The online church has been around for a while but is certainly picking up steam these days. After I had retired as Senior Pastor of Life Gate Church, Northstar Church based in Panama City, Florida, offered me a position as Online Campus Pastor. I thought this would be something I could do and enjoy in my retirement, so I said, sure. I’ll do it.
We’d had an online church where I was pastor at Life Gate. The way it happened was a young man named Caleb Robinson developed a desire to make online church happen at Life Gate Church and he did. Caleb was/is a young techie guy. I’m becoming one, not so young, but more and more techie. So, I have the upmost respect for a techie. They know what I want to know. They make it look easy what takes me days to figuring out. I heard Shack (Shaquille O’Neal) admit he was a techie. If Shack is a techie, then being a techie is fine with me. We pastors and leaders need to thank God for our young, and older, techie people. They push us into the future, into the next generation, and we, this generation preachers/leaders, resist going. We need to be pushed to keep up with what God is doing. We sometimes think we are God’s cutting edge. No. God’s already used us to cut. See, the Lord Jesus is Mr. Techie. I was 66 years old. Caleb was 20 years old. I listened to him, and we did Life Gate Online church. Caleb was hearing God.
I think sometimes we pastors get into the ditch Jesus spoke. It’s the ditch where the blind lead the blind and both end up in the ditch. We need the eyes of those who can see. I probably slowed Caleb getting Jesus online at Life Gate Church six months or longer. Caleb could see it. I couldn’t. How long do we pastors slow down what God is doing?
Today, I am the Online Campus Pastor for Northstar Church in Panama City, Florida because Caleb taught me something. I learned some things about how to do what I do today from Caleb. I didn’t learn so much about the online intricate aspects. I had to learn much of this on my own, but what I learned is online, in my opinion, is a place where God is mightily moving.
Let me tell you what we at Northstar Online Church do every week with Online Church now I have had an inside the box view. Last Monday night we had people watching online church from all around the planet. We had viewers from: Canada, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Macedonia, Montenegro, Morocco, Serbia, Spain, Italy, as well as the United States. It’s this way every week. It’s amazing to us how this happens. How do nations find us? Answer: God. I asked someone today, “Imagine if Apostle Paul had the internet. What could he have done with an online church?”
Share your thoughts.