WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.180 Episode 105 of the Church Digital Podcast, powered by Stadia Church Planning. Jeff here. 00:00:06.040 --> 00:00:12.040 Stadia, we talk a lot about Stadia, of course. I mean, hey, they're my boss. And it's an incredible 00:00:12.040 --> 00:00:18.600 organization to work with, to work for. And I love their heart for the big C churches, 00:00:18.820 --> 00:00:24.540 not only here in America, but across the country and around the world. And so here in this COVID 00:00:24.540 --> 00:00:29.880 season, they have been so aggressive and innovative, trying to help churches learn how to thrive, 00:00:30.160 --> 00:00:35.520 grow, and multiply physically as well as digitally. It's not about being in the building and it's not 00:00:35.520 --> 00:00:41.000 about broadcasting services. It's really about creating those disciple makers, mobilizing and 00:00:41.000 --> 00:00:47.200 releasing them. The Great Commission, digitally or physically, just do it, mobilize and release 00:00:47.200 --> 00:00:53.020 these people out so that your church can even learn how to multiply in this season. And so first off, 00:00:53.020 --> 00:00:58.260 right off the bat, if your church is interested in some of this stuff, we are doing some aggressive 00:00:58.260 --> 00:01:04.920 things in 2021 towards helping churches learn how to thrive, grow, and multiply. So check it out. 00:01:05.240 --> 00:01:12.640 Go to stadiachurchplanning.org slash digital, P-H-Y-G-I-T-A-L. It's the Strengths of Physical 00:01:12.640 --> 00:01:18.740 and Digital. Stadiachurchplanning.org slash digital. Check it out. Head over there. The link's in the show 00:01:18.740 --> 00:01:24.720 notes as well. Get signed up for a learning community in 2021. Find more of what it takes, 00:01:24.900 --> 00:01:30.960 what it takes to get part of this and how stadia can help you, your church, learn how to thrive, 00:01:31.120 --> 00:01:36.020 grow, and multiply. Tell you what, we're going to extend that stadia love heading in here while we're 00:01:36.020 --> 00:01:42.140 doing episode 105. Because in this COVID season, part of the innovation that we have done, stadia, 00:01:42.560 --> 00:01:51.600 we've had the honor of partnering with Barna Research towards releasing a study on what digital 00:01:51.600 --> 00:01:57.320 church, what digital church looks like in and amongst this COVID season. And unbiasedly, I got to tell you, 00:01:57.660 --> 00:02:04.560 this is probably the best research that I've seen on digital church, period. Not to mention the best 00:02:04.560 --> 00:02:09.900 research that I've seen on digital church, what is actually happening inside digital church in this 00:02:09.900 --> 00:02:15.720 COVID season. So I'll put this link in the show notes as well. The report itself is over at 00:02:15.720 --> 00:02:25.400 barna.com slash stadia. Barna, B-A-R-N-A dot com slash stadia, S-T-A-D-I-A. Go ahead and put the link in the show 00:02:25.400 --> 00:02:30.600 notes. No, we have nothing to do with Stadia, with Stadia gaming from Google. Just wanted to get that out of 00:02:30.600 --> 00:02:35.140 the way. Stadia church planning, completely separate thing. But barna.com slash stadia is where you can 00:02:35.140 --> 00:02:42.260 buy this report. And it is a phenomenal report with stats and research. Basically, what the end user is 00:02:42.260 --> 00:02:48.680 experiencing and what their thought patterns are walking into this digital church season. Do they 00:02:48.680 --> 00:02:53.680 like it? Do they not like it? Are they turned off by it? How much do they want to do? Are they okay 00:02:53.680 --> 00:03:00.800 with communion online? Are they okay with discipleship? Are they okay with prayer? It was so rich beyond just 00:03:00.800 --> 00:03:08.840 the one hour on Sunday. I loved getting the feedback from what the people want to experience as a result of 00:03:08.840 --> 00:03:13.880 this. And so the report was so good. I reached out to Barna and was like, hey, who can I talk with 00:03:13.880 --> 00:03:18.720 towards this idea of what we're doing with digital church here with the report? So we're bringing into 00:03:18.720 --> 00:03:23.480 the podcast here, Savannah Kimberlin. Now, Savannah's been with Barna a long time. She'll tell you about 00:03:23.480 --> 00:03:29.520 that here on the podcast. But here with this research journal, we're really drilling into the six 00:03:29.520 --> 00:03:36.700 questions about the future of the hybrid church experience. So when we're talking about physical and 00:03:36.700 --> 00:03:43.720 digital coming together with Barna, they're using that word hybrid, that hybrid church. And so we're digging in here 00:03:43.720 --> 00:03:49.940 talking about the six questions about the future of what a hybrid church experience could look like 00:03:49.940 --> 00:03:56.840 or where are we? What are we learning in this season today? Love this. Love digging in. Not only talking about 00:03:56.840 --> 00:04:03.700 where we are as a church and what we're learning across the Big C Church, but philosophically, what does this mean 00:04:03.700 --> 00:04:09.720 for the future of our churches here in America and beyond? So for the conversation, I'm bringing in Savannah 00:04:09.720 --> 00:04:15.320 Kimberlin once again with Barna and myself, Jeff with the Church Digital and Stadia Church Planning, 00:04:15.820 --> 00:04:22.880 essentially discussing the six questions about the future of the hybrid church experience. Okay, 00:04:22.920 --> 00:04:29.280 everybody. Here you go. Maybe even just open up. Savannah, I'd love to, you know, know your ministry 00:04:29.280 --> 00:04:34.740 story. How you got plugged in working for a company like Barna? What's it like working for Barna? 00:04:35.260 --> 00:04:40.260 Yeah. Firstly, Jeff, thank you for having me on today. This really is a privilege to spend some time and 00:04:40.260 --> 00:04:48.540 talk with you. So my background, actually, I was a math major in college. I love to solve problems with 00:04:48.540 --> 00:04:55.560 numbers. That's what I've always loved to do. So I decided to go to grad school and I actually studied 00:04:55.560 --> 00:05:02.300 decision analytics. So big data, the world of big data and all that is involved there. It's an ever 00:05:02.300 --> 00:05:10.680 changing industry. That's for sure. So that was my career trajectory and path. And at first, after grad 00:05:10.680 --> 00:05:17.920 school, I was in the software development industry, um, but long story short, when I was in grad school, 00:05:17.920 --> 00:05:27.760 I wrote my thesis on using big data to predict volunteer burnout at churches. How can we use, um, 00:05:27.920 --> 00:05:33.880 yeah, volunteers, big data footprints. Yeah. To predict whether or not they're going to stick around 00:05:33.880 --> 00:05:41.700 as volunteers and Brooke Hempel, who's our senior vice president at Barna actually caught wind of my 00:05:41.700 --> 00:05:50.080 thesis and we grabbed coffee. And a couple months later I joined Barna. So that's what led me, um, 00:05:50.260 --> 00:05:54.400 led me to this organization was actually just through, through my thesis. And the fact that I've 00:05:54.400 --> 00:06:02.540 always wanted to do math and study the church and see those two things, those two passions of mine, 00:06:02.540 --> 00:06:08.320 walk hand in hand professionally. Um, and I get to do it every day, which is unreal that I'm able to do 00:06:08.320 --> 00:06:13.980 that. Well, I tell you what, it would be a miss if I didn't pull that thread here a little bit. It's not 00:06:13.980 --> 00:06:20.260 all what I wanted to talk about on the podcast, but what were your observations centered around, uh, big data 00:06:20.260 --> 00:06:28.240 and, and, and volunteering in burnout? Like what, what, what did you observe? Yeah. So you can predict, 00:06:28.240 --> 00:06:34.020 uh, um, behavior through big data footprints, which is wild. And that's, that's why, you know, organizations 00:06:34.020 --> 00:06:38.740 like, like target, you know, or other large companies, they'll look at your big data footprints 00:06:38.740 --> 00:06:45.500 to try to determine, um, you know, marketing strategies and the rest. And so I, I found that 00:06:45.500 --> 00:06:52.660 that actually was the case as well for, for volunteers. So there were, there were certain key elements of 00:06:52.660 --> 00:06:57.940 people's lives, um, looking. So we looked at a wide assortment of variables and a certain, 00:06:58.480 --> 00:07:05.860 a few variables popped that if they appeared in a certain order or organized in a certain way, 00:07:05.860 --> 00:07:13.640 they did in fact predict burnout. So the, the result was we flagged all of the volunteers that 00:07:13.640 --> 00:07:19.580 were showing those signs. And then the pastors reached out to them proactively to shepherd them, 00:07:19.580 --> 00:07:26.180 um, and just to check in on them. And so instead of responding defensively to burnout, they were able 00:07:26.180 --> 00:07:32.340 to respond proactively to burnout for, for the test church that partnered with me. So, um, it was, 00:07:32.440 --> 00:07:38.680 it was really interesting. That's awesome. Big data to save the day. I know, I know. A really cool 00:07:38.680 --> 00:07:43.360 story. All right. Hey, so, so what, what we, I really wanted to talk about here, and I'm excited about 00:07:43.360 --> 00:07:50.360 this. Stadia is partnering, um, with Barna when it, when it comes to the idea of releasing a journal, 00:07:50.360 --> 00:07:58.260 uh, centered around what digital church is and hybrid churches and how it's responding here in the midst 00:07:58.260 --> 00:08:02.640 of the COVID season. And it's, it's been released. We'll, we'll put a link in the show notes. It's, 00:08:02.640 --> 00:08:10.080 uh, barna.com slash Stadia. We'll get you there, but it's six questions about the future of the hybrid 00:08:10.080 --> 00:08:17.260 church experience. And so, um, the findings of it, uh, were just released. And so I was, was really 00:08:17.260 --> 00:08:23.240 excited about this pouring into, uh, all, you know, all just sorts of, of informations and graphs, trying 00:08:23.240 --> 00:08:29.340 to discover what we're learning, what we're seeing, and, and, and really even from the audience 00:08:29.340 --> 00:08:36.280 perspective, what they're experiencing and processing here in this COVID season through, through the 00:08:36.280 --> 00:08:40.320 church. And I was honest, there were some things that I was, I was really surprised by. There were a lot 00:08:40.320 --> 00:08:44.760 of things that, that I expected, but there were a couple curve balls that I was like, man, I did not 00:08:44.760 --> 00:08:49.020 see that coming at all. So, you know, Savannah, I want to thank you for jumping on here, you know, 00:08:49.020 --> 00:08:54.700 even just with Barna's perspective and, and starting to talk here a little bit about the data, super 00:08:54.700 --> 00:09:01.180 excited how all this is, is, is coming together. Um, you know, just maybe even a knee jerk question for 00:09:01.180 --> 00:09:06.780 you right off the bat, uh, general findings. What was, what was something that was surprising for you, 00:09:06.780 --> 00:09:12.640 um, when you were going into this? Did you have like going into it something in mind where you thought 00:09:12.640 --> 00:09:17.320 the results were, did it line up or what, was it something completely different? We went into this 00:09:17.320 --> 00:09:25.900 project trying to, uh, our, one of our biggest goals was to really gauge openness. Are people open 00:09:25.900 --> 00:09:34.560 to digital alternatives for faith experiences? How open are they? Um, if we look at each of those 00:09:34.560 --> 00:09:41.860 faith experiences separately, like just gathering together or even, even just, um, baptism or communion, 00:09:41.860 --> 00:09:48.800 like if we really break apart traditions, discipleship, outreach, evangelism, so on and so forth. If we break 00:09:48.800 --> 00:09:55.520 apart those things, how open are people to each of those different, um, faith expressions or 00:09:55.520 --> 00:10:02.920 experiences and why, why are they open or why are they not open? And what I was, I was really surprised 00:10:02.920 --> 00:10:10.760 to find is there is a lot more openness than perhaps we thought. Um, one of my favorite statistics 00:10:10.760 --> 00:10:17.460 that emerged from this study is we just flat out asked people what type of church experience is going 00:10:17.460 --> 00:10:23.940 to fit your lifestyle the best after, after COVID. Is it a physical gathering, a digital gathering, 00:10:24.140 --> 00:10:35.340 both or neither? And so many churchgoers said both. They, they, um, they acknowledge that a hybrid model 00:10:35.340 --> 00:10:41.920 fits their lifestyle the best. And similarly, we saw openness for discipleship digitally, and we saw 00:10:41.920 --> 00:10:48.980 openness for outreach digitally and, and communicating, um, to neighborhoods and serving neighborhoods digitally. 00:10:48.980 --> 00:10:56.380 It was really interesting to see that, um, one of our data points showed that, um, especially because of 00:10:56.380 --> 00:11:05.260 the pandemic, openness has grown exponentially. And it really speaks to, I think, the moment that we're in 00:11:05.260 --> 00:11:12.960 that on the backside of this pandemic, um, there, there will remain openness that was not there pre-pandemic. 00:11:13.180 --> 00:11:17.440 That's great. Look, looking forward to unpacking even more here. I, one of the things that I love 00:11:17.440 --> 00:11:21.720 about, about Barna and just anytime you're dealing with big data, you're looking at the same data 00:11:21.720 --> 00:11:26.780 through different perspectives and, and, and wrestling with, okay, this vantage point versus this one 00:11:26.780 --> 00:11:33.420 And so you're, you're, you're very thorough with, uh, practicing Christians, church adults, unchurched adults 00:11:33.420 --> 00:11:40.140 perspectives there, uh, generationally, uh, you know, Gen Z, millennial, Gen X, boomers, that, that perspective. 00:11:40.540 --> 00:11:40.620 Yeah. 00:11:40.740 --> 00:11:45.800 One of the things that, that, that I loved here was you also had the perspective of people who maybe had 00:11:45.800 --> 00:11:52.280 more of a bend towards technology and digital, digital. And so like digital church openness 00:11:52.280 --> 00:11:57.640 was, was a phrase that, that you used in here. And so you were looking at the results through people 00:11:57.640 --> 00:12:03.760 who were maybe open to the idea of digital church and others that maybe did not, or not even digital 00:12:03.760 --> 00:12:08.780 church, but just digital in general. Some people who maybe were a little bit less, like, I would love 00:12:08.780 --> 00:12:16.460 to just know how did you, um, how did you filter out whether somebody was like open to digital church 00:12:16.460 --> 00:12:18.600 or had that been towards digital? 00:12:19.000 --> 00:12:26.020 Great question. So we did a lot of analysis, a lot of robust analysis to decide what were the key 00:12:26.020 --> 00:12:32.360 indicators of openness, um, maybe phrasing it a little bit differently. What were the key variables 00:12:32.360 --> 00:12:40.700 that if we cut the respondents by those variables, the divide would be as stark as it possibly could, 00:12:41.040 --> 00:12:48.180 right? We really wanted to create groups of people that looked different and had very defined, uh, 00:12:48.180 --> 00:12:53.580 traits and characteristics that made them unique. So in our analysis, we looked at a bunch of variables 00:12:53.580 --> 00:13:01.720 and we found that some things that, that floated to the surface were, um, that data point that I had just 00:13:01.720 --> 00:13:09.360 mentioned. So saying that hybrid or digital church fits your lifestyle the best, which is a very personal 00:13:09.360 --> 00:13:16.580 type of question, a very reflective question. And so we found that that was powerful, um, for people to voice 00:13:16.580 --> 00:13:26.600 their real world practical needs. Um, we also found that secondly, openness to discipleship digitally 00:13:26.600 --> 00:13:34.240 spiked. So that was very, um, very influential in determining openness. So if you were willing to 00:13:34.240 --> 00:13:42.080 participate in discipleship digitally or online, um, and then thirdly was that outreach piece that I 00:13:42.080 --> 00:13:49.720 mentioned as well. So if you were open to doing outreach digitally, um, then you, you were put into 00:13:49.720 --> 00:13:55.420 that high openness group. Um, and then finally the four, the fourth characteristic that I want to mention 00:13:55.420 --> 00:14:02.280 was actually a pretty unique one. And, and I think for any listeners today, um, this is a characteristic 00:14:02.280 --> 00:14:09.080 that perhaps you wouldn't have thought of ahead of time. Um, we found that churchgoers who said that 00:14:09.080 --> 00:14:16.380 generally speaking, they're the types of people who are open to attending new kinds of gatherings that 00:14:16.380 --> 00:14:22.020 are different than what they're used to. That was very influential. It was a very influential variable. 00:14:22.240 --> 00:14:27.400 They're, they're these types of people who are just open to new experiences. They're willing to put 00:14:27.400 --> 00:14:34.500 themselves out there. Um, as you might suspect there few, fewer, I'm not going to say few, but fewer 00:14:34.500 --> 00:14:41.360 boomers have this trait, um, less so than other generations. That doesn't mean no boomers have 00:14:41.360 --> 00:14:46.600 this trait, but fewer boomers have this trait. Just having, having a general openness to trying 00:14:46.600 --> 00:14:53.100 new things, trying new environments and new communities. So that, um, those were four really 00:14:53.100 --> 00:15:00.200 defining marks, how we, how we defined openness. So if you showed that you carried all of those marks, 00:15:00.200 --> 00:15:05.960 then, um, then you were considered high, high openness. You had high openness. 00:15:06.860 --> 00:15:13.340 Yeah. And I totally believe that there are more people out there that have a digital 00:15:13.340 --> 00:15:18.580 leaning that, that the church just hasn't even recognized yet. And I'm beginning to see 00:15:18.580 --> 00:15:23.880 some of that, even through some of the stats that are coming up, like you mentioned, um, you know, 00:15:23.940 --> 00:15:28.180 digital discipleship or, you know, digital prayer being open to some of those experiences. 00:15:28.180 --> 00:15:32.780 Sure. Uh, practicing Christians, you know, right now, one of, one of the, uh, one of the stats 00:15:32.780 --> 00:15:40.620 that came out of it, practicing Christians, 20% are open to digital prayer experiences when 00:15:40.620 --> 00:15:44.700 it comes to, and I'm even combining digital spiritual formation with digital discipleship. 00:15:44.780 --> 00:15:51.360 You isolated them, you know, potentially 27% of people were, were open to something like 00:15:51.360 --> 00:15:56.660 that. So we're, you're seeing people that have more of a bend towards digital discipleship, 00:15:56.660 --> 00:16:01.540 digital prayer, digital experiences more beyond the, the one hour on Sunday. And there's, 00:16:01.540 --> 00:16:06.000 there's really like a, a challenge, I think, for the church to kind of step up and embrace 00:16:06.000 --> 00:16:12.540 that, uh, from, from a digital perspective. What, um, were there other findings that were 00:16:12.540 --> 00:16:17.900 coming out, like volunteering digitally, digital children's digital youth experiences? Were, 00:16:18.100 --> 00:16:21.260 were there other things that, that you were looking towards as, 00:16:21.260 --> 00:16:26.640 hey, here's a, a tell sign of somebody that's wanting to be more aggressive in the digital space? 00:16:27.140 --> 00:16:33.500 Yeah, I think so. I think certainly parents that are willing to, um, disciple their children 00:16:33.500 --> 00:16:41.040 digitally was a telltale sign. Um, a lot, I would say though, quite a few parents are hesitant to do so, 00:16:41.040 --> 00:16:47.780 or even their youth, um, to have the, the church community alternative for young people today be 00:16:47.780 --> 00:16:53.940 digital solutions. And perhaps I, I think that reason is because we just need to get better at 00:16:53.940 --> 00:16:59.280 serving the youth of America digitally. You know, that I think that's a way that, um, churches are all 00:16:59.280 --> 00:17:06.520 looking to improve right now. Um, um, but we found that, that parents that are open to that are more 00:17:06.520 --> 00:17:13.860 inclined to be digitally open for their own personal spiritual development as well. Um, a couple other 00:17:13.860 --> 00:17:23.260 indicators. We asked a question about, um, do, do you struggle to focus during a service? And quite a few 00:17:23.260 --> 00:17:31.080 people said that they did struggle to focus. However, um, the, the few people that were able to kind of 00:17:31.080 --> 00:17:39.260 cut through the noise and really connect with the community. And what I mean by that is, is emotionally 00:17:39.260 --> 00:17:45.260 connect in the sense where they were showing signs of saying, I feel cared for by my pastors. I feel 00:17:45.260 --> 00:17:51.020 emotionally connected and relationally connected to my community. Um, if they exhibited those signs, 00:17:51.020 --> 00:17:58.960 they were able to cut through that noise of, uh, being distracted or struggling to focus during a 00:17:58.960 --> 00:18:06.160 digital spiritual experience. And, and they showed more signs of openness because they were emotionally 00:18:06.160 --> 00:18:11.100 connected and were, were able to cut through those distractions. Yeah, that was, that was one of the 00:18:11.100 --> 00:18:16.420 surprises for me. And I don't have that slide up in front of me, but the high percentage of people that 00:18:16.420 --> 00:18:23.000 felt connected and cared for by the church, by the individual pastors, by watching that digital 00:18:23.000 --> 00:18:28.720 service, I, I wasn't expecting that level. I was expecting, you know, that they needed more 00:18:28.720 --> 00:18:36.140 engagement, more two-way conversation, more individual approach. But per your report, looking at the, 00:18:36.160 --> 00:18:41.320 the individual attenders, digital attenders, they felt cared for even by, by watching that, 00:18:41.480 --> 00:18:46.800 that online service. Yeah. I think we were surprised by that data point as well. I remember having some 00:18:46.800 --> 00:18:53.380 conversations internally about that data point. Um, but I think also we need to realize that the 00:18:53.380 --> 00:18:59.280 definition of what does it mean for a pastor to care for a congregation is different right now. And 00:18:59.280 --> 00:19:05.680 when we say I'm connected to my community, that's different right now than even what it was nine months 00:19:05.680 --> 00:19:13.080 ago. And so although things are, are more difficult, I think congregants, um, my takeaway from that data 00:19:13.080 --> 00:19:19.860 point is that congregants are very understanding. They understand that pastors are doing the best that 00:19:19.860 --> 00:19:27.260 they can. And we saw in some other data as well, that congregants are just appreciative, that pastors 00:19:27.260 --> 00:19:33.700 are really trying right now. They're doing the best that they can. They're looking to innovate and grow. 00:19:33.700 --> 00:19:40.060 I mean, the number of churches that are innovating for the first time in years during this pandemic, 00:19:40.060 --> 00:19:46.440 it's really remarkable and admirable. Um, and, and congregants are seeing that and they feel cared 00:19:46.440 --> 00:19:51.000 for and they, they feel connected, even though it's different than what it was before the pandemic. 00:19:51.200 --> 00:19:56.140 One of the bad things in this season is, or potentially bad. I don't know that it's bad for 00:19:56.140 --> 00:20:01.060 an individual church. Maybe, maybe it's bad that we're, individuals are attending more than one 00:20:01.060 --> 00:20:07.220 church. And there's a fear, Hey, we're not gonna, we're going to lose these people where that's 00:20:07.220 --> 00:20:12.080 grounded. Uh, you know, that's, it's a whole other conversation, but from, from a data standpoint, 00:20:12.080 --> 00:20:21.300 what it looks like I'm understanding is roughly 20 to 35%, uh, given age demographics are attending 00:20:21.300 --> 00:20:28.980 multiple church services online. Was there any more, uh, understanding towards why or where, 00:20:28.980 --> 00:20:35.000 or how many, or what that looked like? Uh, cause I know that that's something as local churches are 00:20:35.000 --> 00:20:40.200 out there, you know, there's always somebody better on the content side. And I know there's fear that 00:20:40.200 --> 00:20:46.300 they're going to lose some, some of these people. So what, can you unpack maybe some of, of what you 00:20:46.300 --> 00:20:48.920 learned through this, uh, through these findings? 00:20:48.920 --> 00:20:55.220 Yeah, absolutely. That's the question of the day, isn't it? Um, are my people watching my service or 00:20:55.220 --> 00:21:01.020 are there random people watching my service as, as a pastor? Everybody's wondering who are my viewers? 00:21:01.660 --> 00:21:08.620 Um, and that, that is a, a great question to ask because we want to make sure that we understand who 00:21:08.620 --> 00:21:15.480 we're serving. So it's, it's a very understandable question. Um, what we found in the data is that the 00:21:15.480 --> 00:21:21.240 majority of churchgoers are remaining faithful to the congregation that they were a part of before COVID. 00:21:22.000 --> 00:21:28.200 So that's great news for all of us. I think pastors, you can stop sweating. It's okay. Um, 00:21:28.200 --> 00:21:33.360 some of them, it was interesting. We wanted to give them the opportunity to express what their, 00:21:33.560 --> 00:21:37.960 what their attendance habits were looking like during the pandemic. And one of our options, 00:21:38.200 --> 00:21:46.040 response options was I, it was along the lines of I'm remaining committed to my church, like my, 00:21:46.140 --> 00:21:52.420 the church that I consider to be my church, but I'm also sampling other churches. And quite a few 00:21:52.420 --> 00:21:59.620 adults selected that answer. They, they are sampling other churches. However, they were showing signs 00:21:59.620 --> 00:22:06.460 even throughout the data of remaining loyal to the congregation that they were attending before the 00:22:06.460 --> 00:22:14.840 pandemic. So although the number of views that some of these more advanced, larger churches are getting 00:22:14.840 --> 00:22:21.280 are spiking. That does not necessarily mean that loyalty in the hearts of these churchgoers is 00:22:21.280 --> 00:22:28.780 shifting from their pastor, from their local congregation to that, that larger church or whoever 00:22:28.780 --> 00:22:36.840 else they are also watching on a Sunday. So I think that's great news in the sense that, um, even though 00:22:36.840 --> 00:22:44.480 though many churches have not met in person for months and months and months, the loyalty is remaining 00:22:44.480 --> 00:22:52.180 steadfast for many churchgoers. Um, so that that's really great news for the pastors of today. 00:22:52.280 --> 00:22:59.320 And there, there's always opportunities to expand the ministry beyond just that, that content, just that 00:22:59.320 --> 00:23:05.240 weekend, Sunday piece, you know, looking, looking here, like going back to the, uh, the percentage of people 00:23:05.240 --> 00:23:12.040 that will embrace in a, in a digital discipleship, uh, angle, the number of people that are, are wanting 00:23:12.040 --> 00:23:19.560 to volunteer in online environments, um, digitally connecting with, with people, there's a lot more 00:23:19.560 --> 00:23:25.760 opportunity to, to engage. And so if we're, if we're just putting content to content, there, there's a risk. 00:23:25.760 --> 00:23:32.040 But when you create more of that church experience where you're giving people ownership and discipleship, 00:23:32.100 --> 00:23:38.180 like there's, there's a lot more potential growth for somebody in those areas. And I think within that 00:23:38.180 --> 00:23:44.260 growth is where the loyalty comes in, in play. Yeah, absolutely. You know, and, and I know one of 00:23:44.260 --> 00:23:49.400 the things that I'm excited about with you is, um, with where Barna's going is, um, more than just the 00:23:49.400 --> 00:23:54.320 digital church, like there, it feels like there's a, a suite where there's more reports that, that are 00:23:54.320 --> 00:24:00.460 going to be coming out digitally, uh, evangelism, discipleship, right? You want to maybe update a 00:24:00.460 --> 00:24:06.120 little bit on those? Cause I'm excited to see this whole thing develop. Yeah, absolutely. So this 00:24:06.120 --> 00:24:13.140 hybrid church journal is one of many that we hope to publish. So we are releasing a state of the digital 00:24:13.140 --> 00:24:20.540 church series because we know that so many things are disrupted. So many different facets of the faith 00:24:20.540 --> 00:24:26.220 experience are being innovated right now digitally. So we wanted to, um, really explore them piece by 00:24:26.220 --> 00:24:31.080 piece. So as of right now, the hybrid church was our, was our first journal that we launched with 00:24:31.080 --> 00:24:38.800 Stadia. And then we are going to be releasing the first week of December, um, one on digital evangelism 00:24:38.800 --> 00:24:46.620 with alpha. And then also we're doing a second one with alpha in the new year on creating digital prayer 00:24:46.620 --> 00:24:55.180 experiences. How do we create hospitable environments and powerful corporate prayer environments digitally 00:24:55.180 --> 00:25:01.660 when you're not in person? Um, so those are, those are two more journals that we have teed up right 00:25:01.660 --> 00:25:06.820 now. And we hope to do even more in the future into 2021. It's exciting because you're starting to get 00:25:06.820 --> 00:25:13.240 like a more richer picture of, of what church is more than just that weekend service, creating that 00:25:13.240 --> 00:25:20.520 digital, uh, community, that digital discipleship, that digital prayer. Uh, we recently did it, did a 00:25:20.520 --> 00:25:25.940 podcast, uh, Greg Nettle, president of Stadia. He asks me all, every time I see him, he's like, Hey, 00:25:26.040 --> 00:25:31.980 where have you seen the tangible presence of God happening online? You know, and he's, he's not asking for 00:25:31.980 --> 00:25:39.360 like the weekend service update. He's asking for where is God moving. And it's, that's more than just a, 00:25:39.360 --> 00:25:46.340 a content thing. And by Barna doing research and digging into the disciple making into the, 00:25:46.340 --> 00:25:52.280 the, the weekend serve or the, um, the prayer moments, we're starting to explore more of this 00:25:52.280 --> 00:25:58.020 space other than just what's happening kind of within that Sunday morning, 9am, uh, look and feel. 00:25:58.020 --> 00:26:05.480 So that's, that's really exciting. Um, one, one of the things I'd love to maybe pull the thread a little 00:26:05.480 --> 00:26:12.180 bit on is, and I don't know if the, your stats show it or if you can provide any, any leanings towards 00:26:12.180 --> 00:26:20.460 it. The, you know, you shared the stat with me, 75% of people attend, uh, a church that's less than 250 00:26:20.460 --> 00:26:27.500 in attendance. Um, you know, in this COVID season, pre-COVID by far the vast majority of people who 00:26:27.500 --> 00:26:33.480 were doing anything online had more of a mega giga church mentality, but out of necessity in this COVID 00:26:33.480 --> 00:26:40.120 season, a number of churches, um, pivoted and had to get online quickly of, of all sizes. Some of my 00:26:40.120 --> 00:26:46.380 closest friends are, are lead pastors of churches, you know, under 100 that are doing something 00:26:46.380 --> 00:26:54.980 digitally. Um, is there any, um, awareness or, or stats centered around the size of the church or 00:26:54.980 --> 00:27:02.160 how a smaller church is going to embrace an idea versus a bigger, bigger church? Did you 00:27:02.160 --> 00:27:09.800 get any findings in those areas? Yes, certainly. So hybrid, the hybrid model or incorporating digital 00:27:09.800 --> 00:27:16.600 into the way that you did church in some form was already a part of the equation for many churches, 00:27:16.600 --> 00:27:26.180 about 500 in size or larger. Um, but all of the churches that were smaller than that, and for sure, 00:27:26.180 --> 00:27:32.880 the churches that were 250 or fewer, um, very, very few of them had a digital strategy before this 00:27:32.880 --> 00:27:38.680 moment. And if they did, they were ahead of the curve and re reasons for that. I think we need to 00:27:38.680 --> 00:27:46.200 understand, um, you know, understand where these leaders are at. Their initiatives are volunteer led. 00:27:46.440 --> 00:27:53.720 They have very small budgets to work with. Their focus is, um, highly, highly pastoral, 00:27:54.020 --> 00:27:57.960 intimate relationship with their congregants and walking through life with their congregants 00:27:57.960 --> 00:28:04.920 in these smaller congregations. And we, you're right, Jeff, we do need to remember that three out of 00:28:04.920 --> 00:28:11.520 four people that go to church, attend a church that feels like this, that's small, that's volunteer led, 00:28:11.520 --> 00:28:18.060 that maybe has one person on staff. Maybe the pastor may very well be bivocational. So, 00:28:18.060 --> 00:28:25.720 so the transition to the pandemic, certainly our data has, has shown that it was more difficult 00:28:25.720 --> 00:28:32.320 for those churches because they, they did not have a digital strategy beforehand. And that made 00:28:32.320 --> 00:28:39.940 a large difference, not only for ease of transition for staff and, and for congregation, but also 00:28:39.940 --> 00:28:47.660 we did see in our data that those congregants who were exposed to digital church before the pandemic, 00:28:47.660 --> 00:28:54.900 they were far more likely to be open to engaging digitally with things like discipleship and 00:28:54.900 --> 00:28:58.860 children's ministry during the pandemic. They were already open to the idea beforehand. 00:28:59.980 --> 00:29:04.880 Um, so what is the transition to this pandemic moment looked like for those smaller churches? 00:29:05.440 --> 00:29:13.020 It's been hard for sure to go digital. Many of them, um, you know, they just set up their iPhone 00:29:13.020 --> 00:29:20.780 on a tripod and stream themselves preaching on a Sunday. And that's the best that they can do. Um, 00:29:20.840 --> 00:29:26.880 I think maybe as an example of that, some of our dearest friends are Methodist ministers 00:29:26.880 --> 00:29:34.200 pastors in Mississippi and they're in their twenties and in their division, um, all of the other pastors 00:29:34.200 --> 00:29:40.600 in their division are in their fifties or above. And so when the pandemic hit, um, they ended up 00:29:40.600 --> 00:29:45.460 forming like a small group with, with my friends who were in their twenties and all of those other 00:29:45.460 --> 00:29:50.660 pastors, because the pastors were like, I don't even know how to Facebook live stream. Can you help me 00:29:50.660 --> 00:29:56.540 figure this out? And, and all of those pastors that were represented on those zoom calls pastored small 00:29:56.540 --> 00:30:03.340 congregations. They just, they didn't have resources. So it's been a struggle to go digital. And I think 00:30:03.340 --> 00:30:11.460 if we want to encourage these people to consider the hybrid church model in the future, even looking 00:30:11.460 --> 00:30:16.660 beyond just setting up an iPhone and listening to yourself preach, they're going to need some more 00:30:16.660 --> 00:30:22.460 help with getting over those technological barriers. Um, what does it look like to do digital discipleship 00:30:22.460 --> 00:30:28.660 when you only have a hundred congregants? What does that even look like? How do we do, um, 00:30:28.880 --> 00:30:34.440 children's ministry or youth ministry when there are only a handful of children that you're ministering 00:30:34.440 --> 00:30:39.900 to week in and week out? What does that look like on a small scale? I think that's, that's really 00:30:39.900 --> 00:30:45.160 something for us all to think through. And I'm not quite sure if we've, we've cracked the code on that. 00:30:45.160 --> 00:30:50.020 Maybe Stadia has, I don't know. I don't think we have. Um, but yeah, the small church thing is 00:30:50.020 --> 00:30:54.920 different, but I, I do want to say, Jeff, one final thing that we've seen in the data, 00:30:55.640 --> 00:31:03.300 one strength of the small church in this pandemic that the large church does not have is the 00:31:03.300 --> 00:31:10.460 connectedness and the strength of relationship between congregant and pastor has remained so strong. 00:31:11.160 --> 00:31:16.820 And so we've been asked the question a lot. How do we replicate that in larger church environments? 00:31:17.020 --> 00:31:22.480 Because these pastors of small congregations are able to call all their congregants, you know, and, 00:31:22.540 --> 00:31:26.860 and they're able to go knock on their door and check in on them. And of course, socially distancing, 00:31:27.020 --> 00:31:33.300 but just, you know, how do we replicate that for a large church? And, and so any pastors of large 00:31:33.300 --> 00:31:39.660 churches who are listening, um, are you being intentional to build relationship with your congregants, 00:31:39.660 --> 00:31:46.540 or are you getting caught up in the digital production? Uh, when's the last time you sent an email that was 00:31:46.540 --> 00:31:52.100 not professionally designed with graphics? It was just from, from you with words on a page and your 00:31:52.100 --> 00:31:58.060 signature at the bottom to a congregant. Um, that, that is something that I think pastors of larger 00:31:58.060 --> 00:32:01.940 congregations really can learn from smaller congregations right now. 00:32:01.940 --> 00:32:11.580 Yeah. I had a, um, early, call it March, early April, 2020. I had a giga church, digital pastor, 00:32:11.820 --> 00:32:19.920 20,000 pre COVID, um, attendance physically, not to mention tens of thousands online. I had that pastor 00:32:19.920 --> 00:32:23.880 tell me, Jeff, I wish I was at a small church right now where I was able to do tangible, physical 00:32:23.880 --> 00:32:30.940 ministry, individual ministry towards it. And so the, the challenge of, of, of churches today, 00:32:30.940 --> 00:32:36.320 and, and, and I think you, you just, you know, hit the nail on the head Savannah. It's how do we do, 00:32:36.320 --> 00:32:44.380 um, relational ministry utilizing these digital tools that, that, that can, that can multiply our 00:32:44.380 --> 00:32:49.860 people. And at the same time, build relationships with people who are far from God and point them, 00:32:49.860 --> 00:32:55.600 uh, evangelically to God, which is actually, it's summarizes everything of what I'm excited about 00:32:55.600 --> 00:33:02.040 as you're developing this digital, these journals, these digital suite, uh, of addressing the ideas 00:33:02.040 --> 00:33:07.740 of, yeah, the weekend services is, is important. Evangelism is important. Disciple making is 00:33:07.740 --> 00:33:13.400 important. If we can figure out prayer is important. And if we can figure out how to do all of these 00:33:13.400 --> 00:33:19.700 things together digitally, if we can learn what we can do, um, the church has huge opportunities 00:33:19.700 --> 00:33:26.080 to do things digitally as, as well as, as physically, like we're, we're, we're talking a lot 00:33:26.080 --> 00:33:30.860 about this, this digital. And for me, one of the stats that, that I found really telling in this 00:33:30.860 --> 00:33:37.120 is that people are not looking for a lone physical experience. Right. There's a percentage that is, 00:33:37.420 --> 00:33:41.320 there's a percentage that of smaller percentage that's looking for a digital only experience. 00:33:41.320 --> 00:33:46.700 Yeah. Yeah. But the majority seem to be looking for some sort of hybrid where they can go back 00:33:46.700 --> 00:33:52.240 and forth between physically and digital. You want to unpack some of that? Yeah, for sure. So one of the 00:33:52.240 --> 00:34:00.060 questions that we asked was, um, we asked people to agree or disagree to the following statement. Um, 00:34:00.360 --> 00:34:07.480 would you say that physically, the physical gathering of Christians or the physical gathering of a, 00:34:07.480 --> 00:34:13.320 of a church experience is very important to you? Like, would you, would you say that? And the vast 00:34:13.320 --> 00:34:20.740 majority of people agreed with that statement. Um, I, I think we want to innovate digitally a hundred 00:34:20.740 --> 00:34:29.300 percent, but we cannot forsake or forget the fact that many, many Christians still do believe that 00:34:29.300 --> 00:34:35.920 the gathering is a very important piece of their faith experience. So we have to keep that in mind, 00:34:35.920 --> 00:34:42.140 that that's how people are feeling, um, that that's, that is what they're wanting. However, you're 00:34:42.140 --> 00:34:49.980 exactly right, Jeff, alongside that statistic, I mean, 42% of millennials said that they are looking for 00:34:49.980 --> 00:34:59.380 a hybrid solution for their lifestyle for their church engagement after, um, the pandemic 42%. So we have 00:34:59.380 --> 00:35:06.060 to understand that there's this, this need for connection. There's this need for gathering, 00:35:06.060 --> 00:35:12.920 of course, because we're humans, but at the same time, they are looking for flexible solutions. 00:35:13.540 --> 00:35:21.660 So I would say that was probably one of the largest findings of, of, um, of putting the digital and the 00:35:21.660 --> 00:35:29.660 physical next to each other and analyzing them side by side. Physically, we want, we want our 00:35:29.660 --> 00:35:36.760 traditions that are dear to us, like weddings and funerals and visitations. And we want to gather with 00:35:36.940 --> 00:35:42.680 other believers, um, for many liturgical denominations. Of course, we want to take the Eucharist together, 00:35:42.680 --> 00:35:50.780 right? Like that, that is really, really, really important. However, we want flexibility. And on the 00:35:50.780 --> 00:35:59.780 digital side of things, we believe that innovation is totally the answer for the future, because I can 00:35:59.780 --> 00:36:07.260 still get community and intimacy of relationship and a powerful worship experience. I can still get those 00:36:07.260 --> 00:36:15.060 things digitally. So I, I certainly, um, I'm not willing to, we saw respondents say, I'm not willing 00:36:15.060 --> 00:36:20.120 to compromise really on either. I, I would like to have both, you know, your, your, your boss, David 00:36:20.120 --> 00:36:27.600 Kinnaman, uh, who I have the utmost respect for, um, you know, he just recently went through a loss of, 00:36:27.660 --> 00:36:34.720 of his wife to cancer. I'm blanking on the type of brain cancer, brain cancer. Yes. Um, you know, 00:36:34.720 --> 00:36:42.700 and so just, uh, seeing him, um, go through that, that tragedy and just from, from the outside, how he 00:36:42.700 --> 00:36:48.240 was, you know, still doing ministry and, and, and holding strong to Christ in that season was, was 00:36:48.240 --> 00:36:54.820 very telling of kind of the calling that he has on, on his life. He, uh, I've, I've, I've heard him say 00:36:54.820 --> 00:36:59.700 this, uh, a couple of times on different podcasts and I've heard other people quote him on saying this 00:36:59.700 --> 00:37:06.540 on other, other podcasts, but essentially, um, you know, 20% of churches, uh, shutting down, but 30% 00:37:06.540 --> 00:37:12.120 of people, uh, are, are going to disconnect from the church, um, you know, as a result of this. And 00:37:12.120 --> 00:37:18.880 I've heard him, you know, use strong languages like mathematically it's, it's gone, uh, short of, uh, 00:37:18.880 --> 00:37:24.820 an act of God or radical disciple making, you know, we're losing 30% of people out of this 00:37:24.820 --> 00:37:32.680 mathematically. And so your, your report here, um, speaks towards that, that church dropout. Um, 00:37:32.760 --> 00:37:38.780 you know, and just, I would love to maybe even just open it up here. What, as we're, we're looking 00:37:38.780 --> 00:37:45.780 at these church dropouts, what, what are we observing? Um, what, what trends can we do to, to turn the, 00:37:45.780 --> 00:37:50.660 the favor? Hey, that radical disciple making is an awesome idea, but what else are we learning 00:37:50.660 --> 00:37:56.440 here about these, uh, these dropouts, this 30% that Barna's, that Kinnaman speaking of? 00:37:56.680 --> 00:38:00.220 Yeah. Well, that's certainly the question, isn't it? How do we win these people back? 00:38:00.960 --> 00:38:05.620 At the end of the day, when all is said and done and the pandemic passes, we're going to have to 00:38:05.620 --> 00:38:13.060 win some people back. Um, and, and I think we need to be realistic about that. And, um, I think a lot 00:38:13.060 --> 00:38:18.700 of pastors were perhaps short-sighted, even as they were trying to predict when they were going to 00:38:18.700 --> 00:38:25.760 reopen. We had lots of people say, oh yeah, it'll be March. Yeah, it'll be April. Um, and my encouragement 00:38:25.760 --> 00:38:31.940 would be, let's, let's prepare ourselves for the long game with winning people back, maybe a little 00:38:31.940 --> 00:38:37.420 bit better than we did for preparing for reopening. Um, so that's just one little piece there, but 00:38:37.420 --> 00:38:43.680 yes, the dropouts, it's an interesting group of people. So how we define dropouts in this journal 00:38:43.680 --> 00:38:50.860 is people that were actively connected to a church before COVID and say that they have never attended 00:38:50.860 --> 00:38:57.300 a service either in person or digitally during the pandemic. They haven't attended at all. And I think 00:38:57.300 --> 00:39:04.520 we need to be realistic and know that a good chunk of those people, they are, um, distancing themselves 00:39:04.740 --> 00:39:14.220 physically for health reasons. And many people were not offered a digital solution for their home church 00:39:14.220 --> 00:39:21.600 during COVID. I believe it was, um, 22%, if I'm remembering correctly of, of people were not 00:39:21.600 --> 00:39:27.420 offered digital solutions. So, yeah, so we, we just need to be realistic. And again, probably a lot of 00:39:27.420 --> 00:39:33.160 those are very small churches. Many congregations are so small that they did not have to give up meeting 00:39:33.160 --> 00:39:39.320 together in order to observe precautions. Lots, lots of reasons, of course. Um, so there are those 00:39:39.320 --> 00:39:44.960 exceptions and I just, I want to acknowledge those exceptions. Elderly people who don't know how to 00:39:44.960 --> 00:39:52.720 use technology, um, or, you know, people who they were not offered a digital solution, so on and so 00:39:52.720 --> 00:39:57.760 forth. Now let's talk about the rest of the dropouts, the millennials who have totally disengaged, 00:39:57.900 --> 00:40:03.540 the Gen Xers, who they and their family and their children have totally disengaged. What are we seeing 00:40:03.540 --> 00:40:10.700 here? Well, um, one of our crucial data points that I want to call out is we asked the following 00:40:10.700 --> 00:40:20.520 statement, um, do you agree or disagree with this? I am rethinking my faith practices and their role in my 00:40:20.520 --> 00:40:28.080 life during this pandemic. And a lot of dropouts agreed with that statement. So what they are asking 00:40:28.080 --> 00:40:36.300 themselves is this, is my life really better if I incorporate a faith practice of going to church? 00:40:36.360 --> 00:40:44.020 Is my life really better if I incorporate the practice of Bible study? You know, is, is, does that 00:40:44.020 --> 00:40:52.840 actually improve my life? And we are at the point when many people, I, I think the statistic was, it's 00:40:52.840 --> 00:40:59.420 about one in four of millennials, just in general, like not even the dropouts are rethinking their faith 00:40:59.420 --> 00:41:06.200 practices right now. One in four millennials are rethinking their faith practices right now. Um, 00:41:06.700 --> 00:41:14.380 and we need to take that statistic with a grain of salt because the question to any pastors listening is 00:41:14.380 --> 00:41:21.560 what are you doing with that? Like people are really wrestling right now. What is the value add 00:41:21.560 --> 00:41:27.780 of attending a church? Maybe we need to remind our congregants of why being connected to a body of 00:41:27.780 --> 00:41:35.840 Christ is so important. Really? How is your life improved by being a Christian in, but not just being a 00:41:35.840 --> 00:41:42.140 Christian, but being involved in a faith community? What is the value add there? Um, so that's, that's 00:41:42.140 --> 00:41:51.400 really interesting. But I also do want to just suggest, um, that maybe not all hope is lost. We asked the 00:41:51.400 --> 00:41:59.700 question, um, do you plan on just returning back to your faith practices when the pandemic is over? And a 00:41:59.700 --> 00:42:04.640 lot of, a lot of the dropouts, the majority of the dropouts said, yeah, I'll return. Um, however, 00:42:04.980 --> 00:42:10.920 the jury is still out on whether or not they will. Yeah. And I think we need to be, 00:42:11.280 --> 00:42:19.040 begin thinking now about what that re-entry is going to look like for these people. It's not just 00:42:19.040 --> 00:42:26.960 hop back into the middle of things. What discipleship or shepherding, um, strategies are we going to need 00:42:26.960 --> 00:42:32.440 to innovate and dream up to re-engage these people? I mean, we're going to need to teach them to ride 00:42:32.440 --> 00:42:37.920 their bicycle all over again. Yeah. There, there, there's a danger. One of the stats that was in 00:42:37.920 --> 00:42:41.240 here, and I'm, I'm clicking through the slide deck trying to find that I couldn't, but you would 00:42:41.240 --> 00:42:47.300 probably know it. Um, the, where there was larger percent, there was a very large percentage of people 00:42:47.300 --> 00:42:53.420 that were, were spiritually feeding themselves without, um, getting, getting connected to the 00:42:53.420 --> 00:42:57.140 church body. I forget what the exact phrasing is. Do you remember the specific stat that I'm 00:42:57.140 --> 00:43:02.760 referencing? Um, yes, I'm, I'm growing spiritually in ways other than attending church during the 00:43:02.760 --> 00:43:10.280 pandemic. Yeah. And that's, um, that's, that can be heavily encouraging, uh, because now I'm beginning 00:43:10.280 --> 00:43:16.660 to see multiplication happening if in fact that's what's happening, or if it's, uh, now, you know, 00:43:16.740 --> 00:43:23.000 falling away from, from spiritual things just out of loxadaisicalness or, or not. And so like, 00:43:23.000 --> 00:43:28.440 to me, that was the, that was the great unknown stat. Like I would love to have asked maybe three 00:43:28.440 --> 00:43:33.680 or four qualifying questions afterwards to try to discover, why do you feel that way? What are you 00:43:33.680 --> 00:43:41.660 doing, uh, to, to, to, to quantify that just so that we could get a, a gauge on what people are doing. 00:43:41.660 --> 00:43:47.420 If, if they're diving into scripture, if they're having these awesome prayer times, if, if they're 00:43:47.420 --> 00:43:52.920 learning how to be disciple makers and getting out there and investing in communities and, 00:43:53.000 --> 00:43:58.180 and reaching their circle of influence for Christ, that's a, that's awesome. Like we need to 00:43:58.180 --> 00:44:04.260 celebrate that victory. Um, and, and maybe that is happening, but I would love to just be able to 00:44:04.260 --> 00:44:10.180 unpack that, that one thing and say, Hey, if you're spiritually growing without the church, what, 00:44:10.280 --> 00:44:14.560 what, what does that, what does that look like? And what can we learn from you? Cause we may, 00:44:14.560 --> 00:44:20.300 we may need some help. Yeah, for sure. I think too, something along those lines, when I, 00:44:20.300 --> 00:44:24.400 when I saw that statistic, Jeff was like, okay, well, people are still growing spiritually. 00:44:24.400 --> 00:44:34.040 I think my concern though, was, um, are they going to get so entrenched in new habits that they think 00:44:34.040 --> 00:44:40.860 that their own spiritual development, like listening to podcasts or, you know, or, um, you're watching 00:44:40.860 --> 00:44:46.660 YouTube videos, uh, from the Bible project, which is, they're fantastic. But, but is that, 00:44:46.660 --> 00:44:52.200 is that, is that a supplement to the spiritual practice of attending church at the same time 00:44:52.200 --> 00:44:57.200 every Sunday? You know what I'm saying? Like, like actually tithing that first day of the week 00:44:57.200 --> 00:45:05.480 to the Lord. Um, and I think my concern is Christians are keeping up with, with their spiritual 00:45:05.480 --> 00:45:12.460 health as best they can. Great news. But are we sacrificing practices? Cause they're, they are two 00:45:12.460 --> 00:45:17.880 different things. And that's, it's, it all comes down to is, is church that one hour on Sunday or is 00:45:17.880 --> 00:45:24.720 church? Absolutely. You know, the, the community that, that meets 168 or that's part that's active 168 00:45:24.720 --> 00:45:32.280 hours. Yeah. And that's why, that's why a full blown hybrid strategy right now is even more important 00:45:32.280 --> 00:45:39.840 because we want to continue to communicate to these people. Your church is an active partner in your 00:45:39.840 --> 00:45:48.000 spiritual development. It is not just coming on Sunday. And if the church can remain a consistent 00:45:48.000 --> 00:45:52.520 presence when we're talking about spiritual development, not just practices, but spiritual 00:45:52.520 --> 00:45:59.380 development, then I think that bridge to get back to quote unquote normal, whatever that means, um, 00:45:59.480 --> 00:46:05.060 is, is going to be easier for these dropouts, especially. We got a long road ahead. Um, you know, 00:46:05.060 --> 00:46:10.740 it's funny back in March, I remember I was speaking for a conference for American Bible Society or 00:46:10.740 --> 00:46:16.420 something like right when this thing hit and, um, and it was, Hey, you know what, could you imagine 00:46:16.420 --> 00:46:22.040 if we had two weeks, two weeks where we wouldn't go anywhere and just, could you imagine like how, 00:46:22.240 --> 00:46:27.320 what we could make of ourselves if we really just been two weeks on, on our spiritual, on our 00:46:27.320 --> 00:46:32.500 spirituality, on delving into scripture on our own. Uh, so that was the thing. And it was funny at the 00:46:32.500 --> 00:46:36.620 time, like the, the heads of the conference, they were like, we don't know that we want you to say 00:46:36.620 --> 00:46:39.860 the two week thing. Cause you know, what if it's like two days and it's, it's like just the, 00:46:40.320 --> 00:46:44.340 and now it's like, you know, we're, we're, I don't know, month seven, eighth in the year, 00:46:44.760 --> 00:46:50.440 right. You know, 2021. And we're spiking in different areas and going up and, and I don't 00:46:50.440 --> 00:46:56.040 know, I, I think we're going to be doing this for, for a while. And so church embracing that 00:46:56.040 --> 00:47:02.360 hybrid, uh, approach in those hybrid environments, the figuring out how to do the physical, figuring 00:47:02.360 --> 00:47:07.340 out how to do the digital, figuring out how to get them to work together, uh, is, is going to be so 00:47:07.340 --> 00:47:13.840 important for your, you, the church, your church moving forward, because people are not just looking 00:47:13.840 --> 00:47:19.660 for a physical experience there. My physical church is, is meeting right now and I'm not attending 00:47:19.660 --> 00:47:24.720 my physical church. That doesn't mean that I'm a bad spiritual person. That's not saying anything 00:47:24.720 --> 00:47:30.000 about my spiritual walk. It's just saying, I don't feel safe in the building. And so as a result of 00:47:30.000 --> 00:47:34.920 that, I'm going to continue, and my family is going to continue to engage in, in digital space. And so, 00:47:34.920 --> 00:47:40.900 uh, Savannah, I just want to thank you and, and Barna for, for taking the time to shed some light 00:47:40.900 --> 00:47:46.600 on, on what's actually happening there. You know, so often we hear the individual stories, but now to have, 00:47:46.600 --> 00:47:53.140 you know, stats to really start to define what this looks like and for us to, um, interpret, 00:47:53.140 --> 00:47:59.760 learn from and figure out the next steps is, is, is hugely important. So even just as, as we're landing 00:47:59.760 --> 00:48:05.560 the plane here, did any, any clothings, closing thoughts or, or any like crazy stats, something 00:48:05.560 --> 00:48:11.700 that I missed that was just a huge surprise for you? Um, crazy stats. I need to think through that 00:48:11.700 --> 00:48:17.540 a little bit more. Um, but maybe as, as one closing remark, um, I would encourage any pastors or listeners 00:48:17.540 --> 00:48:22.100 today, if you want to unpack these six questions about the future of the hybrid church experience, 00:48:22.100 --> 00:48:28.200 I would highly encourage you to get the journal. It's, it's 40 pages long, um, beautifully designed 00:48:28.200 --> 00:48:33.360 with lots of charts. You can read it in one sitting. Um, so go to barna.com and you can find that in our 00:48:33.360 --> 00:48:43.420 store. Um, but okay, Jeff, one crazy statistic. I, I think, I think for me, and, and I guess this is a bit 00:48:43.420 --> 00:48:50.080 of a teaser for the report that we're releasing in January on prayer. I am shocked to see how open 00:48:50.080 --> 00:48:57.720 people are to prayer experiences digitally. They find, they find it to be safe, um, to participate 00:48:57.720 --> 00:49:03.400 digitally in a prayer experience. They're really interested, especially in the idea of one-on-one 00:49:03.400 --> 00:49:10.560 prayer digitally. Um, that's something that a lot of people, even unchristian people are very open to 00:49:10.560 --> 00:49:17.380 right now. And so I think maybe a practical takeaway is, hmm, are you incorporating prayer into your 00:49:17.380 --> 00:49:22.640 digital strategy? Um, so maybe that's, that's something that we can learn together alongside 00:49:22.640 --> 00:49:26.960 you guys in the upcoming months. Cause that seems like a really critical piece of the puzzle that 00:49:26.960 --> 00:49:31.220 maybe a lot of people aren't considering. Yeah. I'll, I'll be honest and completely speaking 00:49:31.220 --> 00:49:37.260 the truth here. The most in touch that I've been with God in the past six months throughout this COVID 00:49:37.260 --> 00:49:43.900 season was a digital prayer experience on zoom with six guys from around the country. Um, it was, 00:49:43.900 --> 00:49:49.940 you know, and I'm a, I'm a live production guy. I'm a video producer. And so part of me, when, 00:49:50.000 --> 00:49:53.440 when I say that, it's like, okay, the quality standards are ugly. There's gotta be better ways 00:49:53.440 --> 00:49:58.580 to make it better, you know? And so like, I start nitpicking on, on, on what it was. And it's, 00:49:58.880 --> 00:50:03.860 so yeah, it's not, and part of me wants to say, it's not part of what a digital strategy should be, 00:50:03.860 --> 00:50:10.480 but I cannot get away from this fact of, I felt more in touch with God when six guys scattered 00:50:10.480 --> 00:50:14.940 across the country, we're going through a two hour prayer experience, exactly which, 00:50:15.060 --> 00:50:20.660 which you're describing. And so I think there's, I think that we are just starting to scratch the 00:50:20.660 --> 00:50:26.920 surface surface of what's happening by doing our online services. And, and the more that, uh, 00:50:27.160 --> 00:50:30.360 Barna, that, that you guys are pulling the thread on some of these other things, 00:50:30.360 --> 00:50:35.020 the more that we in Stadia side are kind of championing this, the idea of more than just the, 00:50:35.020 --> 00:50:40.940 the experience that we're creating on Sunday. I think this is where we really start to create a, 00:50:40.940 --> 00:50:47.780 a church that can exist physically and digitally that, that co-exist in that hybrid environment. 00:50:47.780 --> 00:50:52.140 And so Savannah, thanks, thanks for the time for this. Be sure, and I'll put the link in the show 00:50:52.140 --> 00:50:58.060 notes. Like I said, uh, it's, uh, Barna.com slash Stadia. We'll get you straight into that. Um, 00:50:58.060 --> 00:51:04.420 and that'll be a great place for, for you to access, to, to buy this journal, phenomenal stuff, 00:51:04.420 --> 00:51:10.600 uh, up and down throughout it. So Savannah, thank you for the time for, for Savannah. This is, uh, 00:51:10.600 --> 00:51:14.920 Jeff with the church digital and Stadia church planning. Thanks, uh, for joining us today and 00:51:14.920 --> 00:51:16.840 we'll see you next time here at the pod. Y'all have a good day.