Nick Charalambous, who was once the Online Community Pastor at NewSpring Church, has a new title: Storyteller.

It seems only reasonable that one of the first things he does is tell the story of how NewSpring Church launched and then took down their Online Campus:

From the early excitement about how Web services could pioneer a new frontier in church growth, offering a response to a post-Christian world where “going to church” is not the first or natural place one thinks to encounter a life-giving spiritual message.

To a prophetic recognition that our use of the Web will radically and inevitably reshape the way we minister to one another and worship.

To a sobering view of the practical challenges of ministering in an online environment where the motivations, learnings, and behaviors of attenders are hard to fathom and even more difficult to guide.

Read more after the jump…

And finally — now — to a theological “peace” about the fact that worship on the Web is just another tool in realizing and actualizing the “visible church.” As messy, flawed, inspiring, and incomplete as any gathering of believers in a sanctuary in Anytown, USA.

The last month of silence on this blog has coincided with a refining of the vision of the NewSpring Web Service that focuses the vision, resources and efforts of everyone on our team toward maxing out our opportunity for evangelism.

There’s a lot we don’t know about how to “do church” online. And we want to be humble as we seek to shepherd people online. We certainly don’t want to — inadvertently, naively — lower the bar for what it means to belong to and “be” the church.

Nick has a great post covering his thoughts about his experiences and has even broken them out in sections for easier digestion.

Here’s the complete list:

• Web Church Challenges, parts 1, 2, and 3
• Web Church Reflections, Parts 1, 2 and 3 and 4
• The future of the Church is online
• The local sermon is crumbling
  
• The rise of net campuses: Are local churches on the ropes?
  
• Can churches deny human choice?
• What the web church can learn from the 2009 Hartford Seminary Megachurch Study, parts 1, 2, 3, 4
• Is this the front door to the church in the 21st century?
• Is Christian community an end or a means?
• The rise of social media means the church is running out of excuses
• Is the modern church ready for radically personal ministry?
• People who diss social networks are hypocrites
  
• The digitally networked church is a dangerous church

I think Nick has done a phenomenal job and there’s nothing negative that I can personally say about Nick or his team’s valiant journey into online ministry.

Thanks for showing many of us the way!