My friend Steve Wilke sent me this TED Talk asking for my opinion. So here goes..

The talk is given by Salman Khan who has started his own online academy of learning by putting videos of lessons online for people to see. He tells the story of how that got started and some of his thoughts on how this can, and should, affect future education.

I happen to think it is a fabulous idea & as with anything, it has me thinking of the church.

I began to think of some of the historic congregational traditions of the early american church was that after the sermons were given there was a time of question & answer. You can imagine for yourself the reasons for that practice. It was inevitably shuned and stopped. The Quakers have their “un-programmed” worship which people sit in silence and only when someone is inspired by ‘the light’ do they break the silence to speak. Others may stand and speak building off that theme, but they do not have to. That, and how Solomon’s Porch does their gathering, is about the closest practice to what I am suggest as an idea for a new way of spiritual formation through the practice of sermon.

What if, we put our sermons out into the digital sphere for our congregation to digest throughout the week, at their own pace. If you wanted you can send out a message and then some reading supplement later in the week. And then, during Sunday worship service instead of the preacher preaching, the preacher took questions to teach for clarification & challenge. The gathered community can participate bringing together the myriad of ideas they have been inspired by after reading the scriptures, listening to the pastor’s exegesis and/& sermon online. Who knows the power, or chaos, that would happen when 50, 200, 2000 come together prepared to share..

I don’t have a pulpit to practice from, but it would be a really awesome experiment. Maybe do it for a summer series or some challenging theological concept (like the trinity).

What thoughts might you have about this idea?

 

 

graphic via cartoon church