EP098: Patrick Holden & The Potential Simplicity of Online Church Services

Episode 98 of the Church Digital Podcast, powered by Stadia Church Planting.

Jeff here. We are just a couple episodes away from the greatness that will be episode 100.

I'm not even going to tease what's coming up other than to tease and say it is going to be incredible.

You're going to love episode 100.

But hey, let's focus here on where we are with episode 98.

Really, episode 97 and 98 are two sides of the same coin.

Because, as you remember, we had this conversation, episode 97, with Craig Dockery,

basically the chief creative in context of Crossroads Weekend Service, phenomenal church,

huge giga church, doing some incredibly creative things online.

You know, I'm kind of tongue-in-cheek here, joking a lot.

They are the church that Brian Tom, lead pastor, preached the sermon while wakeboarding.

Literally, you can see on a boat in the middle of a lake somewhere, boats moving.

Brian is preaching a sermon, not about wakeboarding, but tying in with the analogy of wakeboarding.

And so there's all sorts of creative resources that we, the church, can do in context of our weekend services.

But if you're like the majority of churches out there, well, man, like Crossroads team, Craig's team is huge.

And so he's got all these resources.

He's got all these people.

But if you're like the typical church in America, you probably don't have that deep of a bench in your creative team.

It'd be great to have.

Maybe you've got some volunteers that are stepping in and filling in some gaps, but Crossroads is in a different league.

And so to that point, I wanted to have a completely separate conversation on the exact same topic.

So we brought in Patrick Holden, who's a church planter with a church called Nuvo Church.

Now, I'm not sure if, I don't even think Patrick's church has officially launched, whatever launched means.

He's doing online services and he's developing his core team.

Patrick's actually has been on the podcast here before.

He was the guy that was in Michigan, was not even living in the Ohio area where he was wanting to plant his church,

but was developing his team interstate, utilizing tools like Facebook Messenger, Facebook groups to start to connect to people and build up his core team.

Well, I wanted to bring Patrick into the conversation because for a church planter,

I would once again suggest he's probably got one of the most creative church services,

most creative online church services around and how it clearly functions.

It clearly communicates.

It's minimalistic approach would seem to be very easy for a church to replicate kind of this model that he's creating.

But what's interesting is the model that he's created actually does not feel very much at all like a typical worship service,

like the flow, the feel, even some of the liturgy is kind of different.

And so, hey, we did like the giga church approach to creativity and worship services and saw their unique approach.

And so, how they were wrestling with the liturgy of this.

And now, here with episode 98, I wanted to do the exact opposite.

Let's not go to a giga.

Let's go to a guy that has barely even started down this road and see how he is able to do this online,

maybe even starting to wrestle with what physical and online look like together.

So, really, really fascinating conversations here.

So, I'm bringing into the conversation, of course, Patrick Holden, lead pastor with Nuvo Church.

I'm bringing in Ray DeArmis, co-host here with the Church Digital Podcast, digital pastor over at Christ Fellowship in Miami.

And, of course, myself, Jeff with the Church Digital and Stadia Church Planning.

In a conversation that I'm simply calling here, the potential simplicity of online church services.

Okay, everybody.

Here you go.

The heart of what I really wanted to talk about here is, and we're hearing a lot of this where churches are trying to figure out how to do physical service and a digital service.

There's, hey, let's just live stream what's in the building.

But they're really not, by live streaming what's in the building, they're really not speaking to the online audience.

Nor are they, like, how you would do a service physically is different than what you would do digitally.

And so, we've been bringing in some different people.

We're starting to really dive into this idea of what a digital service and online service can be and how it's different than, you know, the typical model.

And so, we brought in, oh, dang it, I just blanked on his name, from Crossroads.

I'll have to look it up here in a second.

But we brought in Crossroads to talk with them about, you know, what the service is and their interpretation.

You know, they're a gig at church.

They got all sorts of resources.

They're blown out of the water.

You know, I'm watching Brian Tome preach a sermon while he's wakeboard.

Yes.

Patrick knew it.

I saw that one.

Oh, yeah.

Immediately, we had a creative team meeting.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

Why can we not wakeboard?

What are we going to do to keep up with the tomes?

And I was the limiting factor.

Yeah, that's right.

I was the limiting factor.

My athletic ability became the limiting factor for that.

So, yeah.

So, did they look at you and you're like, no, we're not even, or did they at least entertain the thought?

Yeah, I think what they did is they looked at me and they're like, I feel like NUMA is more your speed, where you're just walking.

You know what I mean?

I feel like the NUMA thing.

And I'm like, I don't know how to feel about that.

But, yeah.

Anyway.

Ryan Tome's a man.

We don't trust you to walk.

We just don't trust you to do much.

Walk and talk?

Great.

That's it.

Do you gum?

No, I can't do that.

That's too much.

Absolutely.

I belong in a West Wing episode.

That's where I belong.

Not like doing fun things.

Anyway, sorry.

I belong in a West Wing episode.

We're going to have that be the title.

This guy belongs in the West Wing episode.

Hey.

You guys want to see my dog?

This is awesome.

My little puppy.

Ray.

We named Ray Ray.

Not after Ray Ray, but Ray Skywalker Ray.

And so this is Ray.

Oh, that's cool.

It's like I told Jeff.

They named her Ray because she's always trying to get in the podcast, just like me.

That's the big issue.

She's always trying to steal the show.

She's four months in very high maintenance right now, and she is very excited.

Yeah, very much so.

That's awesome.

I love it.

What I really want to talk about with this really roundabout intro here, let's get into

this idea of this creative services that you're doing, church services online.

I've been vocal in saying this, and with humility, I don't mean to stroke egos or anything,

but the creative approach that you're doing for your services, even as a church planner,

is truly phenomenal.

Kind of some of the approaches and the creativity and the intentionality that I'm seeing, even

for somebody that hasn't even started launching a service or meeting regularly, or you've got

30 people on your core team that haven't even met in the same space because you've been

planting and starting in this COVID season.

So, man, I would just love to just really focus on this idea of the church service, and maybe

even just to kick it off.

As you're doing your online services, how have you structured this?

What part does it play in your church's strategy?

What's the role of the online service?

What's its function?

Yeah, no, that's great.

So, you know, first of all, I think, obviously, you know this, we're, as a church plant, brand

new, like, and by new meaning, like, pre-launch, way pre-launch.

And so, you know, what we did, and the way that it came about is, you know, we were in

Michigan.

I think you know that we were in Michigan at the time.

We decided to do online services.

We're moving to Ohio.

And then on top of that, my wife and I just moved into, like, the 700-square-foot, tiny

cottage.

I have two kids.

I have one's four, one's two.

We'd film these things late at night once they went to bed, once they got in a deep sleep,

right, like 10 o'clock in the evening.

I had a GH4.

So if you're a camera guy, if you're, like, a camera guy, a GH4 with a lens that doesn't

zoom, so it's, like, across the whole way.

And we just said, would it be possible, as COVID happened, which was six months before

we planned on doing anything like this, would it be possible to put up an online service

that would be helpful to people and help people see who we want to be?

And that was really kind of, that was really it.

We hoped it was helpful.

We hoped people enjoyed it.

We hoped people had a great experience.

But there was, like, a legitimacy component, at least as a church plant, where we go, we feel

like we can start a conversation around a topic.

In 18 to 20 minutes, which is about how long I speak, I'm not going to solve, like, we just

did a politics, but I'm not going to solve politics in 18, 20 minutes.

But can we start a conversation that leads to a digital group and launch out of that?

And so that was kind of our strategy back this past Easter.

That's what we started doing.

We still do that, right?

So we do a once a month online service, and then we do digital group.

Now, digital group is where our bread and butter is.

But our online service, we say, it brings legitimacy to it.

It helps people connect with who we are.

And for people who are inviting, it helps them to be able to point to something and say, they

have something.

They're a real church, I promise.

It's not a cult.

It's a real church, right?

There's a little bit of that.

And for us, it's a conversation starter.

And so we've tried to figure out, and it's more of a little bit, but we've tried to figure

out how do we make that engaging experience that, you know, helps people see a little

bit of who we are.

Patrick, at what point, because I'm kind of gushing before we kind of got into the pod

about how much I love the content that you guys have created.

At what point did you guys decide, hey, we're not going to do a traditional search service.

We're going to do something that's really tailor-made for a digital experience.

Because that's what really kind of set me off is, oh, this is uniquely created for digital.

Like, this isn't just, hey, we're taking a search service and we're putting it online.

This is everything, the preaching is YouTube style.

Everything is very much like I'm watching a vlogger on screen.

And so kind of walk me through some of that creative process.

Oh, that's good.

So, you know, that's a great question.

I think for us, part of it was before COVID hit, right?

We knew we wanted to have separate content online that was just not streaming our services.

And it was partly because, like you were talking about YouTube, I was finding that when

I had a question, I would go to YouTube and then there was some guy and, you know, I have

a car question.

There's some guy in his garage is trying to fix something, he's going to walk me through

it.

And that's where I found helpful things, but they were filmed completely different, right?

And then I started thinking about, I don't remember who said this quote, you guys could

probably quote it better than me, but somebody had said, you know, students right now, like

Generation Z, they want to be YouTube stars rather than they want to be the next Brad Pitt,

right?

And so like there's this whole generation of people that are looking at YouTube differently and

their films, like the jump cut thing and they're shorter, you know, typically shorter content

and quick, you know, sort of statements.

And so we had said, so for us, we said, even if we do live and even if there's a component

of the streaming, there's going to be a day where we want to create that kind of content.

And then the real question was, can I be that kind of communicator?

Can I learn that?

Which is a different flex for me.

And so then COVID hit and it was like, that was our only choice.

You know what I mean?

Like that, we didn't, we didn't have a space to stream.

There weren't a thousand people in a room.

It was me and sometimes my wife in the room and usually my mom watching on Facebook live.

Like that was about what we had, you know?

And I think for us, that was kind of what kind of spearheaded it because we think, you

know, we still do that as much as the online live stream experience of a big room is great

for the person who's not a follower of Jesus yet.

They're going to stumble into the content we put on YouTube or a content offer probably

more than they're going to sit down and listen to me talk for 30 minutes in that vein.

So, hey.

And so I love the intentionality of aiming the services online towards the ones realizing,

hey, I'm trying to connect with new people and I want to create this standalone piece of

content, maybe it's not what we would do in a physical building that we're sharing digitally,

but it's something more specifically aimed at it and how you're using some of these creative

elements in ways that connect with ones to keep them engaged with the content longer.

Like, I'll be honest and I've said this to you several times.

It's like, I never realized how much I want to hear backing tracks behind sermons until I

actually heard you do this and I'm like, oh my gosh, this is the greatest thing ever.

I must have told two dozen churches in this COVID season, put a backing track behind it.

Watch what happens.

And I don't, I actually, I don't know that any of them have the courage to do it.

I don't think anybody's kind of pulled the trigger because it's, it's different.

It's weird.

It's, it's maybe, maybe that's not, but you're, if you're not trying to reach your 99, but

you're trying to reach your one, all of a sudden that backing tracks, just another element

to kind of keep people engaged with that.

So like looking at your services, what's been some of the feedback?

What's, what's been some of the observations?

What are, what are some of these creative elements that maybe you're thinking outside the box,

maybe doing some different things creatively and how's that been working?

I love that you talked about the backing tracks.

Thanks for noticing that.

I didn't know if anybody would ever notice that, but yeah, you know, and that stuff's so

cheap now.

We use Soundstripe for most of that or GarageBand where I filmed something.

I don't even have a keyboard, I'm filming it on my like typing keyboard, like a backing

track or something.

You know, I think the backing track is a big deal.

I think, and it caused me to think differently as a communicator because it forces me to go,

what emotion am I trying to, you know, convey in this moment?

Wow.

And I'll pitch people to that.

And that's different.

That's different than I've had to speak before like that.

Backing tracks are a big deal.

I think we use some version of a title package or a bumper video before the message.

A lot of churches do that.

I do think it's different digitally, right?

So usually in a room, that's when people are doing, offering a lot of time, you know,

things are shuffling.

You have to be really, I think we have to be punchy and short and intentional about how

we do those title packages.

And then we try to, you know, through a backing track, seamlessly lead into the talk, which

means we're asking the question, what emotion are we trying to convey in the tension of

this title package that musically and thematically can lead us into a talk?

So we did one, I believe it was on like mental health a while back.

And the first part of it feels like very like house oriented.

Remember the show house, like it's very like cerebral and we were about to talk about that

kind of stuff and medical and quick.

And then it leads us into the talk.

So we're trying to figure out how do we seamlessly do those things.

A lot of people are doing that, but I think it's a completely different thing when you're

thinking YouTube style.

We do that.

The other thing for us is jump cuts.

We've talked about that a little bit already.

YouTube kind of thrives off of, um, it's not the normal version of a conversation that you're

having with somebody.

It's, it's very quick and it's cuts and it's zoom in and zoom out.

And, you know, we, we try our best to be very creative and how we move in and out of

those shots.

So, uh, this is kind of a, I mean, again, for the people who are video geeks, like I

am on this, we, we shoot with one camera in 4k or 6k, depending on which camera reason.

And then we just set up four different shots where we zoom in and then the person editing

just gets to essentially edit like they're editing four or five different clips.

But creatively we go, we try to on the front and decide what, what do we want to zoom in

on and what do we not?

Like, how are we kind of approaching that?

Then the big thing for us too, is, uh, how do we showcase our city?

So what we did is I don't have a drone.

We don't have drone shots of the city.

We found people who had taken drone shots of the city on Instagram.

I just messaged them and we got pretty much everything for free.

And one person was like, no, I think I need to charge.

They charge us 20 bucks.

I'm like, I'll give you 20 bucks for that whole 4k drone video.

And we use those as transitions.

A lot of times in our services to go, Hey, you know, we are, we are contextual in the city.

It's not just, you know, in a studio kind of thing.

Um, I think the other big thing for us is in our hosting segments, this is one of the

big things that we've talked about is we want that to feel very personal.

Um, and so the types of cuts and zoom in and zoom out and, you know, music that we put behind

that, um, is trying to help them understand those things.

Uh, the other thing, sorry, last thing for the communicators too, I would say this humor

is completely different on YouTube.

It's just different, which means the jokes that you're going to make in a live room.

And you, you know, this, if you make a joke in a live room and you get, you know, 10%

of the audience laughing and they're in the middle, you know, laughter goes like from one

spot and spreads out.

Right.

That's why when you have more people in a room and they're close together, they laugh, you

know, more of your jokes and you can not be as funny, but if you make 10% of the people

laugh, oftentimes people are going to laugh if they're laughing around you, nobody's sitting

in their living room with four other people.

Like you have to legit be funny on YouTube.

You have to, you have to do it.

And so for us, we're going to, the humor feels very different.

We're trying to get creative on, I think I made a joke the other week about Ohio state

and Michigan.

We bleeped out when I said Michigan, right?

That's funny when you, when you see it, but it takes more production to be funny sometimes

on YouTube.

And we're trying to explore those things creatively as well.

For what it's worth, I chuckled at the bleep with the Michigan.

I did because, and I'm like, because in my mind, I'm like, aren't you from Michigan and

you're bleeping yourself when you moved and at least you had lived in Michigan.

And so like, I found the irony in that.

I don't think I was rolling on the floor laughing.

It wasn't like a rifle.

It was probably more like a, that's cute.

Yeah.

And then, and then move on to it.

So, you know, I, I do feel that, you know, and even like, I've seen some, some where you've

done like interviews with the mental health where you pulled in an expert to kind of like

have that conversation creating, once again, another piece of content, another asset that

maybe you can't do in the physical building or that you can kind of tailor making and create

and aim, uh, towards, towards a particular end.

Have you, I saw the one with the mental health.

Have you done other types of interviews or other types of involving people outside of the

church in those conversations?

Yeah, we have, we, we, so we, so we, so we did that with Dr. Carter on mental health.

She's a psychologist.

We actually did one where we talked about joy.

And, uh, when we talked about joy, um, it was interesting because we had a guy who really

works with athletes to help them like, uh, have better performance in the way that they

think and in their mind.

And so I love interviews, especially on, on digital, because I can take a 50 minute interview

and I can get 12 pieces of content out of it.

Right.

So we might show three or four minutes of that in our service.

And then we, what we do, we'll make these content offers that'll say, Hey, if you, if

you like that and you want more, go to this website and then it'll either be the full interview

or it'll be sliced up in a bunch of different segments.

So interviews have been huge for us.

In fact, we think about discipleship a lot of ways in how do we, how do we give you small

pieces of content consistently to help you come, you know, both become more familiar with us.

But, but for you as a person going, you're not going to, you're not going to digest 50

minutes a lot of time on principle-based things like that.

You're going to, you're going to digest it over time.

And so, so like with Dr. Carter and with my friend, Craig Fullan, we did both those

interviews, filmed them at, you know, 15 minutes to an hour, and then showed three to five

minutes in the service and then had another 10 pieces of content that we'll email you later

on.

So I, again, that's not something you can do in a one hour segment in a physical building.

You know, even if you did, I would say to people that are doing it that way, you could

still take that interview, slice it up, brand it slightly different and send it out.

And people are going to get a lot further, I think, transformation from, from seeing it

spread out over time.

So that's how we've approached interviews so far.

And again, with both of those interviews at 50 to 60 minutes, we've gotten at least a dozen

pieces of content from it.

So tell me you guys, especially when we talk about content in this era, in this time, it's

so divided.

And yet you chose to like lean in to some of the most uncomfortable things.

And especially in your, you know, as we talk about like the click funnel, just talking about

the conversation that you created around what it means to, you know, kind of live in this

election time and how to deal with people on Facebook and some of this stuff.

And so kind of walk through that and how that's been for you, because in my mind, I'm like,

man, churches want to run as far away from that as possible.

And you guys come back into the building that's on fire and you're like, nope, we're going that

way.

This is the core we're headed.

Yeah.

Oh my gosh.

So it's funny because 2020 didn't just give you a pandemic, right?

It gave you racial tension.

It gave you an election.

It gives you everything.

And you're right.

The temptation, I think, for a lot of pastors is to go, I don't want to be divisive.

I don't want to say the wrong things.

I'm going to kind of walk away from that.

What we found, though, is when we talk about the one, that's what they really want to hear

more than my top three messages.

You know what I mean?

There's like a, they want us to lean into that.

Now, the struggle with that is being able to research quick enough to be able to put

something out there that actually says something substantial, you know, which again, for our

monthly services, it helps me because you'll have a couple of weeks to plan that.

The things that have shifted for us is we had a plan of content for about a year out.

And I think we're finding we can't do that because something is going to pop up that's

different.

So we said we want to lean into those things.

We also, this is a big strategy for us.

We invite people from Columbus to help me write my talks.

We found that people who are not already a part of our services or other people's ones,

like people that they're inviting, we say, hey, jump on a Zoom call with us.

I'm going to be talking about racial tension.

Jump on the Zoom call and then coach me on what you hope that other people will coach me

on what you hope your friends would hear from a church.

And what we find is when they speak into it, then they show up to our online services.

And we have people that are on our launch team now because they did that early on.

That's been a huge strategy for us.

And it gives me just a lot of clarity because, again, I'm a 30-something white guy that lives

in Columbus, Ohio.

I have a very specific perspective when it comes to politics or like we talk about racial

tension.

And so we've tried our best to lean into that.

We've found a lot of opportunity.

I think so much of it is just saying, as a pastor, this is an opportunity more than it

is a challenge or an obstacle and trying to lean into that.

But yeah, that's how we've approached it.

As you're inviting people to come in off those talks, is this like a large net, like throwing

it out there?

Or are there specific people that you're like, you, you, and you, or hey, is it non-Christians,

Christians?

Is it mixed?

Who are you co-writing with?

So we have like, we have people in Columbus where we say, you're on the launch team, invite

as many people as you can and help coach me.

So we have the wide net.

But I would also say to every communicator, right, especially in 2020, right, especially

in 2020, you need a people who you can put on a text thread, who can look at a Google

doc, who are not Christians, who are agnostics, who are different race than you are.

You need women around you, who can speak into this.

And so I have a, I have subgroups that I'll text out to the content.

So I'd say like we did one on racial tensions a couple months back and it was probably a good

30 or 40 people that, uh, that were speaking into that pretty deeply.

Like they had my notes and they were saying, I wouldn't say it this way.

And Harvey looked at this resource.

So, so yeah, so there's a strategy component to saying, we know that if we invite people from

Columbus to be a part, I'm going to be, I'm going to be better.

And they're going to be interested.

And then as a communicator also go, I also need perspective of people on a consistent

basis that are willing to look at me and go, that just, that ain't it.

You know what I mean?

And give me some clarity.

So I never, uh, the, the idea of sharing it out with, with people having that never had

that thought, never like, you know, and, and I've heard like, it's a stretch to get, I

know, some churches that have like teaching teams where, you know, there's five or six staff

people, maybe it's a couple of campus pastors, uh, communications person.

We'll hear the sermon preached, but the idea of being that transparent and open handed, um,

with what you're teaching now, I'm not hearing you question, like the theological adjusting

the theological, but, um, the, the tone, the attitudinal allowing people to breathe into

that, even own that, um, speak into it, man, that's going to give them so much more, uh,

ownership of, of your, your ministry and direction.

It's, you know, we, we, there's this saying, we say it a lot.

Um, you know, we're talking about online engagement and, and social media within church.

And it's, it's in 2020, it's better to ask questions than make statements.

And so what, what you're really doing is you're asking a question, Hey, this is what I'm thinking.

Is, is this right?

Is this wrong?

You tell me your, your approach here, um, and, and either validate or question, but help

shape me, um, with, with how I'm, I'm communicating this.

That's, that's, that's beautiful.

And, and that's been effective moving people, like engaging with people, maybe outside the

church, getting them within the church, that, that sort of thing.

Oh, it's, it's probably been one of my favorite thing.

Absolutely.

Yeah, absolutely.

So we had one, my favorite story from it.

There was, there was a guy who wasn't connected to us.

I mean, he's kind of loosely, he'd been to one digital group.

Um, and then I know we were talking about racial tensions, started his own watch party,

uh, for our Facebook live event.

And then we picked up people from that watch party to be a part of, of what we're doing.

And you're just going like, that's like our reach, you know, grew exponentially through

that.

Um, and so, yeah, but he had also like helped speak into, he was one of the people that helped

speak into those talks.

And, uh, yeah, we're finding that it, it happens.

And especially, and I would say this, sorry, not on a soapbox, but you know, I'm kind of

awesome.

I would say the communicators, especially people who are not followers of Jesus in, everybody

knows this.

We have our own vernacular, our own language.

You need people who can tell you that if you say it that way, uh, then they're going to

immediately build a wall.

And I just, as much as I'm trying to think about people who are not Christians, I, I don't

always think of it.

You know, one of the slight shifts we made is, uh, when I talk about God, I want to talk

about Jesus in the talk.

And then somebody said, have you ever thought about just referring to God as the divine or

energy?

I'm like, I would never do that.

I would never talk about God like that.

And they're like, well, it would just, it would help this person maybe to think of it

differently.

And I said at one time, the divine, and I had a guy, and then I progressively talked about

then God, Jesus, we moved our way through the Trinity by the end of the talk.

But just because I changed the language slightly in the very beginning, it, it, it broke down

very, and I would have never thought to talk about it that way.

And I do that in our digital group.

And so we, we, we try that a lot.

So anyway, yeah.

That's powerful though, because, you know, I know we're kind of building towards kind of broader

concepts than what you're talking about, but, um, let me ask how far out in advance then

are you kind of testing some of these things out?

Because content is very hard in the way that you're doing, right?

Like there's, there's, there's an overarching story that you're trying to tell.

Every service seems to be very intentional that it's not separated.

Right.

Right.

But, um, which means that you've got to be further out, uh, until how far out right now,

because you're not trying to be so far out.

You want to be a year out, but you want to be close enough to where you can create great

content and produce great content without killing your team.

Right.

No, that's good.

Uh, that's a great question.

Um, I want to tell you like, it's perfectly systemized because I want you to know that

I'm systematized and that there's a perfect, but, uh, there's not, I would say I'm shooting

to be two to three weeks out of having a draft that I can send.

The hardest thing for me as a communicator in those moments.

And it takes, it takes like a, a breaking open, you know what I mean?

I'm saying this is number one is not done yet.

So look at the art and know that it's not done and then critique something that's not

done.

Um, so two, three weeks out, I'm doing my best to do that.

Um, and then we'll send it.

But I also would say like, there are parts of the talks I'll send statements to.

Like, does this statement work?

Does this statement not?

How would I make this connect to a 50 year old empty nester?

You know what I mean?

Who is thinking about it differently?

Like I jokingly say an African-American woman in her mid fifties, who's an empty nester.

I, I don't think about that.

So I have people that I'll send statements to her thoughts too.

So yeah, usually two to three weeks out.

Um, and then I progressively are adding and I'm truthfully between just between us.

Uh, I'm tweaking, uh, in the room that we're filming.

I never feel like it's done.

In fact, most of the talks that I've given, I would still say, Oh, I could have, but I'm

sure that's most speakers, but yeah, anyway, we're tweaking up and filming to give you credit.

I feel like that's all content creators.

I think we get frustrated in church about that stuff, but then I've, I've seen all the documentaries

and some of the stuff behind the scenes of like, say Saturday night live where they're

trying to take all of the world's events and content or even the daily show.

Right.

And they're trying to shove it into one event and they're like, man, we wish we could have

perfected it, but next week's coming.

So we kind of got to move on.

Right.

Absolutely.

And it, and it, it forces you to be open-handed and knowing it's never quite, you know, and

then I get to go, Hey, maybe I'll give that talk again four years from now, you know, a

version of it at least.

So for sure, for sure.

So tell me about, um, cause there's the content that you're creating for the weekend, but then

there's this other content that you guys have kind of created.

Is it similar?

Is it the same content where it's like, you're trying to get people and draw them into a deeper

conversation with your church?

Yes.

So yeah, we, so Tony Morgan, um, really helped us with this early on.

We were sitting with him and I, I, I remember one of our team members, I believe it was one

of our guys, his name is Ryan Steigel.

Uh, and then another guy on our team named Zach White.

Again, they're the, they're the brains behind a lot of what's happening, but we asked Tony,

what, what is it that you wish churches were doing that nobody's really leaning into?

Or a lot of people aren't leaning into because I don't understand why people don't do content

offers.

Cause a lot of people online that are selling things or putting things out there and doing

the content offer.

That's how they, and funnel, you're talking about funnels.

And so we started saying, Hey, we're, we're writing content.

I'm writing content anyway.

Can we make it to where it's shorter and punchier and something that we could put on Facebook

to draw you in with?

So we've done that with interviews.

Uh, recently we did this with the politics thing.

So we're, we did like a two months where politics talks and we took my application steps and

we just made a video, a two minute video out of each one of those application steps and

just kind of filmed it slightly different and send them out.

So our goal with that is to help people be exposed to what we're doing.

Number one, because we think that they'll watch a two minute video, probably before they'll

watch a 30 minute, you know, kind of thing.

Um, and then say, Hey, it's also a discipleship tool for people who are already a part of this

to go.

I get, even though they've heard me say it, hopefully in a service, they get a quick reminder

with a different example in their inbox consistently.

And we're seeing the watch through rates on those just kind of skyrocket.

We're seeing people do this on MailChimp and, you know, and then we can, we can give them

more content later.

If we do that again, those are basic, you know, principles online with that kind of stuff.

But I feel like for us, it's a newer thing that we're trying.

So a lot of that content is there.

The other thing that we're trying to, and we've done it a few times is how do we do behind

the scenes stuff?

I'm a, I'm a perfectionist more by nature as you've experienced before we started filming

today.

Um, you know, I'm just, I'm just wired that way, but we're also saying there's a lot of

people, even people that are outside of the church that want to see the behind the scenes

part of it as much.

So one, I think one time I filmed on my iPhone, how we set up for a service.

That's probably one of the most watched videos that we've had.

Um, and so we're doing some of that content too.

So there's like the content offer and then there's behind the scenes and story part that

feels more vlogger, you know, kind of thing.

Well, you know, you made mention of it and I don't want to belittle it because I really

feel like you guys are pioneering more a lot of this side on the church side because, you

know, I've seen, you know, other folks try to draw people into deeper conversations

with their products.

But when you talk about the church doing it, I was, I was looking at some of the stuff you

guys are doing.

I was like, Oh no, this is, this is a different approach than what I've seen.

from other folks where this is tailor-made to take you on a journey further and further

and further into the church.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

And the cool thing, you guys know this too.

There are people who want to be anonymous for a while and this gives them a longer on

ramp to be anonymous, but also behind the scenes engage enough to where we know what they're

engaging with.

One of the biggest shifts I feel as a speaker now is I know what content is landing through

numerical value by whether they're watching.

You know what I mean?

I can tell you which one of the application points was most interesting to people because

now we have data.

And so to your point of saying we can draw them deeper, it helps me be more informed on

how to do that and, and, and help be able to give them content that's most helpful to them.

I got to ask just kind of coming out of that because you guys are so, I've been so forward

thinking that matter.

Are you thinking of making said data and then leveraging it for, okay, and this is where we

need to go next.

That's great.

We, uh, yes, I would say Zach and Ryan, those guys, they're doing more of that.

Uh, I'm probably approaching it more from a communicator.

What's working, what type of language, but, but yeah, I would say like the forward thinking

parts of their minds certainly are, are, are looking at that.

Now we're so new to it.

So I'll also say like, candidly, we're very new to it.

We got like Tony Morgan's been doing it for years and you know, they can, they have a lot

more data to work with, but we're, we're trying to say, we can see demographics and people

and location and we're trying to make decisions even in a city.

So we're attracting people from all over the city because we're digital.

We know where they are in the city.

We know the demographic of the person that's watching and we know that sort of thing, which

helps me to tailor the types of content that we can put in front of them and what we'll

do next.

So yes, I would say I'm probably less involved in that because again, those guys are just

so brilliant that you should probably have them on a podcast.

They're, they're, they're the ones that are so great at that.

But, but as a communicator specifically, I'm trying to figure out what's, what's working

with which demographic and I can now see that data, which is helping me write a little bit

differently.

So, well, let's not sleep on the fact that you're, you're being very creative.

You're being very intentional.

You're thinking outside the box with the way, some of the things that you're doing, even what

you're describing and how you're creating this other content, you're allowing people to speak

into things like this is a very unique approach.

But honestly, you're preaching once a month and so you're only doing that one service.

So you've got more time to be creative, to do things, to let it breathe.

Is there intentionality?

Like, I know I'm sure short-term there is, long-term, like, are you going to the place

of where you're going to be doing weekly services?

How are you going to manage the tension?

Like, what, what is some of that long-term creative aspect look like?

Are you, if you're going to get back into a more weekly rhythm?

Yeah, that's great.

That's a great question.

So I don't know that I have a perfect answer for that.

So I'm going to pitch you the questions that we're asking.

You guys might even have an answer for it before we do, you know, but I would say this,

the questions we're asking right now is right now we've been, we've been put in a place

where we're prioritizing digital over physical first.

So now my question goes, we've always asked the question, how does physical inform what

we do in digital?

We're, we're switching it.

We're going, we have big screens.

Most churches have a projector.

You know, if you have the money, you have an led wall one day, right?

Like, so we're going, people are sitting in front of screens anyway.

So I'm asking the question right now, how does our digital approach inform what we would do

live?

I don't think we're saying we wouldn't do music, but I would say, what does a message

look like?

We're also asking the question, how can I leverage the phone that's in your pocket in

an interactive way to interact in a live setting?

So the one thing that you miss when you're live is the comment section on Facebook or the

comments, you know, on a zoom call, like, which is where a lot of communities happening

in real time.

Also, I acknowledge the communicator, this generation is fact checking me as I'm speaking.

You know what I mean?

Like they're doing three tasks on their phone as they're hearing me present live.

So we're going, if that's the case, let me just tell you where to go.

Like, this is one of the things we're talking about live is going as I'm speaking.

How great would it be if there's a pop-up on the screen that you're watching that says,

hey, for more information about, check out, I don't want to be, I don't want to assume

that people aren't already doing that as I go.

And I'll also say it gives us so much, I think it gives us so much more credibility

if we can point to people who both agree with us, now this is kind of out there a little

bit, and disagree with us.

If I can point, if I can, when I can reference a person who is secular thinking, this may be

different than me.

And then while somebody's fact checking that, be also talking about why I think this perspective

is right.

I don't think we lose influence there.

I think we only gain influence because they're going to go look at it anywhere they already

are, right?

And so for us, we're trying to say, how do we make that an interactive experience live versus

a sit and listen to a lecture?

Can the narrative approach to a message work in a live space?

And if that's true, this is what I really believe.

And we'll see, again, how it all works out.

And we may not even be the ones who figure it out.

There'll probably be other people too.

But if that works, how much more scalable is that kind of environment?

If it's interactive, a lot of it's not just like live stream video based, but like more

narrative video based, like what does that look like five years from now, 10 years from

now?

And is that more natively how teens, 20s, 30 somethings are experiencing the world in a

way?

So again, we don't have answers for that, but I would say those are questions that we're

asking.

I think no matter what, as much as we can, and as long as we have the margin and team

and dollars, we're going to try to have a separate wing of YouTube-esque kind of content.

The frequency, we don't know yet, but we're trying to figure that out and then figure

out how does that make its way into a physical.

I love that you're blurring the line between that thinking digital first and how can that

scalable digital first content, how can that support what happens in the physical space?

We were doing video teaching on multi-site campuses across the country mere months ago.

And so even blurring that more with as creative and as engaging as what you're doing with that

content online.

When it was funny, one of the first services, you know, you sent me or that you did, or one

of the first services that I saw was giving you some feedback, you know, on and thoughts

and just even floored, you know, even at some of the early workers as you were coming out.

But I remember one of the content, one of the things that I just kept beating on is you've

got all this creativity that you're doing online.

How are you going to represent this in physical space?

You're doing all these great cuts.

How does that impact what you're going to do in your physical building?

Are you going to do the backing track in the physical building?

Because even then I was like, okay, I'm thinking, I'm thinking physical first instead of, okay,

let me think digital first and then allow that to resource the physical piece.

There are, and I'll just give you the brass tacks on that.

There's a handful of churches that are talking serious about that.

I don't know of many churches that are actually executing on it because there's the, I've got

a multi-million dollar building.

That's where all the value is.

I've got to think physical first and digital is becoming that, you know, and so it's an interesting

exercise where, and actually I look towards planters like you and this next generation that doesn't

have, once again, the years of baggage, the previous assumptions of what church is from

attenders and just being able to really work at it with a clean slate to really define what

this next level of church is.

If we, like you're suggesting, continue to think digital first.

I mean, I love this.

That's cool.

The one person we're looking at in the secular world, I don't know if you're familiar with

Hasan Minhaj on Netflix.

Love Hasan Minhaj, man.

You love it.

Absolutely.

You love it.

Yeah.

So it raises the question, how many people do you have to have in the room to make it

interesting?

And what is the graphics package and live component looks like?

Now, I don't, I'm not recommending it for content.

He certainly says words that you don't want your four-year-old in the room to hear, but I

would say in terms of a communicator and humor and style and what could be replicatable across

the way.

That's one thing that we're looking at.

Yeah.

And that kind of style, you know, and once again, you talk about like allowing people to

fact check and this kind of thing has been something that he's been comfortable with from

the get-go.

Like he's understood conversing with his generation, both through screens, but also through social

media and kind of continuing a conversation.

And I think even though he just recently got canceled by Netflix because Netflix is trying

to shift towards a different direction, that had nothing to do with the popularity of his

content so much as, oh man, his content was really good.

And even his mindset was great in terms of how he was delivering it.

And especially like you just talked about the difficulty of doing comedy through screens.

Right.

He was delivering it in such a way that he went from the live audience that got scrapped

because of COVID.

And now he was still able to punch the jokes, provide the content and do it in such a way

where it was, oh man, but if you don't believe me, here are two or three links that you can

go back and check me on.

Right.

Oh, yes, absolutely.

And it makes you also think about on the hiring side of things, for those of us who are creative

content writers, you look at a guy like Asam Minaj who has however many researchers, however

many content writers, and there is a lot of content you have to produce, but going, who is a comedian

that you know that could look at your talk and say, here's four jokes to make that better?

Right.

We don't think about that until we have to, but I think we're in an age where we have to

think about how do you build a communication team to make that content punch?

Especially for those of us who, again, I'm in my thirties.

I didn't natively grow up with YouTube.

I grew up with a razor foam, you know?

So I mean, like, there's a little bit of like, how do we, how do we view that world?

Because this is what I keep coming back to.

There is an 18 year old somewhere who has less time than I do and has less money to put

towards something.

And they're getting millions of views on YouTube.

How are they doing that?

There's a way to do it.

And I think the local church and specifically communicators have to figure out how to do that.

There is so much truth right there coming.

Oh my gosh.

Coming from a guy with a live production background and, and, you know, and I'll walk into churches

and they're like, I had a church tell me, yeah, we're in the middle of dropping like six, multiple

six figures on, on building out a production studio.

And I'm like, that's nice.

What can you do now?

Like, don't, don't wait three or four months to, to write the big check.

You got what you need right now.

And, and, and, and starting to, you know, fire those BBs before bullets and the bullets

before a cannonballs, you know, that, that is, that is so true.

You know, even in this COVID season, experiment, test the waters before you, you write that

big check.

Um, sometimes the thing that you think you want to do when you actually do it, you're

like, Hey, you know what?

I don't want to do this.

And then you're, you know, $200,000 invested into something that you don't want to do.

So there's a lot of wisdom towards that.

Hey, um, let me pivot a little bit here.

Uh, another thing that, that you're working on, uh, or that you've been able to take advantage

of is like, you're not even, do you even have a worship guy at this point?

Because every time I see the services, like it's, you're, you're outsourcing, you, you're,

you're bringing in a friend from somewhere or like, you know, Austin stone worship, you

know, home of like Chris Tomlin.

I, you were, you were showing that video.

So like, what is, what's like the, the, um, what, what's the role of, of worship, musical

worship?

What are you thinking?

Short-term, long-term what's, what's the plan?

Oh, that's a great question.

It's one of my favorite things to talk about too, because we stumbled into this and it's

been one of the best things.

So, um, I was at actually Stadia CPAC, which I loved.

And I met a worship leader there and he shows me his phone, but I was like, yeah, we did

this little video and it had like 15,000 views and it's them in their living room and their

recording quality is fantastic.

And, but it's built for YouTube.

It's, it's a worship music that was built for YouTube, not just streamed from a big stage.

And it got me thinking, I can't afford, you know, I mean, I guess we don't have a worship

leader.

You know, we don't have somebody doing music.

We're new to Columbus, you know, we're still gathering people, but we wanted to have something

that felt artistic and as transcendent as we can make it in the service specifically around

worship.

And so I asked him at our first service, I said, Hey, would you mind?

I mean, it'll give you some exposure, not a ton, but it'll give you some exposure, you

know, and then it'll help us to have some quality music.

Would you let us use it for free?

And he said, yes.

And once he said yes, I was like, okay, who else could we ask?

And so we just started, we would, now what we do is we find the song that we want.

We find someone on YouTube.

Typically it's, it's a person who's getting, you know, between 5,000 and 15,000 views.

Generally after that, they're probably pretty big, you know, but around 5 to 15,000, sometimes

a little bit more.

A lot of these are churches.

And we say, Hey, like, we're going to give you all the credit.

So like when we talk about Austin Stone, we put there in the comments, go check out, follow

their YouTube page.

Here's where you can find it.

Here's the specific singers.

I hear the people that are doing it and then we say, Hey, can we take it?

Like, we'll skin it out.

Like we'll put like a background behind the video and make it, you know, still nouveau style,

but, but use their, their stuff.

And honestly, no one has told me no yet.

No, no church has told me no, no individual.

It feels like in some ways a win-win.

We're not a massive church where they're getting so much exposure, but they get a little bit,

you know, they'll pick up some followers and, and we get great worship designed for the

screen, which is a different thing.

Like it is a different feel when you do it that way.

And so I'll just kind of tell you, we, Austin Stone was phenomenal.

They have amazing stuff.

Garden MSC, they're out in California.

They let us use one.

I mean, incredible quality.

These are both churches.

One of my favorites has actually been a church in New York city.

And it's called Hope Church.

A friend, Drew's pastor out there.

I mean, these are three people, I would guess in their early twenties and studio apartments

in New York, but they're, I mean, the quality is phenomenal, you know?

And again, it's built for the screen.

So that's what we do.

We just ask people if we can use it.

Again, people have said yes.

And, and then we give them, you know, as much credit as we can possibly put out there and

do it that way.

So, yeah.

That's an, and I just, nobody has ever said no, like that is, is, is intriguing to me.

And so, but I guess it's, you know, cause I would try to do that where I would try to

get licensed for a movie clip or, you know, a TV show or something.

And like those people that they're never calling you back, but I guess the YouTubers within

that community, they're already within the Christian community because it's worship music.

It's, that's, that's fascinating.

They've been able to like engage more and follow up and are willing to do that.

And see, oh man, I would say this too.

And again, I, the open source concept, the open handedness of these churches, and hopefully

for all of us, it, it, when we come to the digital space, it really is an opportunity for

us to give everything away to each other to make it better.

And so again, like you said, there are so many of these churches that'll do that in YouTubers,

but hopefully we all do like our, our, our, we can give away the little things that we

have and hopefully we are doing that.

So, yeah.

Yeah.

I'm glad you, but you're right.

It's a great opportunity.

You know, even post 2020, as we're redefining what churches look like, cause COVID, you know,

maybe there's an opportunity for some of these bigger churches to start to supply some of

these resources, maybe not at a network level or maybe at a network level, but start to open

up open handedness in the season to, to provide resources for churches that are starting out

or for churches that are, that are struggling, maybe having to go back from, you know, as

churches are shutting down before they're pulling the plug, maybe they're going back to digital

because they've lost that school.

They've lost that set up, tear down venue.

And so they're needing to fall back on, on churches helping by providing worship content

and things like that, that honestly, like that's the hard part of an online service.

I believe to kind of assemble, uh, on the teaching there's prep time, but at least in the technical

aspects to really make it screen first viable, that's difficult to do.

And so like Austin stone, I had a lot of respect.

I used to work in Austin at another church, Austin Ridge, which was confused all the time

for Austin stone.

So I already had a lot of respect for those guys.

Uh, and just even the fact that they just did that, um, when I, when I saw their little

watermark pop up on the video, I was like, Hey, I know those guys.

That's, that's awesome.

I love that they did that for you.

Um, well, Hey, you know, even maybe just as, as we're kind of wrapping up here and, and,

and, and transitioning, um, like what does it look like for you?

So you're doing online, when are you meeting physically?

Like, do you have a plan at this point of, of what exactly that physical engagement is,

how you're going to kind of balance the tension between physical and digital?

Yeah, that's great.

You know, and we're, again, we're so new.

Our launch date is September of 2021.

That's when we'd go weekly, uh, like in a physical location, you know, we're actually

looking right now at mid-October, you know, COVID pending, you know, uh, and trying to find

a venue.

I think our approach right now, um, and other churches have done this too, is we would do

like gathering, we would hang out, we would spend some time together and then it would

be a teaching, but a lot of it's like working to connect with one another, gather in person

as many of these people that have engaged with us digitally, um, you know, and, and start

doing that.

I think as we progress to like the September launch, again, there's a lot of question marks

that we have around coronavirus and how we navigate that and what our venues look like.

And for a lot of church planners, it'd be difficult to get school or government buildings

in general right now.

Um, so how do you do that?

I think the thing that we keep wrestling with, as I said earlier, is how do we make digital

migrate into what we're doing in a physical location?

We feel like we can do that.

We can scale it multiple times and that's what we're hoping to try to do.

Um, but, um, and then, yeah, and then trying to figure out like, how do we make those

two worlds collide?

So we're, we're asking the question anytime that I'm up in front of people, even in a

physical location, how do we capture that content in a way where we can build out more digital

content with it?

We don't want to waste any time that we do speaking that way.

Uh, and the great thing is, and you guys know this too, the equipment now to be able to do

that is so much cheaper than it used to be.

We can get a cinema camera, black magic thing for, I mean, we're all in it, like maybe $2,000

for a camera, maybe a little bit more and have a couple of those going with the right backdrop.

Like we can take that content and morph it.

The other thing that we've also kind of dreamed about as we think about physical locations,

how do we pre-capture some content in the same room and then try to like morph that into

digital content as well.

So we're hoping we can merge those two spaces.

We definitely do want to be a physical location and on digital.

I think what we're discovering is that those two worlds hopefully will merge, uh, or in

mess in some messy sort of format some way.

Um, and then we also are operating off the assumption that the vast majority of people who will connect

with us in the beginning will connect with us digitally and likely in small chunks of content

that we put out first.

And so we're putting a lot of our efforts there.

So that was a long answer to your question, but that's, that's what we're attempting.

So loved every second of it.

I think it's a great strategy and looking forward to seeing how it gets implemented.

executed and what the results are up there in, in Columbus area.

So, uh, Ray, as, as my dog jumps back into the frame, she's been great.

Um, I don't want to hear from puppy Ray.

I want to hear from Ray Ray Ray's we're landing the plane in any thoughts on your side?

Yeah, Patrick, I mean, you, you and your team, and I, and I love the humility that you're

giving so much credit to your team as far as, you know, your name names and some of the

folks that are, that are obviously kind of directing what you guys are doing.

You guys have not just captured my attention, but I can imagine, you know, the attention

of many people that are there.

And the fact that you are inclusive and inviting them into the conversation to help create some

of the content that's helping shape and mold the community that you guys are trying to build

is huge to me.

I'll be praying for all the success in the world.

And I'm going to be keeping an eye on Columbus, Ohio, a community that has broken my heart since

they stole a national title for my Miami hurricanes like 19 years ago.

It's, it's still burning inside, but let me tell you now, now I've got a reason to root

for Ohio and I'm so excited for what God's doing in you, man.

I think it's wonderful.

Even the Buckeyes need Jesus, man.

That's, that's, that's awesome.

What way to like rip that bandaid off, man, that, that, that hurts the heart right there.

So some wounds have never healed, you know, that's great.

That's funny.

Awesome.

Hey, yeah.

So Patrick, as, as we're landing the plane here and any closing thoughts on your side?

You know what?

I don't think so.

I think, you know, I'm very passionate about communicators and speakers, obviously.

I'm sure you've heard that.

And I think I would say to anybody who's listening, whether you're in your twenties or you're in

your sixties, where we are right now, it is a different, is a learning curve and it's easy to

feel discouraged and try to navigate through how do you do it well and what does that look

like?

But I would just say, you are learning a new skill.

It's okay.

But just make sure you don't just, I would encourage you all the time.

Communicators, don't just fall back into the way we've always done it.

The world has changed.

The way we communicate is changing if it not already has.

And let's just be the best students of that that we can possibly be.

And then lastly, I would say to you, Jeff, thank you for all of the things that you're

doing a resource.

We have been a recipient of the content that you've put out and we are better for it.

And so I just wanted to say thank you for all that you're doing here, your podcasts and

blogs and your text messages and the feedback that you've given us.

We're just so grateful for you and all that you're doing.

If you're listening to this, you need to be listening to this podcast and watching this

content a lot.

It's super helpful for us.

So thank you, Jeff, for what you're doing.

Awesome.

Yeah.

Love, love every second of it.

Even when my dog barks in the middle of a podcast, apologize for that.

Um, yeah, this, this is the, this is why when your kids are like, daddy, I want a puppy.

And I'm like, no, let's get an older dog.

This is why, and you work at home while they go to school.

And while your wife works, this is why you fight.

You don't give in, you fight because this dog has bitten me.

This four month old dog has bitten me at least 300 times in this podcast.

Um, my gosh.

Okay.

Hey, listen, Patrick, I, I am always, it's always fun to talk with you.

It was funny.

I remember when we sat down across from each other at that CPAC, uh, with Stadia, whatever

city, I don't even, I don't even remember where we were, man.

Uh, whatever, what was California, California somewhere, right city.

Yeah.

We're over, we're over at those guys.

And just, you know, we sat across each other at the table and just immediately was like,

man, this guy's smart.

This guy's asking the right questions and heading down the right path.

And so, man, I'm excited to see how the church has developed and, and, and the road that you're

on.

Um, we'll continue to pray that God's doing great things, uh, through Nuvo, um, as you're

moving from that digital to physical and, and, uh, and growing in that way.

So, and, and once again, man, thanks for jumping on here.

The, the services, everything's awesome.

We didn't say it.

Maybe I said it up front, but, uh, there's links in the show notes to like examples of the

services and things.

And so y'all check out some of these services, uh, don't carbon copy it, but find ways to

maybe take some of these lessons, uh, and apply it to your churches where, where they

are.

Uh, and so for Patrick, for Ray, for the other Ray, my dog, who's currently biting me for

the fifth hundredth time.

Uh, this is Jeff with the church digital.

Thanks for joining us here in the podcast.

And we'll see you next time here on the show.

Y'all have a good day.