A Deacon Of The Internet, Part 1

I want to make a suggestion to the church in general about the installation of a new position in churches locally. This position doesn’t yet exit, so far as I can tell, but needs to for a handful of reasons I'm about to explain. This position, however, is filled by people with other titles right now. And we’ll deal with that too. Don’t you worry.

That position is a Deacon of the Internet.

Now I can hear the church IT guy choking on his second-fourth coffee already. Don’t worry, I’m not here to add another role to your plate. But I'm also drawing a distinct line between the guys who make sure the livestream is always working on Sundays, and the guys who knows the live stream isn't church. Which means this may or may not apply to you.

Over the last few years one of those guys (The IT crowd) got a whole lot more sway in church logistics, and the other didn’t because his role had never really been defined for the benefit of the church. A subtle power shift happened during the pandemic where the guys who were serving the church by providing It IT and Tech services, got lofted into essential higher leadership, by being the essential service they are to the online church. And we haven’t quite reckoned with that yet. I know this because most church IT guys are not required to fill the qualifications of the role they fill. Sure they have certifications in a host of IT specialties that would seems as Greek to the layman who just needs Wi-Fi. And they likely have staff behavioural contracts that will be offered as good enough. But have we ensured that they are fit to lead in their roles biblically, apart from there ability to lead technically. Because like it or not they wield leadership power now.

And in those days, when the number of the disciples was multiplied, there arose a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews, because their widows were neglected in the daily ministration. Then the twelve called the multitude of the disciples unto them, and said, It is not reason that we should leave the word of God, and serve tables. Wherefore, brethren, look ye out among you seven men of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business. But we will give ourselves continually to prayer, and to the ministry of the word. And the saying pleased the whole multitude: and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost, and Philip, and Prochorus, and Nicanor, and Timon, and Parmenas, and Nicolas a proselyte of Antioch: Whom they set before the apostles: and when they had prayed, they laid their hands on them.

Acts 6:1-6 KJV

You can’t look at a person who can single handily shut down a church’s entire online ministry, church communications, and functional administrative work, and say that a person, who wields that kind of power, doesn’t lead. It’s obvious that they lead. But also obvious, to the biblical, how they lead. They lead through serving. They provide the service of a specific kind of knowledge and the ability to exercise that knowledge as a service. To most of us, we don’t know how the internet works but are fully prepared to accept when we’re presented with things the internet can look like it does. It looks like we are a single window pane away from the church service being livestreamed. Which is why online church exists. It the same, to the layman, as the window pane that separated the babies from the church service. More so than anyone wants to admit , actually. But a IT guy knows just how performative and false that illusion is. Not that he mentioned it at all since 2020. Again power showed up on his lap. You think he was gonna be the first person to say to the global senior pastor “You guys know this video streaming idea isn’t a magic, COVID proof portal to the congregation’s living room, right? Like it’s basically email but faster?”

Where this rubber hits to road is the same place it hit it for the apostles. Because they most certainly could have served tables filled with hungry widows. But through discernment and wisdom, they knew that they had bigger fish to fry but also that the smaller fish still needed frying. They commissioned the deacons to get more kingdom work done, but also tied that force multiplier that was service based to unique qualifications.

Likewise must the deacons be grave, not doubletongued, not given to much wine, not greedy of filthy lucre; Holding the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience. And let these also first be proved; then let them use the office of a deacon, being found blameless. Even so must their wives be grave, not slanderers, sober, faithful in all things. Let the deacons be the husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses well. For they that have used the office of a deacon well purchase to themselves a good degree, and great boldness in the faith which is in Christ Jesus.

1 Timothy 3:8-13 KJV

A deacon of the internet would look different than the average church IT guy. Mostly because, across the board, the deacons would be guys. Not that there’s a whole lot of girls in the church IT crowd. They would be guys. With beards even. Accompanied by wives with hopefully less beards. They would have well behaved children and well ordered houses, and a lack of chemical dependencies. If any of that last section made you bristle a bit, remember, I’m just reading the Bible out loud here. You're the one who choked on your coffee back in paragraph three. The Bible says bitter sweet nothing about IT infrastructure personnel, but does talk about people who serve. And you’re serving the church in your role, right? Did you get hired because you could do the job, or because you were a godly person who could do the job. Would you step down if that godliness became an area of compromise in your life? Because the qualifications of that godliness are a married female spouse, children who behave, no chemical dependencies and a testing period. Good news is, you don’t have to. You just have to be an IT guy. for now.

There's a reason A deacon of the internet would need those ducks in a row. It’s a test. It’s blatantly a test. They need to be able to pass a testing. Which is going to be the trickiest part of this endeavour. Because most of us are luddites comparatively. So, how are we going to test a deacon of the internet about their ability to serve over the church’s need for ministering on the internet. Can’t exactly turn him off and on again, can we? But we did have a great test of the what the internet and the church do to one another, in recent memory in point of fact. That test was what happened and was allowed to happen during the pandemic. There was a real chance for people who facilitate the service of internet connectedness at their church, to tell their pastors they can’t do online church, because the internet is a thing not a place. And the gathering of people that makes up the church needs a place to actually gather. otherwise it’s just correspondence. Email but faster. That there was no such thing as gathering online. And that people who mince words for a living, biblically even, should know that you can’t just decide how they work. Like when we started saying “gathering online”. You can’t gather online. It’s the opposite of getting together. It’s connected apartness.

The current caste of IT professionals in the church had a chance to do biblical ministry when it counted, and chose not to, in lieu of what a pastor who knows nothing about how the internet actually works, made them believe about the internet. They were told, during an emergency meeting, that they were gonna facilitate the pastor telling their entire congregation, that they would be gathering online. And instead of serving that table of leaders, they acquired a taste for power. They could have held what the internet could do hostage so orthodoxy could be maintained. Instead they compromised into online church, online communion, online baptisms, and anything else that kept them that power. How many previously recorded live streams authorized entirely separate family groups and COVID cohorts, to do an online Eucharist. A meal meant to be partaken together, with your church, to show the unity of a indivisible body. Split into a live streamed version and a re-broadcasted live streamed version an hour and half later. Alongside a thousand different and separate homes and breads and juice boxes?

If we did have deacons of the internet they all failed their testing. And need to either be removed or brought to confession. And no one in the church wants to do that because it will likely drag the pastors into the fray again. And unlike the health ministers of the time, they don’t have legislated amnesty for actions done in good faith. What’s worse is that the IT guys likely know they’re currently punching above their pay grade. But conferences like FILO have convinced them they are as essential, if not more, than the enabling pastors that got them there in the first place. It’s a particular kind of deaf blind and dumb to say you are the first in and last out of the big complicated church tech monster, only to find out the janitors beat you there and wait for you to leave to clean up your greenrooms. The reason I know this is I worked a big church tech enabled monster and was in charge of the janitors. And the security system. I know who was first in and last out. It wasn’t Tech or IT. Though it was occasionally the senior pastor, who needs to be held to account for changing how church is done and what “gathering” is defined as to said church.

If and when that happens, the church’s online presence will begin to look different, and God willing, it will look better. It will be more Christ like, more biblical, and more different than TED talks, the Daily Stoic, and pop rock concerts at your nearest NHL arena.

Of the faithful few and repentant (hopefully) many, that answer that particular deacons call, a steep list of responsibilities and duties, as important as staving widows, will be made of and to them.

Of which you will read in part two of this blogpost.