Technology: Blessing or Distraction or Dead End

The gift of technology is, or perhaps could be, a tremendous blessing to the Church.  It may well be in some quarters but in many congregations it is a burden and has proven more costly than anticipated.  Web sites, apps, social media, live streaming, podcasts, cloud based systems, and the like have added more than a hefty bottom line cost for all that they might do.  Even under the best of conditions, it is a maze more than a superhighway and it offers a dizzying array of choices, options, alternatives, and possibilities to the Church.  The problem lies not simply in what to do with it but also where to begin and where to end.  For most congregations, technology is a tangled skein of yarn without a clue to the thread that will unravel it all so that something useful can be made of it.

Most congregations do not have the bucks to pay for or the manpower with the know how or the free time to do much with the technology so it often ends up like a DIY project gone terribly wrong.  It somehow seems to end up on the desk of the pastor -- typically as one of those other duties as assigned.  The technological problem has become a pastoral problem.  Even the recruitment and supervision of it all is largely deposited on the altar side of the rail instead of in the pews.  Perhaps large congregations can afford the cost of consultants, installers, and maintenance of it all or perhaps they can staff and pay for it in house but the bulk of us are left to fend for ourselves in a marketplace too filled with options and choices to make much sense of it all.  It ends us becoming a financial drain and a headache more than a boon to the mission.

How much do these things distract our attention or actually contribute to the fulfillment of our mission as a church?  How much do these things consume of our resources and would the be better spent in pursuit of other things or how much do they actually ease the burden or expand the reach of the same church?  Would we be better served investing more in technology or applying the savings from less investment to other purposes?  These are the questions facing most congregations and most pastors.  How many more apps do we need to put on our phones as church workers and how much more screen time should we obligate ourselves to give?  It always was and is easier to pick up the phone or order online the office supplies and resources you need to do your work as a pastor than to find a place to shop and go there.  I get that.  But is it easier to provide competitive and state of the art digital access to those inside or not yet inside the Church?

Personally I think it is high time to begin to test the various means available to us to make sure that we are using technology and it is not using us up in the process.  Stress and burn out come from trying to do too much with too little and this is exactly the promise of our technology -- do more with less but do it at home and on your phone while you are off duty.  How is that working?   We pay through the nose for online software costs, for cloud data storage, for access to our stuff wherever the internet goes, for security, and for the RAM and processing power to do it.  Is it helping us?  Really?  It is not a rhetoric question.  Is is a real issue of how best for a pastor to apply his time and attention and the congregation their money and leaders?  Maybe too much really is too much.  I fear we are at a tipping point when the gift has become a burden and our technology is costing us as much as, if not more, than it returns.  You tell me.