How Should The Church Embrace New Technologies? — Good Faith Debates
foreign [Music] Welcome to TCG's good faith debates the good faith debates are a series of conversations where we bring together people to have conversations about contemporary issues of life and culture sometimes issues that are confusing challenging even divisive in hopes that you will learn a little bit about the issues and how to how to engage in them my name is Jim Davis I'm pastor of Orlando Grace Church and it's my privilege to be able to moderate these debates the topic for today is technology technology is changing at a rate faster than we've ever seen before and the question should the church be quick or slow to embrace these new technologies so with me today I have Patrick Miller who is Pastor podcaster and author of Truth over tribe and I have Jay Kim who comes to us from Silicon Valley also pastor and author of analog Christian and analog church thank you both for joining us today great to be here yeah thanks for having us well we'll start with you Patrick what is your perspective on this issue well my first perspective is that Jay is going to have to use stone tablets for the entire evening since he's defending the other side I know in all seriousness it's great to be here because Jay and I have actually become friends out of this and we've had some fantastic conversations on the topic and so I'm going to start with a story that might sound like I'm defending the other position I promise I'm not I was about three years ago a couple comes into my office older couple and the wife is crying and the husband puts his arm around her and he's telling her it's going to be okay but he's wrong she's not going to be okay because she just lost her mom but not to death to Facebook three years before that she got her mom onto Facebook she goes from being Facebook illiterate to a Facebook junkie she goes from being a great grandma he's liking all the photos of her great grandkids to liking all Q Anon photos and all Q Anon posts she goes from being a Godly woman who told her daughter you know love your enemies kill them with kindness to saying no the world's about to end we've got to fight the culture war and all this happens in a very short period of time and sharing she tried multiple times to reach out to her mom to help her see what was going on but she couldn't get her back and she's crying on my couch she's saying I lost my mom to Facebook and when that happened I kept asking how did we get here how did this happen and to answer that question we've got to roll back the clock about five years ago five years ago inside of countries like Iran China and Russia there were foreign Nationals that were propping up American Facebook pages and Facebook groups and 2021 MIT report found out that it got so bad that 19 of the top 20 Christian Facebook pages were run by Foreign troll Farms they were specifically targeting Christians the largest one of these groups had 75 million Christians inside of it and the strategy of these groups was pretty straightforward 9 out of 10 posts were you know totally milk toast you know kind of Evangelical type stuff right it's just curse of e Bible verses over Mountain Landscapes a few CS Lewis all the stuff that you'd expect but then there was that one out of ten the misinformation the disinformation the conspiracy theories and because they're looking at this group and saying oh my gosh there's 75 million other Christians on here I should trust this obviously it's credible but it's not it's a foreign run troll farm and so these groups they were able to take people captive and it made me ask the question why were they targeting Christians I mean you can Target a lot of different people and the answer is actually really simple they wanted a large demographic that had a dearth of content because they knew they could if they could give them contact they could engage with them they could destabilize democracy in our country and that's why they targeted Christians which should make us ask another question which is why was there such a dearth of content we have to go back another five to ten years to the time period when Facebook YouTube Twitter and Instagram were all spooling up and if you look at what Christian leaders and Christian pastors were saying at the time for the most part the message was either this stuff is a fad and I can ignore it or on the other hand it was the steps of distraction and it would be Noble to ignore it so as a result that's exactly what Christians did in other words here's the tragedy we created a vacuum that the trolls that the foreign trolls came and filled up and then they took millions and millions of Christians captive to quote the Apostle Paul with false and empty philosophy and then those people uh in the long run in some senses lost the heart of their faith 75 million people in that single group remember 19 out of 20 and those people are people like Sherry's mom and that's how we got there and so when I think about that it makes me realize that right now in the church we aren't just two steps behind we're ten steps behind we we are in a rough spot you know the Apostle Paul told Timothy that we need to be prepared to preach the word in season and out of season but we were not prepared for this season this little device in all of our pockets uh it is the most powerful discipleship tool ever invented or at least in the last 500 years since the printing press it forms people it shapes people and the idolatrous systems and powers of the world they're happy to utilize it but here we are 15 years after its invention debating should we and it's not just that American Christians and Americans in general they are living in that digital Babylon but where's the church where are the Christians why is there such a dearth of Engagement and content and so I think right now we're facing maybe the most profound missional moment missional question of Our Generation and perhaps again of the last 500 years which is how can we to misquote acts 13 36 how can we be faithful in our digital generation how can we be faithful in this particular moment you know does does the spirit only work on analog Networks or does the Great Commission have a little asterisk after it you know Make Disciples of all the nations but don't do it on the internet because we know what happens there these are the questions you have to face Maybe most fundamentally is a question can the Holy Spirit subvert this technology now I want to make a few really quick caveats so people know what I'm not saying the first caveat is this digital can never replace the vital in-person work of the church on this I think we have tremendous levels of agreement it cannot replace it but I do think that digital technology can enhance what happens inside of the church and some very profound and tremendous ways the second thing I would say is this a lot of people in my Camp they like to say that technology is neutral it's just a tool you know you can do whatever you want to do with it I vehemently disagree with that technology is not neutral the internet is not neutral and in particular social media is not neutral these were designed with a purpose with a goal in mind and they didn't have our best interest in mind when they designed them so when we're talking about this technology we have to talk about can it be subverted because it's not designed to do things for our good and I think that the answer to that question is yes I think we look throughout Christian history we can get a really clear eye to answer we can see multiple forms of non-neutral technology that the Spirit came in and transformed and the fundamental thing that I would say here is not that these are all the same things as digital technology but there's some examples so I'll just give a few really quickly number one would be roads the Romans they they created the world's largest network of roads with one very non-neutral purpose they wanted to efficiently move their violent Imperial War Machine wherever they wanted it to go Paul subverted that technology he used it to plant churches and to spread the letters that eventually became the New Testament another example may be more modern is the printing press when the printing press was invented it was largely used to create gossip pamphlets and spread conspiracy theories so sounds like something else I've heard of but moving forward what happened the reformers they subverted it by printing vernacular translation to the Bible and spreading them across Europe it was a non-neutral technology but again we saw the Spirit do his work another one would be radio the early days of the radio were incredibly bad one of the most popular speakers was Father Charles Coughlin who used it to promote pro-nazi profascist anti-semitic commentary for over a decade but Billy Graham saw the potential and he subverted the technology using it to call people to repent and believe in the gospel across the country and so I realized that these new technologies the internet social media and whatever comes after it they're not the same as those things and yet I really firmly believe that the spirit can work to subvert those Technologies and that he's going to work as he's always done through people who see the possibilities and are willing to work out in the end how we can do these things together and so I realize we have to ask some important questions about how we should engage we've we've counted the cost of engagement we've been counting the cost of engagement for 15 years I just wonder if we've counted the cost of disengagement and I wonder if the cost is Sherry's mom and I wonder if the cost is millions of Christians across our country who are being fed false information I wonder if the cost is billions of people across the world who could be reached for the gospel if we would use this technology if we would harness it for good I think if we did that and we did it to the glory of God and if we found people who were ethically sound theologically informed practitioners of digital Ministry we could see some real amazing transformation not just in our country but across the globe thank you Patrick Jay what's your perspective yeah well first I'll say You know despite our differences um I love that we're talking about this I think we agree all of us probably agree in just the pervasiveness and the ubiquity of digital technology it's here it's not going away so we have to address the topic a couple of thoughts come to mind for me first I I want to make clear I'm not anti-technology I'm not anti-digital technology in in the same way that I'm not an anti-car I am for a car driving children safely to school in the morning I am against a car driving 60 miles down a little neighborhood street where kids are playing right so I'm not for or against I think again much like a car you know there's a reason why I wouldn't let my seven-year-old drive a car it doesn't necessarily mean that she'll never drive a car in fact the hope is someday she will drive a car but there's a very good reason why she doesn't drive one now there is a potential danger that's latent within the technology that she is not prepared for or ready for so that's the first thing I'm not anti-technology but I do think that engaging technology and in particular new technologies digital Technologies with as much care and thoughtfulness and caution in some cases is just so vitally important again for a number of reasons one that Patrick has already mentioned that they are non-neutral Technologies they have an intention and a design um they and they pose I think a really fascinating complexity in that you know unlike cars you get into a car because you have an intention to get from point A to point B unlike a hammer you only pick up a hammer when you're going to nail something unlike those other tools uh digital Technologies again have a ubiquity a pervasiveness to them in that they are constant everywhere all the time and in any moment of boredom we find ourselves leaning in there is a sort of inherent um addiction an addictional uh an addictive property to them and so that leads us to the question you know should churches be fast or slow to lean into and embrace new technology and I want to say the first thing I think is there there is an inherent fear baked into going too slow particularly in a culture that is as progress oriented and speed oriented fast-moving is ours falling behind is akin to falling off a cliff you know this sort of descent spiral into irrelevance and I think a lot of churches and church leaders fear that and then the Assumption conversely the assumption is well if we can quickly and innovatively lean into new technologies then we can get ahead we can go fast we can go first and that'll put us ahead but I would actually argue that we have already evidence to the contrary LifeWay research noted that by April of 2020 a month into the pandemic basically every Church in America 97 percent had an online service up and running and then Barna researched just a few months later in the summer of 2020 just three or four months into the pandemic found that um the most digitally native amongst us Millennials and gen Z who had gone to church prior to the pandemic they were leaving the church and disengaging from online church at the the highest rate and so those who are most comfortable with digital were the ones that were watching and engaging online the least so I I would actually suggest that as the church has rushed headlong into new technologies whatever is sort of at our disposal the results have been mixed at best and I would say disastrous at worst overall Church engagement has declined congregations you know Sherry's mom fracturing over online content has increased and the public witness of the church I would argue has suffered because of those things and some would suggest I think Patrick would suggest that it's because the church is not innovating enough right and this line of thinking proposes that mere presence online is not enough that we have to begin going first we have to lead the way we have to innovate and subvert these new technologies and I I would admit that there is some Redemptive potential in this line of thinking but I do think that there's an inherent problem in that it does not adequately take into account what we've both mentioned already the inherent design of these new technologies so as one example social media which is a it's a prime example because it again it's huge it's significant social media is designed for many things but one thing it's designed for is scale right it's designed for reach the power of social media in part is that you can tweet or post one thing and with that one thing you have the potential to achieve scale at a rate that no other technology would have allowed any individual in years prior and so this is why so many of us are addicted to the sort of slot slot machine pull of the refresh lever because essentially we want to see the promise of scale and reach fulfilled and so we pull that lever how many likes how many retweets how many shares scale and reach I would suggest are about being noticed by as many as possible as near or as far as possible and this is actually a wonderful approach I think when it comes to content and content is important right christ-centered gospel saturated content is necessary vitally important but I would argue while content can Inspire and inform content alone cannot transform it cannot transform Sherry's mother it cannot transform the people at my church whom I love and serve and of course it is God alone and his goodness and his grace who can truly transform a life through the regenerative work of his Spirit but I think most often God chooses to do that transformational work through the medium of real human beings and so in other words I think the most effective way to reach an unbelieving and hurting world is not scale but what I would call symmetry right individual Christians and Collective Church communities aligning their energies together toward a handful of those within the ripple effect of their life family friends co-workers local towns neighborhoods you know workplaces schools Etc and leaning into those lives as personally and as intimately as possible now I would say that symmetry is not about reach it's about Rapport it's about relationship it doesn't focus on being noticed by as many as far as possible and instead I think symmetry helps us to notice as many as possible within our proximity and to be sure this is slow work it's far slower than social media it's far slower than scale it's it's certainly much slower than the ability to get one piece of content out there to the masses it doesn't work that way but when the church grabs hold too quickly of new technologies thinking only of potential possibilities and missed opportunities I believe the church leaves herself susceptible in two key ways first embracing new technology too fast I think leaves the church susceptible to being subsumed Again by the overwhelming power and design of the technology itself sabotaging even our best efforts toward Redemptive subversion we've seen this in recent years as churches rushed to social media in the wake of a variety of cultural moments making statements too quickly taking sides and they were all in in good faith attempts to represent Jesus but often we saw them fail miserably and unnecessarily alienate entire segments of our congregations because of a lack of nuance and faltering back to square one and two I think the other danger is and maybe most important is that embracing new technology leaves the church susceptible to losing sight of the very real thing in our midst not potential or possibilities out there but the seemingly mundane and ordinary gift of proximity right here yeah we are to take the gospel to the ends of the Earth but that Journey always begins in Jerusalem or in Silicon Valley or in Missouri or in Florida wherever it might be wherever we are and so I think that one of the dangers of new technology is that it has a tendency to constantly shift our gaze always toward the distant Horizons where real people feel and look like an easily reachable mass and when our gaze fixes on the when it fixates on the horizons I think again we are susceptible to losing the gift of proximity and the invitation to build rapport and relationship with those right here in our midst Jesus says in John 15 right abide in me and I in you in a branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine neither can you unless you you abide in me this is gardening language right gardening is slow and it's steady it's often boring it's often unspectacular and it certainly is not about going first nor is it about going fast in fact it is in many ways the antithesis of speed gardening requires patience it's mostly watching and waiting but there is no other way to Bear healthy fruit you can't microwave an orange and so it is with the church and for me I think in recent years I have found immense confidence and comfort in contemplating the long slow steady Arc of God's unfolding history that in his sovereignty and his faithfulness he has led his church through Wars and famines and pandemics before he has gently and effectively LED his church through countless cultural shifts and technological advancements and that has not and will never change and my belief is that under his care even when we go slow we're never behind thank you Jay I appreciate it my question my first question is going to be for you Patrick obviously here there is a caution from being on the Forefront of Technology when you consider how untested these new technologies are you know you've said that we're 10 steps behind is there value sometimes when you consider how untested the Technologies are and unknown and how we've not discipled our people into these Technologies is their values sometimes to being 10 steps behind yeah I well I would say maybe not 10 steps behind but I think there is some value to being a little bit behind in fact when it comes to digital technology in general the the Pioneer rarely wins who here uses Yahoo to search who here's favorite social media is MySpace being the first really no longer on AOL Instant Messenger yeah yeah you've got mail you know that kind of proves the point though the goal for the church is not to be a technologist our goal is not to be pioneers of new technology I think my fear and it's interesting because obviously Jay you're coming from Silicon Valley so you're actually surrounded by tech people I live in Missouri I live in Missouri so I'm never around those kinds of people and so so you know our context might shape some of our perception with this but as I look at the church right now we are not wobbling on the precipice of the future we're tripping backwards over our own feet into the past and so I'm not saying let's get up to Step One or even step two I'm okay with step three four or five the stuff that we're doing on our team as practitioners of this kind of ministry is not really exciting it's very it's very basic down down the pipe uh marketing that really you could read any book and find out a little bit about and yet we're still light years ahead of most churches we're so light years ahead of most Christian content creators and the heart again behind this is that what we've seen is that when we utilize these very simple very inexpensive tools there are enormous results in just the last year we've been trying to reach the church people which is the quickest growing group of people walking away from the church and it's a massive massive problem you know that and we we thought how do we get these people back and so with a very small advertising budget and with a very simple strategy we started using email devotionals and we created Target audiences to go after those people and what we discovered was that about 10 percent of the people that we were able to reach online would end up in a real in-person Church context within the next year that 10 of those people were going to come and so this year we're on target for bringing about a thousand new people who were de-churched back into churches and that kind of highlights the point this is where I'm saying enhancement is the name of the game it's not replacement we talk about live streams live streams are a form of replacement what does the live stream do it's a broadcast of what's happening on a stage or inside of a church and it's trying to replace what's happening there I don't want to replace it we don't actually do much with live streaming to be honest what we want to do is enhance what we already have and bring people into the church using the technology that we have so I see it as a Synergy between the two not not picking between one or the other that's really helpful so Jay you made the comment content alone cannot transform yet you you write articles for TGC you're here debating something that will be delivered um through through technology do you believe I mean you must believe that your efforts here can can contribute here do you believe that by the holy spirit's activity that I mean your efforts can be used to transform lives through technology or is there a contradiction there sure yeah I mean yeah content is important I want to make that clear what I am not saying is that content doesn't matter just show up to a building do life with another human being and everything will be well that's not what I'm saying I would also say you know analog embodied presence is not the answer to everything we didn't always have digital this is like maybe a 25 30 year old phenomenon for us the church had many problems long before the internet so it's not like analog showing up it solves everything um content is is vitally important I think the only thing the argument I'm trying to make is that content alone is incomplete I think that content at its best can Inspire it certainly can inform and and inspiration and information no right knowledge all of those things matter a great deal but I think the Christian Life is a life cult that needs to be lit lived you know it's an embodied life it's not knowing the right things it's living in alignment with right knowledge and I think if we over emphasize content content content that's all you need let's get into these spaces and let's overwhelm bad content with good gospel-centered content again I'm not saying that's unimportant like you've said I participate in that endeavor and I believe in it that's why I do but I believe it's one step in the direction of a transformed life it really does require and I think this is where Patrick and I both diverge and maybe have some agreement the goal you know the end of the line is to is to make sure that followers of Jesus encounter the Risen Christ within the context of other human beings who are um attempting at least to follow Jesus and Live Like Jesus in no ways do you feel like that's in line with what you were just saying this is what we always end up laughing about is we end up agreeing in the end because I would she's going to the same destination you you might be talking about getting there different ways but but that sounds very similar to what you're saying about replacement yeah I mean as a pastor the thing that I see change people's lives is of course content and it's also Community you need both of them and one without the other really does the trick and again that's why it's so key for us to say that the goal is not to replace Community or to replace analog connection it's to supplement it this was a few years ago Home Depot hired a new CEO they bring him in and he says I'm going to be all about online and so the project he takes on is changing their website so it'll bring more traffic onto the website and everybody's freaking out we're going to end up hiring you know firing all these people who are in our stores you're not building any new stores this is going to be terrible for the brand well what he did was he worked really hard to make sure that everything they did on the internet brought people into the store you could if you had a return you could return it at the store if you wanted to pick it up same day you could go pick it up same day at the store he he multiplied foot traffic inside of the building tremendously during this period and it was because he was using the internet to get people in side of the four doors of their Home Depot stores and that's again how I want to see the the internet right now is do we have a way to use the technology that we have to get people inside of community and inside search especially in an increasingly post post-christian culture where people have to take a lot of steps before they ever show up inside those doors to begin with so what are some ways that you see the church misusing technology right now well I I think there's countless ways uh here's what happens in a lot of churches they go out they read the best marketing books out there and they just baptize it and they just they they just recreate what they see there so for example there's a guy named Gary vaynerchuk or garyvee he's a very famous marketer and his approach is essentially how to create a celebrity you know and so I see people coming to the church and they take his approach and now their goal is to turn their Pastor into a celebrity well that's not promoting Jesus and again it by the way almost entirely focuses around the live stream the replacement of the in person with the with the digital thing and so that's an example of if your goal on social media is to turn your pastor into a celebrity that's incredibly problematic but the reality is that the threat is not how the church is using it it's how other people are using it and how that's shaping people inside the church because we just aren't using it very much all right so you bring up a really good point we're not looking to make our pastors celebrities hopefully but Jay you said um you talked about the risk of the potential out there distracting us from the mundane ordinary calling of proximity right here so as a pastor my primary focus is Orlando Grace Church as pastors we have a primary focus outside of our family and our own faith so but we now have all these other opportunities to engage with our own church and the broader community Through podcasting or YouTube or whatever it is what are some warning signs that a pastor is Maybe tilting into a bad area when we may be forgetting our primary focus that we're called to that's a great question I think any time the word brand is involved in anything with the kingdom of God you've created competing values and it's not necessarily even that you use the word I think if anything sort of smells of brand and brand building and establishing brand I think that's a key warning sign and and I think this is where Patrick and I actually diverge and maybe it's because I cannot see yet but it is difficult for me to imagine that um you know success and in particular measurable metric success on social media for example can be achieved without some form of brand building now I say this in some ways is self-indictment right I some of my work is semi-public so you could make the argument well Jay you've written this article for that you're on this video right that the are you building a brand so yeah I mean I will readily admit I live within the tension of that but I love what you said Jim I try to to think of myself and sort of Center my myself on that reality I think we were talking before we started filming that primarily I see myself as a follower of Jesus as a husband and a father and a local church pastor who's called to love and serve the people within my proximity now because of the digital realities in which we live certainly we have some digital expressions of our church and we have variety of reasons for that um but but I just I try to be really careful about brand building again not to say I do it perfectly but but that's where for me I think leaning too hard too fast into digital into new technologies at our disposal I'm just not sure that the human heart and I'm growing increasingly sure that the human heart is not conditioned for the platforms that are at our disposal and what they offer us I just even even the most faithful amongst us I think um yeah the reach and the scale that they offer us we just leave ourselves really vulnerable I think well there are sadly many stories to support yeah that's right what you're saying in just the past 10 years so Patrick you said that the internet cannot replace the vital in-person localized functions of the church can you be more specific about what those functions are oh yeah I mean I I find that tremendously easy you cannot watch a live stream and tell me you're having the same experience as standing shoulder to shoulder with someone now I want live streams we have shut-ins and people at pla they cannot access our services if we don't put it online there are people who come to our church who've never walked inside a church they're terrified of doing it and so they just want to see what's happening on a screen before they come in for all those reasons I love it you know if you're on vacation you want to watch church I mean there's worse things you could do on vacation than watch Church however watching church is not the same thing as worshiping alongside other people hearing their voices together now again I I want to be cautious though because the minute you walk into the most traditional Church in Birmingham the minute you walk in that church you are surrounded by radical technology we don't think about it that way but once upon a time people didn't sit on pews Once Upon a Time creatures weren't up in pulpits Once Upon a Time they didn't have hymnals they knew the songs and so their eyes were up they weren't down inside of the book they weren't sitting down they were standing up to hear they didn't have sound amplification when you started thinking about the radical Technologies they're right inside those cars that are outside you just have to walk to your church and now you can drive wherever you want to and so we have all these other analog Technologies there's air conditioning I mean yeah that I don't want to get rid of that all of these Technologies are present in every single church and I only say that to say look when you're watching it on a screen something very different is happening I want to acknowledge that and yet I don't want to be overly skeptical or or pretend as though what we see as being non-technological today it was technological 100 years ago 150 years ago or whenever those things were introduced so you do have a live stream at your church yes I have a good deal and you are discipling people to tell them this is a lesser experience well you know so I actually really hesitate to start telling people that it's a lesser experience and here would be the reason why for that person again who is because you kind of just did say that well I'm saying it here right so if I'm talking to a friend of mine who has been going to the church for 10 years and he's telling me hey you know I'm done going in person I love watching in my pajamas I'd say hey that's that's great I'm sure it's awesome watching your pajamas you need to come to church but if I'm talking to a college student who's never come to a church before and he tells me have been watching your church on live stream for the last month I don't go hey you know that's great you really need to cut that out because that's not the real thing you know or if I'm talking to the shut-in who literally can't come I'm not going to say to them and so we're cautious up front because we want to have a space for process but again we have designed our entire technological apparatus to get people inside the doors what we do in our newsletters on our blogs on social media we have shown time and again that is that is the top lead generators the thing that's bringing most people to our in-person events and so again we've designed a structure we've subverted the structure of what's Happening social media we designed it to bring people in person and and we've seen it work and so because it's working as we're seeing people show up we feel confident that we don't necessarily have to broadcast don't just watch the live stream do you think it would be different for the church that did everything same philosophies but decided instead of live stream we're going to record Put it on the next day with all the same values uh you know that's an interesting question I mean there's there's nothing different for the person who's watching it except for when they can watch it and again because I think people want to be a part of church on Sunday morning again I think of the challenge of thinking of the people who wouldn't realize I can watch Church afterwards uh for all those reasons I would want to keep it on on Sunday mornings uh and again I think there's perfectly good reasons for some people to shut off the live stream but I don't want to live in a city where there's no church with a live stream how does that land with you live the live stream Centric conversation yeah you know our church has a live stream which I take a lot of flack for you know like oh the analog Church guy has a live stream that was a a pandemic and post-pandemic decision we made um I heard another church leader recently say uh the live stream or the online service whatever you want to call it has become the new lobby of the church and that is the primary and and really internally at least the only reason we've kept our live stream is that as we've tracked it and we have tracked it um new people who actually walk through our doors and show up in person they will say on average that they have watched the services online between three and five times before they ever show up so we we've discovered okay not having an online service or streaming the service in some form or fashion would be akin to essentially destroying our lobby and going parking lot right through the doors into our Sanctuary which would be an incredibly jarring experience for a brand new person and it doesn't know where they drop off their kids and all those sorts of things so we've kept our live stream service but I will say we talk about it almost all the time for the same reason the concern that we also again we've measured this as well through some some data we've collected from directly from our people it is we we believe that it's um it's having a formational effect on our people and we do not know yet how to parse the two out to be able to communicate to those who are not yet with us and not yet comfortable being with us in person this is for you and then to communicate to those who are in their pajamas because it's just far more convenient to sort of have church on in the background while you make pancakes on the on Sunday morning and then get ready for the football game or something we want to be able to communicate to them this is this is almost nothing what you're doing is almost nothing there's a reason some Churches call It On Demand that's right that's right it's like Netflix you know and you think about your Netflix queue you've got 400 different shows and movies and you watch two minutes of the first one it's kind of boring and you move on to the next and off it goes from from the queue well that has a formational effect we begin to think about church as content you know and we the way we think about content in the digital age now is that there is and always should be an endless stream of options nobody nobody gets Netflix because they have two shows they get it because they have two million shows or whatever the number might be and I think that that's of deep concern to me so we're still navigating those Waters and trying to figure it out well in your defense we're not talking about Cutting Edge technology and live streaming this is something the church has been using and wrestling with for 15 really some since the mid 90s if they had the capabilities yeah the money so you're it's not inconsistent with the argument you've been making I am curious I thought his Roman Rhodes analogy was really compelling so was the printing press but the Roman roads stuck with me how did that land with you it is a compelling argument I will say um you know social commentators social scientists Jonathan hate is one of them have re written recently and compellingly in my view as as I've seen it the difference between new technologies in the digital age and previous Technologies like Automobiles and Roads and the printing press and such even television and radio is that digital Technologies change so rapidly that it does not give us the necessary time to assess its full impact on culture and society and I think that is the danger this would be akin to if in transportation technology we went from horseback riding to you know a car to the Tesla within a matter of 12 years we just would not know how as a culture and Society we need to adequately you know consider all of the effects all of the impacts we just wouldn't have the time and so I think that's the concern that that the parallels sort of are inadequate in my mind because of the speed and the the rate which is why for me my argument is not to become a Luddite run away from technology again I'm not anti-technology the argument is to go slow that it's okay to go slow we need to create the necessary space between us and the technology happening all of the chaos sort of happening before us we need enough space so that we can see the long Arc of Technology story in the digital age so that we can have again as God by his spirit moves in us and gives us eyes to see sort of all of the impact that that's unfolding how does that land with you what are your thoughts I I will actually agree with a lot of what you said and again my point is not that we should be uh first movers or that we should be you know right on the precipice of whatever is coming next uh my point is that we need to uh if you think about the digital world as an infected body politic it needs antibiotics you have to do something to solve the problem and again this goes back to Sherry's mom but we are on the precipice right now of artificial intelligence that's going to radically change the face of how information works we are really one generation away and generations as you just said are becoming very very short so we're probably talking two years from the ability for someone to take a story write it into a text box press enter and then the AI produces 300 different news stories based on what you put in there that look very credible that can be spread across 300 different websites by these same troll Farms that have been talking about and so determining what's true and what's not true is really difficult we are currently at the point where I can type into text box something that I want to see on a video and all of a sudden it's there so artificial intelligence as it's changing things it's going to make our ability to discern what's true what's not true all the more difficult and so the mission I think pastors have to have is they have to now be talking to Christians about hey one don't live your whole life online I think it's an incredibly important message but two the life you live online you have to live intentionally but if I'm going to tell you to live your online life intentionally I better be giving you the stuff you need to live that intentional life I think about churches at a church called Quorum Deo that does a midweek podcast where they discuss what happened inside of the sermon that's just for their people at their church it's a wonderful way it's just like in the old days when a pastor could walk around the town and visit with everyone and see how they were doing if we can create podcasts and content that they can actually go and engage with and choose to trust over the fake stuff over the news pundits over all of the trash that's constantly coming into their feet if we give them the good stuff there's actually a chance that we not only will be discipling throughout the week but that they won't be discipled by all this other things I'm just maybe I'm a overly realistic or or too pessimistic I don't I think if our goal is let's really get people off the internet more I mean I just want to say good luck I mean good luck to myself let's get them off the internet more yes let's try but let's also give them what they need to be healthy on the internet so Patrick one more for you Jay uh mentioned that quick adoption of technology has harmed the church's witness in some cases and certainly we've seen Reckless usage of social media by Christians and how that has harmed Witnesses in certain ways how do you respond to this is the missional potential of Technology greater than the possible reputational risk well I suppose it depends who's behind the keyboard if we're going to be honest I I agree there are Christians who are doing great harm the way these non-neutral Technologies are designed right now is is the the companies want to keep you on their platforms and the way they do that is by giving you emotionally engaging content in particular outrageous content content that causes anger and that means that the algorithm is going to prioritize content that's extreme and so what's happened right now is that the Christians who are causing the most harm they actually don't know how to use the internet they just have a nice algorithm that's highlighting their stuff it's lifting it up to the surface where everybody should be able to see but they don't know what they're doing they're just being outrageous and of course yes that causes that causes harm to to to the church it causes harm to Jesus reputation and our community but that's why it's so key right now if we who are not living in those extremes but want to be thoughtful when some charitable kind have a different face on the internet if we can figure out how to use those algorithms as they stand right now and get our content in front of people instead of that content when these algorithms change and they are constantly changing and the day will come when the outrageous stuff gets pushed down in fact that's where everything is headed at the moment the people who have figured out how to give good content in the existing system they'll be elevated up to the top and again the goal here is not creating celebrities I think or I pray what's going to happen is is tens of thousands of very small scale platforms reaching broadly their local communities using the internet and again we're already seeing some of the stuff begin to pick up so yes there are risks yes the algorithm takes those worst people and brings them up but no I I don't think that that outweighs the need to figure out how to work in this new environment hey I've talked to a lot of pastors who have in 2020 and 2021 had to take the biblical peacemaking discipleship skills that they had been teaching in normal life and begin to say oh we've got to apply this to social media use because we have people getting in fights publicly inside the church about all kinds of things these days I read an article in the Orlando Sentinel last year that said the average attention span for an American adult has dropped from 12 seconds in the year 2000 to 8 seconds today making officially making our attention span lower than that of a goldfish nine seconds which if you watch Ted lasso might be interesting to you this lower attention span is directly linked according to this article to the rise of devices in our hands so if that is the context that we live in what implications that does that have on discipleship do we need to adjust to that new reality or do we need to push back on it can I say yes all of the above I I think I think we do need to push back on it and one way we push back on it by the way is by creating substantive long-form content that people can engage with if you want people to have longer attention spans you're going to have to give them some stuff that's has a longer attention span required on the other side I think we're already adjusting to it short form content is the King on Instagram it's a king on Tick Tock it's the King on YouTube and you're seeing more and more Christians adjust to that reality now on one level we might say how in the world can you make the gospel that that small that short and most these videos are longer than eight seconds and yet I see the other potential there are a lot of Christian tick talkers who are doing some amazing things I I just met a guy the other day who had no connection to church no connection to Christianity but he watched this Christian tick tocker and he liked it and the algorithm is it's designed to take you down whatever Rabbit Hole you want it gave him another Christian video and then another and then another and another and within four months he's at a PCA church this guy never thought about Jesus before now I'm sitting there thinking praise God those Christian tick-tockers were on there to take him down that rabbit hole because if they weren't he'd be going to a very dark place so yes let's do long form yes let's try to help people extend their attention spans and yes let's do the short form stuff too if that's where they're at I mean where would the Apostle Paul be I I I don't know if we'd be on Tick Tock it's kind of hard to imagine but I kind of Wonder you know the the tick tock to the Romans what would that be like you could ask him one day I'll ask him one day I think he would be there though communicating and reaching people in the digital Babylon he would figure out a way to share the gospel with them on their areopagus even though it's something that we might feel really uncomfortable with do you have any response or agreement disagreement to that yeah I mean I think the design of social media platforms like Tick Tock and increasingly so where Instagram and YouTube and Facebook where they're headed it is getting shorter and shorter the attention span is decreasing and I find that really problematic and I'm you know Patrick you said something earlier that that I found really interesting that if something is sick you need an antibody I think where what we diverge is I I'm I'm sort of interested in why we're sick there and is there the possibility that we can live in a place where we're not as sick just not exist in so again not a Luddite I'm not you know under the guise of everyone's going to throw at their their phones and not have the internet or anything like that I just think that you know our sort of content information diet needs to change our consumption needs to change the other problem with that is I think the way these platforms are designed mind the lines between Creator and consumer get really blurred I think that's why it feels so social in some ways there is always the constant possibility I could also be a Creator and I think in some ways that can inherently pull out of us um you know really ungodly nature that that just is going to work against our formation into Christ's likeness so yeah I think you know would Paul be on Tick Tock maybe he would but he certainly could not pen Romans on Tick Tock you know there wouldn't be enough time and there isn't enough space for the necessary Nuance in the breadth so you talked about the fact that you know people who are you know in your Camp here they're going to feel left behind there's going to be a fear of missing out there just will be so what do you do to Pastor your people through that fomo and let them feel okay in that yeah I think the first thing I would say is relevance matters less than you think it does what matters more and what matters most in pastoral Ministry whether you're actually a pastor at a church and now serving on staff or not just as you as a follower of Jesus Pastor people Rapport and relationship at the end of the day is what really matters you know when um someone's husband is dying they're not going to go to YouTube to look for a video to encourage them they're going to call the person they know the person that can show up at the hospital you know you can't share a meal on Tick Tock no matter how much you try so that's what I would say you know you are where you are for a particular reason God has given you the gift of your proximity and the calling primary calling is to serve that proximity and the people within your midst really well Patrick you brought up AI so AI is quickly is a quickly developing technology what are the principal principles we need to have we need to sort out to have in place in order to navigate questions about how much AI can justifiably provide help in pastoral work writing the sermons doing the research care coordination communication because of the story you just told about one use of AI could you know you write up something and put your theology out there and say what kind of book you want to preach through and all of a sudden all the sermons are printed for the year yeah I mean it's actually quite feasible to imagine someone typing in uh write a sermon on Romans 12 1-2 and the style of Jake ham and all of a sudden it's read Jenkins books and it just wrote you the Jacob sermon that you wanted to preach of course those are interesting ethical questions that we're going to have to explore it's not plagiarism it's also not actually your work and there's a long history by the way in past fostering of people using you know prefabbed outlines this has become a debate even right now a bunch you know what what what what qualifies as a as a sermon that's done in the right way the wrong way so you know I don't know if I have any principles at this point what I would probably change the question to saying the threat of AI is not you know what happens when you're whoever does your your images starts you know using artificial intelligence to create video it's like that's an interesting question can you put those videos on your screen is that somehow wrong I don't know I think the far more important question is how are we creating the antibodies inside of the people in our churches to be able to identify the misinformation and disinformation that's going to be created by this artificial intelligence and maybe of equal importance is realizing that artificial intelligence isn't in the future when we talk about the algorithm we're talking about AI these are neural networks they are machine nodes that are that are studying you that are creating a model of you so they can sell you to companies so they can sell you goods and so they can prep you to buy those goods we like to think that we're not not you know fifth graders who wouldn't would be able to resist if someone was nipulating us but we can't the AI is already at work manipulating how we think and what we do and so that's this is why I say it's so critical both for Christians to create content that can be engaged with online but also for Christians to understand how those algorithms are working and use them for good I I again I've seen tremendous story tremendous things happen of people's lives being transformed by Christians who use those algorithms to reach people who were far from God to reach people who are de-churched to reach people in different countries I mean right now the Iranian church is exploding and the crazy thing is if you talk to someone in Iran who's become a Christian you say hey who discipled you there's a high chance they got discipled on Zoom that's how it's happening and if you want to find out how they heard about Jesus again it's happening through a lot of this technology and so that's why for me it's like yeah we can talk about how is AI going to affect what's happening inside the church doors the far more important question is not what's happening in the church what's happening outside the church because guess what that's where most of our people spend their lives and their days if we aren't there and if we don't know how to use it we've given up so Jay you talked about the danger of embrace racing technology too fast Patrick you said that we're not in danger of doing this because we're so far behind so I just I I want I sat yesterday and I just I wanted to make a list of really how much has changed in 20 years just just to really just flush it out myself and I'd love for you to hear y'all do two things as we finish I'd love to hear just how you process the church going through such big changes so more a heart level not necessarily picking apart each each of these and then second I'd like you to tell me what's next on the horizon do you think for the church to have to battle so in the last 20 years the world of Bible distribution has fundamentally changed with Bible apps and smartphones words of songs are mostly on screens now and hymnals are disappearing every church has a website explaining who they are and what they believe people can click a map on that site and know where to go and how long it'll take the world has access to both great and heretical teaching in a way that it never has before through podcast apps to YouTube in the palm of our hands a skilled Communicator preacher can now be made into a live hologram and preach in dozens of places at the same time maybe never even seen the people they Pastor giving has gone mostly online zoom and other sites now allow instantaneous communication with missionaries to your Iran Point missionaries now get to talk with family and friends back home mobile kid check-in and training cell phones Facebook and text messaging has made a pastor available at all times I can't imagine being a pastor before a cell phone through websites like take them in a meal we can now organize in minutes ways to provide for families in need that would have taken hours or days 20 years ago through online curators social media and podcast pastors with any visibility at all experience more scrutiny than they ever have before social media algorithms are targeting our people with extreme views of church and culture through those same mediums abusive leaders are exposed more than ever before the church can now stay in touch during a pandemic people can now stay at home and worship without being connected to anyone we've talked about that Seminary education which we haven't touched on is now globally available and accessible seminar
2023-03-17 00:26
