How a Small Church Can Benefit From New Technology
In many cases especially within the church, technology can be used as a wonderful tool to achieve your goals. Whether it saves you time, expands your reach, or automates a process, when it comes to implementation in the church, technology is just that, a tool.
As The Church, the goal remains the same, to share the gospel love of Jesus with all the world. It’s not to have the latest and greatest new gadget, system, software, or app, but to reach the lost and the hurting.
In today’s day and age, the good news is, technology can help you do that.
Just as there is no one size fits all church model, there is no one size fits all tech package that will solve every obstacle you face as a church. While one church may benefit from an online database, another may find it completely unnecessary. This will all depend on the size of your congregation, the different ministries and initiatives you are offering, your pastoral staff and leadership, and much more.
If you are a church on the fence about implementing technology into your operations, services, or communications let us gently encourage you to continue reading to see how a few small tech enhancements could support your church’s overall mission. We will even provide you with a few of the simplest and most impactful technologies you can start with to get your feet wet if you make it to the end!
How Technology Can Help Support Your Small Church’s Mission
Implementing technology into the operations of your small church may seem intimidating and you may be convinced it’s unnecessary but we are here today to show you the benefits your church may see should you choose to implement some simple tech tools.
Technology Supports Your Worship Experience
Technology will never fully replace your worship experience. While some churches have adapted to fully online services, that’s not what we are advocating for here. Instead, how can technology enhance your worship experience?
Adding digital elements to your worship service could give you the opportunity to do things like providing worship lyrics on a screen, sermon visuals, projected bible verses, event information, video clips, or biblical readings in relation to the worship experience.
For churches that don’t have a robust music ministry or worship band, digital music can be streamed to enhance the worship experience.
Technology Supports Your Sermons
In addition to digital visual aids and digital music, technology incorporated into your weekly worship experience can also support and enhance your weekly sermons. Technology can be used to display sermon notes, points of distinction, bible verses, video clips, and other visual aids pertaining to their message.
This will help keep your congregation engaged and connected with the sermon you are preaching and hopefully helps them retain more of the wisdom you have to impart.
Technology Supports Connection
We have seen technology do wonders in creating connections in the secular world, but how can the church use technology to create and foster connections? Utilizing technology will help you take advantage of the many different avenues your congregation is already familiar with including SMS, social media, video calls, and more.
The good news is most of these platforms are free to use. Whether you need to make a church-wide announcement, connect small groups, market events, or gather feedback, it can all be done digitally.
In fact, the Torchable app was created specifically for churches to foster connection in their congregations and the communities they are a part of. One feature of the Torchable app is the ability to organize, advertise, and manage small groups. We all know small groups are huge in helping people feel connected within a church and grow in their faith.
Technology Supports Accessibility
Your church is here to reach the lost and hurting people within your community and spread the gospel message of Jesus. It may be hard to do that if people can’t find you. If your church has zero online presence, those searching for a church, small group, or church event in your area will have no way of finding you.
“Churches near me” is an incredibly popular Google search. You could be within a mile of those searching for a church home but if they are utilizing technology they won’t find you if you don’t exist online.
Additionally offering digital and online resources keeps you accessible to your current congregation as well. Help your members stay connected outside the 4 walls of your church through a website, social media pages, or emails.
Technology Supports Administration
Chances are if you have any sort of administrative staff or volunteers in your church they will jump for joy about the implementation of administrative technology. Technology can be used to track church attendance, giving and donations, expenses, and many other key metrics to help you track the health of your church. Having your church metrics digitized and stored allows you as church leaders to make informed decisions and steward your resources wisely.
Additional administrative tasks that technology can support include weekly newsletters or emails, storing and organizing contact information, and membership records, and coordinating small groups and events, the list is endless.
Technology Supports Giving
Many people are eager to give to and support the church through their time, talents, and finances. In today’s day and age, it isn’t uncommon for people to never carry cash, and younger generations may not even know how to write a check. This means if you have no way for your congregation to give digitally, you could be missing out on the generosity of a lot of people.
There are many different software and technologies that would allow you to take offerings and tithes digitally.
Where to Begin?
Okay so now you’re convinced technology could help support the goals of your small church but where do you even begin? We know it can feel overwhelming but luckily there are several small ways you can start to implement technology to make a big impact for the kingdom of God.
Your Church website
Do you have a church website? This is one of the first steps to digitizing your church. Your church website is essentially your new front door and first impression. It will allow visitors and those in your community to familiarize themselves with your church and lead them to join in person.
Starting a church website can be done in a very affordable way. There are many website-building platforms that allow you to create and maintain a website with an affordable monthly fee. This includes torchable kingdom plans where we offer churches website templates to create their own website!
Your Social Media Pages
If you aren’t on social media at all, this is a completely free way to reach a whole new demographic of people. With a little creativity and effort your social media channels can be used to promote your church’s services, events, small groups, and more.
Church Management Software
This is a form of technology that will greatly improve the operations of your church and the lives of your administrative staff. Church management software will allow you to track practically any church metrics you wish, send bulk communications, organize data, and more. Church management software can also help you implement protocols such as a digital kids check-in system for enhanced safety and security.
Online Giving
As we mentioned above, a large portion of the population only deals with digital currency. This means that if you don’t have an online giving system they can give to your church even if they want to. The trends have shown that most churches that implement an online giving option see a bump in their giving.
Digital Projection
Implementing digital projection to enhance your worship services, events, and classes may be an investment up front but if your church can afford it, it can go a long way in supporting your services and helping your congregation engage and connect with what you are teaching.
The Torchable App is Here to Help!
The torchable app has been designed specifically for churches to connect with their congregations and surrounding communities digitally. Through this app, you can communicate with your congregation, help your community find you as a place of worship, facilitate small groups, promote and invite people to your events, and more!
Not every small church will benefit from all these forms of technology adaptations but we encourage you to take some time to think about and maybe even research how technology could help your small church make a bigger impact. Even just choosing one of the above technologies can be a step into the future.
Utilizing technology as a small church does not mean that you are becoming “of the world” rather it is utilizing appropriate and powerful tools to spread the gospel message and reach more of the lost and hurting people in your community. The only question left to ask… what step can you take today to implement one of these digital tools in the near future?