Get Your Worship Services Online! Part 2, Bring Online Worship to Life.

It was unsafe to attend in-person worship services when I wrote my previous blog post, and it hasn’t become any safer in the past few hours. My previous post talked about streaming and online worship with minimal equipment that is probably lying around the typical church. Now, let’s talk about making a podcast into a meaningful worship experience. The basic format that works for ordinary Sabbath worship will work just fine online, but with a few little tweaks. Suggestions: 

Music

Start with music. Well, not right away. The pastor can make a brief introduction or welcome. Keep it to two sentences – not three. (You’re not-in person. Short is good.) Then go straight to the music. If you have an organ, use it and turn up the volume. (Many church organists keep the volume down during services. But you’re online!) Monitor the feed to make sure that people can hear the organ. Contemporary worship can start with a lively vocal and band performance. If you are using a piano, get it professionally tuned. Almost any piano sounds great if it is in tune, and even a priceless Steinway is a piece of junk if it’s out of tune. Zoom in on the musicians. 

Earlier Post: Part 1, Make the Technical Stuff Work in Online Worship

At this point, homebound worshipers are going to want to hear and see a familiar experience. Include the usual prayers, reflections, and testimonies that you would usually have. Put the prayers on the computer screen to help people participate at home. Individual church members can, if you wish, record brief testimonies at home and send them to you to include in the podcast. That adds a nice touch to help people feel in contact. If your videographer is an amateur (which will almost certainly be the case), bunch testimonies and clips right at the end so you don’t have to switch back and forth too much. 

A Sermon?

Sermons and homilies: of course you should have a sermon or homily, if that is your usual practice. But that doesn’t mean you do it the same as always. For one thing, good microphone technique is essential. The microphone should be a consistent 2 inches in front of the speaker’s mouth at all times, no matter what. Remember, you don’t have your live human voice as a backup. Breathe from the abdomen. Don’t yell, but push your voice to the back of the room, even though you don’t see anyone there. 

Are any of my readers children of the 60s? Do you remember Marshall McLuhan? He said that “the medium is the message,” and media (the plural of “medium”) are either hot or cool. Television is a cool medium: speakers are calm and conversational. Radio is a hot medium: speakers are energetic and forceful. Internet streaming is a moderately hot medium. What that means is that vocal delivery should be enthusiastic, quick, and lively. The voice needs lots of variety: loud and soft (not too soft), fast and slow, and loud and quiet (not too quiet). Don’t overdo it like a 2:00 a.m. used-car commercial. Watch some of your favorite YouTube videos; you may notice that the most successful Internet speakers are lively and speak with lots of variety. Don’t speak too quickly, however, since the audience is listening on cheap speakers and you don’t want your words to blur together.
 

More Music?

Hymn singing? Great idea! However, gathering the choir for worship is unsafe these days. If the church has professionally trained singers, let them do their thing but only one or two at a time. Please practice substantial social distancing – have singers at least three times as far apart as your local health department recommends and have them wear appropriate cloth masks. Set a good example of public health and safety. No, the mask won’t hurt their singing. They will feel strange but they can still sing just fine. Put the words up on the computer screen to help people sing along at home. If your singers are not professionally trained, you can give the at-home audience a much better experience if the piano or organ (best) accompanies the singers. Amateur singers can follow the organ to get the pitch and rhythm right. That’s the main reason that churches install organs to begin with. 

Finally, people often love short YouTube videos. In addition to full-length worship services, it’s possible to post multiple short, inspirational videos. A song or two, a five-minute meditation, a 10-minute scripture lesson, whatever. Set up a YouTube channel and invite people to subscribe.
 

Involve the Online Audience

How can you help people feel they are participating?

People want to feel involved. I already mentioned having people record testimonials to post. Viewers can run online commentary on YouTube. Any teenager can show you how to do that. (When you want social media skills, the teenagers are your top experts.) People can write comments below the video. Encourage members and viewers to share the video with their friends. There’s a button on YouTube that helps you do that. You can reach past geographically close members to reach a larger congregation. 

If speakers and singers are new to the online experience, well, so are the rest of us.  Don’t worry if you feel awkward. We all feel awkward at first. Pretend that you are projecting to the entire congregation, and not just to the camera. You may think that nobody is listening, but, trust me, they are. And they will be grateful that you’re there for them.

Peace to all.