As a boy growing up in the suburbs of Atlanta, Georgia, I was blessed to have parents who never said, "Because I said so!" I was always encouraged to ask why things were as they were and to use that why to determine what I would do and how I would do it. I have used that philosophy in all areas of my life and have been richly blessed to see it help me in discovering the powerful use of media in worship.

If you're thinking about using media in worship, first stop and ask yourself the question, "Why?" I have received numerous calls and e-mails from inquiring folks who are fast and ready to begin using media in worship, but when I ask them why, they seem to flounder and have little response.

So "Why use media in worship?"

First of all, we minister in an audiovisual age. Every day, we are surrounded by a multisensory collage of video, graphics, color, movement, displays, and media that tap into all five of our senses — sight, smell, hearing, touch, and taste. All are intended to get our attention and convey compelling information in a short timeframe.

The human body is wired to receive and respond to various stimuli as these five senses send signals to the brain, which, in turn, responds by sending signals to the other parts of the body in order for the body's response to be appropriate to the situation. Do you remember when you were a child and your parents told you not to touch something because it was hot? Most of us were not convinced, and we actually had to feel the heat before we realized exactly what hot meant! So it is within the church setting. We can stand behind lofty pulpits and tell folks over and over again, but when we are able to help them actually experience the story, our efforts have much greater impact on the people we desire to see respond to the greatest message ever known to humanity!

But this philosophy really isn't anything new in the world of communication. For centuries, people have shared the message of the gospel through culturally appropriate methods. The early church relied on vivid storytelling sprinkled with parables and illustrations to pass the message from home to home and person to person. In the fifteenth century, the printing press stoked intellectual fires, helping usher in an era of enlightenment. This great cultural rebirth was inspired by widespread access to and appreciation for classical art and literature, and these translated into a renewed passion for artistic expression. We have developed into a multisensory culture that experiences life through the diversity of print, music, video, computer, and many other forms of communicative media on a daily basis.

Why use media in worship? Because that is the language our people are accustomed to hearing, seeing, touching, tasting, and smelling thousands of times each day of their lives. Using these forms of media offers the church an opportunity to speak the message of the gospel truths more effectively in a relevant and transforming way to a world desperately in need of some good news.

When planting Hope Church in 1997, I was aware of why I wanted to use media in worship. My question then was "what?" — "What do I need? What is available? What resources might I find that will help me reach the 217,000 people within twenty miles of Hope who don't currently have any affiliation with any local church?"

As with most new church plants, finances were an issue. I knew I would be limited in how much I could initially invest to get up and running with media in worship. Patience is a key word for all new church planters. Rome wasn't built in a day, and neither will your new plant be a finished product the first week. I started with two Kodak Ektagraphic 3 slide projectors. The company we ordered them from was able to take my measurements from the school cafeteria where we had our worship each week and provide the proper lens to project the distance and size I would have available. I didn't have the budget for any high-tech screens, so I found a large piece of white canvas that we cut to make two screens that could be hung each week to the sides of the stage in order to project the lyrics of the songs. We ordered our slides from Worship Visions (1-800-368-6701) and built a portfolio that we kept in a slide folder. We also applied for a Christian Copyright License (CCLI) through Christian Copyright Licensing International (www.ccli.com). CCLI bases the cost on average attendance, and we were able to obtain our license for less than $100 per year.

Some people came to the new church looking for the hymnals. We kindly explained that we used the projector format to make it easier to follow the lyrics and to keep people looking up as they praised the Lord, rather than having their faces buried in a hymnal trying to figure out which stanza we were on. But the music we used was not in a hymnal anyway. We used this method of projecting the lyrics for a year before we were able to upgrade to a laptop computer and a liquid crystal display (LCD) projector. This allowed us the capabilities to use live camera feeds and video clips. We were also able to use PhotoShop to create high-quality graphics and PowerPoint to generate the entire presentation. The day we made this move was a quantum leap in using multisensory media in worship! My advice to anyone starting would be to go with the LCD projector and laptop from the beginning. Even though it is more costly, it will greatly enhance your ability to reach the audiovisual culture in your area. Investigate and research the newest technology available, and begin with the most you can. This might be a case where your question does not need to be, "What can we afford?" Instead, ask "What can we not afford?" (For video clips you will need a license — Motion Picture Licensing Corporation (MPLC). We pay less than $100 dollars a year for this license.

After looking at why and what, you next need to consider how. "How do we use media to create a multisensory worship experience?"

The first thing to do is to build a team! As lead pastor of Hope, my main responsibilities are preaching, teaching, and vision-casting. That's a full-time job! I do not have the time, skills, or God-given design ability to create, produce, and format multisensory media on a weekly basis, fifty-two weeks a year. Find people who are already skilled in many of the new technological understandings of equipment, resources, formatting, and presenting. Identify people who have these gifts as well as leadership skills. Invest time in these people and help them see the use of multisensory worship as a part of the vision of the church to transform people's lives through the message of the gospel! "Crank them up, and turn them loose!" Begin building a team of people who will use their skills to create, format, and present the gospel message through media each week in the worship setting.

As you create multisensory worship, make sure it's done with excellence! Would you rather watch CNN or some local cable access station? Poor media can be worse than no media at all. Even though you will not have the resources of CNN, you can make your presentation more like CNN than the local access station by staying current with the latest styles and look. Begin to be more sensitive as you surf through the channels. How do they use graphics? How are they mixing video? What colors go together the best? Be observant because the people you are trying to reach in an hour of worship once a week are exposed to these things multiple hours every day, each week, fifty-two weeks a year. They've come to expect and respond to excellence. Don't cheapen the gospel message with cheesy media or compromised presentations. Train your team to think excellence, and challenge them to continue raising the bar as you grow in your media presentation and develop your ministry week after week.

A Week in the Life of Hope
Although many churches are using multisensory media in worship more effectively than we are at Hope Church, we offer this "week in the life of Hope" to demonstrate how we move from idea, to creation, to presentation of a multisensory worship experience.

Monday
The worship design team meets at 7:30 each Monday evening. I (or the preacher for that week) bring a theme, an outline, and a metaphor of what I would like to convey in the message. (We view the message as everything people experience from the time they pull into the parking lot throughout the 70 minutes of worship on any given Sunday.) The worship team is made up of the preacher, the music leader, one or two key musicians from the band, the a/v team coordinator, and the person who will be directing everything on Sunday.

After we prayerfully look at the theme with "So What?" on our minds — So what will this mean to those folks God will wake up and get into this place on Sunday? — we begin to create an order for the service. We ask if there is any movie clip or skit that might set up the theme. We consider if there is a song (secular or spiritual) that really accents the message theme. If I know the preached portion of the message will be deeper or more intense, we might look at songs, a skit, or a movie clip that are a little lighter — and vice-versa. We might choose to produce our own video clip, but we are not fully set up at this time to do as quality a job as we'd like. We then begin selecting songs that are appropriate to the theme, and we look at how all these components flow together. We are sensitive to transitions between the many parts of the service and how we can best enhance the message through smoother and more appropriate transitions so that the parts make one cohesive message that's presented during the worship experience. Our minds are on transformation rather than on simply sharing information. We leave that two-hour meeting with all the pieces, and we each do our part in bringing the pieces together for the coming Sunday's worship.

Tuesday
A technical guide is completed that has the entire service broken down into all the technical pieces such as lighting, time limits, cameras, mics, live video, and so on. Our administrative assistant gives the tech guide to our volunteer administrative team; and they format, print, and fold the worship guide that will be given to each person who attends worship on Sunday.

The a/v coordinator rents any video clips that might be used, previews them, does a sound check, and cues them on the main VCR in the worship center so they are ready to go on Sunday.

The musicians go over music, purchase any CDs they need to learn new songs, and transpose any necessary music in preparation for their Wednesday rehearsal.

Wednesday
The sermon has been fleshed out and is usually completed by Wednesday afternoon. A copy of the message notes is sent to the administrative assistant who mobilizes the administrative volunteer team to format, print, fold, and insert the message notes page into the worship guides.

The worship team rehearses all the songs that will be used in worship and coordinates with the entire praise team (band and singers) when to be on stage and how to best transition between the songs and other parts of worship.

Any skit that is being used has been passed on to the drama team, which gets any necessary props together, disperses the script, and rehearses in the worship center with mics and lighting to ensure the best effect from the skit.

Thursday
The graphics and PowerPoint presentations are completed, reviewed on the screen in the worship center to note any clarification that needs to be made, and saved on the main network for the computer person to have available on Sunday.

Thursday is a day to care for anything that needs to be changed or tweaked to best serve the message for the day.

Sunday
Personnel arrive an hour before the first worship service. The preacher for the day, praise team, technical team (including the director, sound techs, computer operator, camerapersons. We use three live-feed cameras throughout the service, mixing between the live cameras and graphics) all look over the tech guide to become familiar with the flow and technical portions of the worship service. The praise team does a sound check. All people using microphones that day are hooked up and checked. New batteries are installed in all mics, headsets, and other electronic devices. (Be prepared for about a million dollars budgeted for batteries alone!)

The director goes over the tech guide and assures that lighting and video/graphic mixing is coordinated with the computer person and camera personnel.

Team members pray together before people start arriving, take one last bathroom break (essential!!), and take their respective places to begin worship.

And last, but definitely not least, LIVES ARE TRANSFORMED FOREVER FOR THE BETTER through the age-old gospel message shared in a relevant format!

I hope this helps you as a new church pastor. Please see our website (http://placeofhope.org) because you may find it helpful to see the graphics we use.

Tommy Willingham is the Lead Pastor at Hope Church in Dallas, Georgia.