticed that a lot of the connection that people that are in that community, that they make that connection in online communities, right? So people talk about, um, making major life decisions. Like, you know, as much as, you know, giving your life, Jesus is a huge, uh, treasure, a huge decision you have to make changing your gender is a huge decision that some people that, again, we're, we're, we're evangelical Christian.
Speaker 0 00:20:56 So we're not in agreement with that. But I will say that a lot of these people have found beyond the support and the, the, the, the guts yes. To make that kind of life decision in online communities. And I think that that's just, that just kind of shows you a lot of these people are very young. Uh, so I'm seeing all the time, younger people that are kind of confused and going through some of these kinds of transitions in their life. I, it's really interesting to me to see the way that they have kind of surrounded each other in online community. So I think that there's something to learn, uh, especially the way young people connect. You cannot tell me that they're not giving life, giving life, changing a foundation relationships they're not happening in online communities nowadays. So I think that there's a lot that we can grow in in this.
Speaker 0 00:21:45 And so that should be an encouragement to us that the potential is out there. Now, I am not saying that if you just put 90 minutes of content online, once a week, that you're going to be able to create real life-giving relationships and life change. It needs to be more thought out than that. But I think that if we are willing to pay the price and go deep on it, I said, really work hard at building online communities. This can be done. Like it was a perfect example, what you said, you and I, and our relationship. And I think our whole team at reach, right, right. Anybody on our team and our retry in person in at least since the pandemic, but I haven't seen it felt like we've missed a beat with our relationship at all. So it's something that I think churches can really run with, but you really need to be intentional about it and find ways to have a regular communication.
Speaker 0 00:22:35 Here's the one thing that I found, I heard this from Tim Keller, it was really interesting. He was commenting on how the online format as it is today. Yay. It's really good for top down communication. So pastor preaching to large groups of people, but it's not great for this kind of relationship, the interaction they have side of things. And that's where so much of the life of the church happens, right? Like it's one thing you listened to your pastor. I know you go to a large church and you listen to your pastor and he gives great messages. You have a great worship experience, but to really grow it's what happens in small groups. It would say, it's what happens in the foyer. It's the interactions you have in children's ministry. It's, it's that thing that when we were kids or whatever, it was a kid, uh, that we would stick around at church after church for like 45 minutes every time.
Speaker 0 00:23:23 And I wouldn't be begging my mom. Let's go, please. I'm so tired of being, I want to eat lunch. And mom would be stuck talking to everybody there at church, because that's just the way that it is. So that's not as easy online, like, cause you don't have that, that time that people can hang out and it's not as comfortable usually to type it into the chat. Hey, how are you doing today? And like kind of doing a type Fest back and forth there. So there's lots of challenges, but I w I don't want the church leaders that we serve to throw this out and dismiss online relationships as being second class to in-person relationships. I think that this is something we need to, we probably need to really think through. And I, we haven't found that perfect model to do this just yet. So rant over. That's all I have to say about that. I have
Speaker 2 00:24:10 A couple of just examples that came to mind. No, that's all good stuff. You shared Thomas. But so first of all, you know, my daughter's 12 and she does a bit of online gaming plays Minecraft, and we're of course, careful with, you know, we want to understand and know who she's connecting with, but this is something where people can join from all over the place. Like, so she has someone that she feels close to in the UK that she'll probably never see, but they join regularly and know stuff about each other. Now, again, you, as a parent and everything, you should be very careful to know who's on there. And we all know there's some danger there and all of that. So that's, that's a whole nother topic, but, and we're careful about that. But the interesting thing is, is that, you know, and while we, you know, everything in moderation is how we, we roll, right?
Speaker 2 00:25:01 So we make sure that she doesn't sacrifice her in-person relationships or friends that are in the neighborhood, or that she goes to school with for these online relationships. And so there's a balance to all of this. But the other example that came to mind is same thing with my son who plays Fortnite. He was playing with a guy, a kid that lived probably 30 minutes away from us, and he's my son, he's 10. And so he's playing with this guy and they'd Dave for months were playing. And then all of a sudden things started to loosen up out of the pandemic. This was over the pandemic, him and this other little buddy of his, they wanted to meet in person. So
Speaker 0 00:25:43 They had not
Speaker 2 00:25:44 Met before. And then they ended up wanting to actually schedule a play date to swim and, and they did that. And it was a really, it was a really interesting thing. So on the flip side, yes, you can have genuine relationships that are life-giving online, but I did think it was interesting that even a 10 year old kid and these kids that are in virtual Lala land these days still wanted that personal, you know, even with being online one or to try to connect in person. So I think it is, that's
Speaker 0 00:26:15 What I said. I said, I'm still there too. Like, so I'm still totally there. I, I desperately cannot wait to have a Sunday morning worship experience at our church. Again, we're very excited about that. Uh, I just know that there are, I think, especially for people that don't have a history of being involved in church, uh, that are, they don't have a relationship with Jesus. This is a much more approachable place. And maybe there's going to be people that have their initial life-giving community happen online. That could be a possibility. Uh, I don't see a lot of good examples of that happening all the time consistently yet, but I think that really is the future for a lot of churches right now. So yeah,
Speaker 2 00:26:56 One last thing I'll say to that, that end is I gave non church examples with my kids and everything. So what you just said, I think is a really good thing to, to, to close on on this point is that it is different when people are, like you said, if someone is unchurched or they maybe haven't been to church in a while, there's a lot more apprehension that they have to get physically connected to a church compared to playing an online video
Speaker 0 00:27:19 Game. So it's a different
Speaker 2 00:27:22 Story when we're talking about God and spirituality. So I think that's a good, I'm glad you touched upon that, but the examples we gave the non church examples still show how this relationship slowly building can happen. Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 0 00:27:34 So, all right, let me finish this off with number seven, uh, online services, they actually level the playing field for smaller churches. And let me explain what I mean by this is that there there's so much that, uh, that money can bring to a church experience and larger churches. I know your church, I'm sure when you guys just built that amazing building, you put up there, and I don't know what the sticker price on that was, but it was alive. We have millions and millions of dollars, right. But money that most churches won't ever see. Uh, and so, um, and it makes for a really great in person experience, whereas smaller churches can sometimes, you know, they, they can do things with smaller budgets and there's all kinds of ways to do that. But there are a lot of just limitations when you're a smaller church and resources that you lack that doing an in-person service.
Speaker 0 00:28:23 It can be really hard. You turn that all on its head. When you get into online services is for first smaller churches. You know, you've already made some kind of an investment in this, and really you can produce really great content that can be life-giving on a very small budget. There's, there's fantastic. YouTube offers out there that are able to create great YouTube content, uh, that have just their phones that they're doing it with. Or they're just using a small DSLR camera. They have $1,500 of camera equipment and sound equipment. And they're doing the whole thing off of that now. Yeah. It takes a certain level of talent to do that kind of stuff. And that's something that you need to, we all need to grow in is getting better at talking to cameras. I know you and I have grown at that in this time doing the podcasts. We didn't do a lot of camera talk like this here. And so it's something that everybody can grow in, but yeah, it really does serve this purpose of it. It makes it so that smaller churches can have just the same level of reach as some of the largest churches in the world. And I think that's really something to be excited about. What do you have
Speaker 2 00:29:25 To add? It's really neat also to think about how many churches I spoke to over the pandemic. Like we heard, we had the pleasure here at reach, right of working during that season, uh, with a lot of smaller aging congregations that had never invested in an online presence, or whether it be a website or just being visible online, or like we're talking about online services. And they came out of the woodwork because they realized they had to have it now. And so it was great for us to be able to help these smaller churches that needed to grow more than churches like mine. And we've helped churches like mine too. We love every size church. And, but during that season, uh, we heard and worked with more smaller churches. And the neat thing was that these pastors that started, they started getting so excited when they all of a sudden, maybe before, if they were doing online, they had like 10 people maybe watching online in a week, if that, and then it skyrocketed to like 250 people following them.
Speaker 2 00:30:29 And that's, that's a big number for a small church. All of a sudden you got an, and it made, you know, that used to be only for the, you know, the big mega sized churches or the big personality, the big mega sized pastors and preachers out there that do preach great. We're all for that. But for these smaller churches, they were on a leather level playing field, especially if the production quality was good and they weren't just throwing something up there. But the excitement for that kind of growth was just great to hear from these smaller churches we got to.
Speaker 0 00:31:01 Yeah. I've never pastored a large church. Uh, we wouldn't say. And so, um, I know that for me, uh, we've always in the churches, I've pastored, we've always really focused on online options. We've done in-person options and we've never been huge there, but online, it's really amazing the kind of impact you can make. I shared before about how we've had pod or I guess blog posts, uh, that I, I wrote years ago at the last church that I pastored that have reached like hundreds of thousands of people at this point with the message of Jesus. And so it's really incredible that you can have that kind of impact. And that's just a blog post. That's not even a video or any of that kind of content. You just hit the right, the right servant. Now there's lots of blog posts and videos. We did that only a hundred people saw it. So it's not to say that every single one is going to be a home run, but if you get that good piece of content, even a very small church can have an enormous, enormous reach. And that just 10, like we said before, it tends to snowball over time. So as you continue to do that and you'll see even more results, so anything to add, no,
Speaker 2 00:32:07 No, I think this, hopefully this was helpful to a lot of pastors and ministry leaders out there and our listeners, I think it just is an encouragement because we are transitioning right now into this post pandemic and thank God for churches coming back in person and things, getting more back to normal. And so we're very excited about that, but I think this is hopefully timely for many pastors that are considering, oh, well, how much do we continue to investor or do with online? And I think hopefully we've encouraged pastors to keep that up.
Speaker 0 00:32:40 Yeah. I think that's a good thing to finish on is just, if you are looking at your results right now, and it looks like it's been kind of a, uh, a downward slope, uh, since March of last year, when you started doing online services for the first time, um, you're looking at too short of a time horizon. Uh, don't don't judge your results based on, you know, where you were and how it's only been going down really, uh, have a longer time horizon because I assure you that online is not going away. That the desire for online services, especially for younger people is only going to grow as time goes on here. So don't look, you can't look at one year of results and say, that's it. We tried it, it didn't work. It just kept going down, um, have a longer time horizon. And I believe the results are out there for a lot of our audience here. So I hope that's been an encouragement to you guys today. If this conversation has been helpful, it would mean so much to us. If you would rate review, subscribe, give us a comment, give us a, share a that's how we get the word out about this podcast. Thank you so much for being a part of our reach right family. And we will catch you guys next week. <inaudible>
Speaker 1 00:33:51 Thanks for listening to the reach right podcast. We hope this episode will help you reach people the right way, looking for more resources for your church. Check us out online at reach, right studios.com. If this episode has been helpful to you, it would mean the world to us. If you would rate, review and subscribe on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks again for listening. And we'll see you next week. <inaudible>.
