What a nice deal. Imagine Fellowship, who’s been using Twitter as an integral part of their strategy for both during Sunday Worship and during the week, got a nice plug from Mashable in regards to their Twitter use.
Hope it builds them up big time!
Spending a few minutes on their site was encouraging though, and I’d recommend you check what they are doing and how they are using Twitter:
- A Twitter projector displays the texts of anyone who is signed up for Twitter. It allows our service to be as interactive as it gets.
- We live tweet our service every week for people who follow Imagine on Twitter but can’t make it to service. The live tweet gives a detailed “play by play” of everything that happens during service.
- A verse of the day is sent everyday from our pastor through @imaginechurch
- Twitter Bible Studies take place every so often and allows real time input from anyone following the Bible study.
- Imagine sends out the latest news and upcoming events through @ifannouncer.
- Imagine was recently recognized by Outreach Magazine for the way we us Twitter during service and to connect people. Imagine Fellowship has also been recognized by the San Antonio Express News and KLOVE radio for the innovative ways we use Twitter.
Has your church and/or ministry gone this far in regards to Twitter usage? What’s stopping you?
For my church, we are still at the before blogging stage. Lets not even talk about twitter.
hehe. one step at a time!
Oh I know, and you have a very good point. Its just challenging. You comments about being an educator are very appropriate.
would love to see pics on how this plays out in the actual service. it is a stinking cool idea though. WTG "if"
Here's an article and photo on how we do church at Imagine Fellowship (@imaginechurch)- http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/religion/Blest_b...
sweet, is there a bigger picture. Looks like you are using facebook or something on the screen. Is that right?
How do you handle hecklers?
thanks!~ this is great.
wow, very progressive. could be a great way to keep people up to date who can't make it, who want to find out more or those that could find out more.
I lead River of Life Church in Hot Springs, Arkansas and we are utilizing twitter in almost exactly this way. Instead of having just one designated person to tweet the services, we encourage our congregation to tweet and this creates an "open mic" type scenario and also builds community. By using the #rol hashtag, tweets are captured and fed into our church's blog (wordpress, by the way) at http://www.liveintheriver.com. We are not showing the twitter stream live during the service yet, but are considering that in the future. We utilize @rolchurch to communicate announcements, prayer requests, and encouragement. The daily Bible verse is a good idea that I will start tomorrow!
You can follow the church at @rolchurch and myself @benwiles.
Hey Ben! Great work! Our use of twitter includes the one person live tweeting the service being shown on the screen and going out so others that aren't physically in church can follow along. Everyone else is encouraged to tweet as well. Often, Pastor Kevin Joyce (@kevj) will host a "twitter minute" where people at church will answer a question and it displays on the screen. If you have any questions about how we do things, please feel free to drop us a line!
Cheers,
Nan
SWEET! thanks for stopping by!
excellent….
Ben,
This is awesome! great looking WP site!
i'm digging it! how long have you guys been doing it?
very cool
Hi! No facebook, just twitter on the left and video of the service on the right. We haven’t experienced any hecklers yet, everyone has been great. We do get a random tweet every once in a while from people not at church, but it has been very agreeable.