Church YouTube Contest

July 26, 2007 by

A few days ago we talked about online church video. We encouraged everyone to embrace the phenomenon of online video and harness its power. One church in Boston is doing just that.

The Greater Boston Vineyard is having a YouTube video contest for their fall kick-off service. It’s certainly an interesting way to harness the power of web 2.0 and mobilize church members outside of church walls. I see some really good things coming of this.

  • People will be having fun. When people have fun, others want to be where the fun is.
  • You can tell your neighbors you made a video they need to vote on, and it’s easy buzz for the church.
  • It reaches out to people beyond the normal audience. YouTube has a lot smaller barrier to entry than a church service.
  • You can find people within your church with talent you (or even they) didn’t know they had.

In a world of technological advance, web 2.0 hasn’t replaced the coffee shop, but it’s mirrored it. A church housing an event like this on a secular site is like a church having a Bible study at Starbucks. The same positives and negatives come to mind.

It puts Christians out of only church circles, and it brings them into the public domain. This, however, isn’t enough. If you have a Bible study in Starbucks, you aren’t doing any good unless people know why you’re there and what you believe. You have to build relationships for it to be effective. The same is true for web 2.0, but these relationships are virtual.

So maybe for you it’s a Facebook cause or group, maybe it’s a church blog, or maybe it’s a YouTube video contest. Whatever it is, remember two simple rules:

  • The same principles apply on the web and in reality.
  • These are points of entry, but once people access them, it’s your message that matters.

(link via Paul Griffiths)

Post By:

Joshua Cody


Josh Cody served as our associate editor for several years before moving on to bigger things. Like Texas. These days he lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife, and you can find him online or on Twitter when he's not wrestling code.
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4 Responses to “Church YouTube Contest”

  • brad
    July 26, 2007

    This is a well-balanced post, Joshua. It’s easy to overlook the relationship-building that needs to take place to maximise our technological advances. The message isn’t what you say (whatever the medium), it’s what you do.


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  • Paul Loeffler
    July 26, 2007

    Great contest, and some decent videos. This is a great example of a)some people get marketing, and some don’t, and b)even in marketing, different tastes work for different people. One of the highest rated ones (so far) I found to be barely worth watching, if at all.


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  • LayGuy
    July 27, 2007

    Hi Joshua,
    Great post. Great idea. I think we as Christians need to embrace cultural phenomenons such as YouTube all the time.
    I come from a small church plant in Melbourne, Australia and we place all our video on YouTube. Below is an example of the intro we have on our current sermon series.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdTOH0cGEQo


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  • Every church should be doing things like this. With people going online like they are and enjoying youtube and such it makes for a great way to get the word out.


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