I was a local celebrity pastor for one Saturday when I made the following article in our local newspaper about pastors who use Twitter in their ministries. Story by Kelly Jasper.
Last Sunday, Alan Jones preached on courage.
Between services at Cedar Creek Church in Aiken, he caught up with a few friends and members.
By a few, he means 300.
Mr. Jones, the media pastor, used the time to post a prayer request to Twitter.com: “first service done. praying for the courage to preach on courage again at 11 a.m. :)”
His Sunday morning tweet, as the text messages are called among the Twitter-savvy, might not seem like much, but Mr. Jones has found a powerful ministry tool in his year with the site.
“It’s become a natural way to communicate,” he said of the site, launched in 2006. “You develop an online community. People want to be talking about life, ministry, struggles.”
That includes fellow pastors, members of the congregation and friends.
“The pace of our culture is so breakneck at times. There is a need in us to connect with people,” he said. “You need community. God wired us that way.”
Twitter is hardly the only social networking site to allow users to post updates throughout their day, but it’s the most popular. A number of churches have found novel, even attention-getting, uses for the site.
This spring, a Florida congregation made headlines when its pastor invited members to tweet from their seats so he could answer their questions about his sermon in real-time. On Good Friday, a New York congregation used Twitter to deliver a Passion play adapted from the book of Mark. The account gained 1,700 followers in just a few hours.
Original Article on Augusta Chronicle HERE That’s where my interview is 🙂