There are far more people outside the walls of our church than are on the inside, and at our home church, we have taken steps to be sure that the messages preached inside don’t just stay inside. We send those messages to The People of the Stream…

One of the ways we get the Gospel preaching messages outside our four walls is by live streaming every service. There are tons of people who go to our website and click on the little “Watch Live Services” button and then, they watch the services live! Imagine that!

The People of the Stream have become an important part of the ministry at our church. We never forget that they are watching the service with us, and Pastor often mentions them or even looks straight into the camera and addresses them directly.

So just who are these People of the Stream?

They are folks like everyone else who simply are unable to attend a particular service in person due to illness, travel, being stationed abroad, or because they simply do not have a church to attend. We’re pretty sure nobody just stays home from church and then watches the live stream just to say they heard the message.

One amazing benefit of having the live stream available is that there is actually a satellite “congregation” that has developed around our live stream in a city quite a little way from us. A group of two or three dozen people gathers together each week around a large TV screen to watch the live stream, and dozens upon dozens of men, women and children have gotten saved during these gatherings!

In fact, there have been more people saved as a result of watching the live stream than have gotten saved attending services inside our building! Now, at first glance, that might not seem like the kind of thing your average Baptist church would want people to know about. But with just a bit of thought, you can see how it makes perfect sense.

Here’s the math:

(more people outside of church) + (hearing the same good preaching) = more people getting saved!

[bctt tweet=”(more people outside of church) + (hearing the same good preaching) = more people getting saved!” via=”no”]

I think that math adds up!

Good, solid evangelistic and discipleship preaching needs to be available to the masses, and since most of the masses are not coming to us, we are going to them through the live stream. While our crowd size inside the building is not that large, our global footprint is huge! Our pastor is able to directly impact the lives of people all over the world through his Gospel centered preaching.

Setting up a live stream for your church can be as simple as using your mobile phone and going live on Facebook, or as complex as having multiple cameras, a digital switcher, an audio mixing board for all the different microphones, and a whole team of camera operators and technical personnel bringing everything together, or, you can find somewhere in between that is comfortable for you.

The main thing is to be able to get the Gospel to as many people as possible using the most efficient and effective means available, and live streaming your service is a proven method!

But what about after the service has ended? What happens with the service that was recorded? How can that incredible message the pastor just preached continue to reach people long after the lights are turned off and everyone has gone home?

Next time!