Sharing the word of God through video

 

MOUNT VERNON — Andy Beatty and his leadership team at Central Christian Church of Mount Vernon had been dabbling in a different way to reach not only their 350 members but also beyond with the word of God — video.

Then, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine issued a stay-at-home order and CCCMV wasn’t even able to reach its parishioners for Sunday services. The leadership team decided a video would be its best option.

“We had been posting video of our recorded message a couple of days after Sunday services and we were getting a pretty good feedback from that. We were wanting something a little more immediate, but that was just on the list to accomplish at some point,” said Beatty, the teaching minister at CCCMV. “With all this COVID-19 ramping up, we were considering the safety of meeting together and we felt it would be really irresponsible to gather 350 people together in that building. We knew we wanted to get something out Sunday mornings... We knew this would be a great way for people to have connections, too.”

There were several hurdles in doing that — from making sure they were following all the rules of streaming videos to the physical part of putting on the show. Beatty said they got the proper licensing, then got to work on perfecting the message and figuring out how to get it online in time for regular Sunday services.

Then, there were additional costs, from the licensing to upgrading the equipment.

“We figured the additional costs were worth it to still be able to connect with our people, to encourage them,” Beatty said. “We have a lot of people who struggle with loneliness on a good week before all of this happened. This has only heightened that. It doesn’t take long for people to get into a rough spot, especially if they’re stuck in their house and away from other people and places. For us, the cost really never factored in... It was the right thing to do from a health standpoint and it was the right thing to do to spend a little extra money to do it well. We didn’t want to put something out that wasn’t a good representation of us, or more importantly, a good representation of God.”

For normal Sunday services, there is some time and planning involved during the rest of the week. Now, those timeframes are cut a bit short.

The praise team practices, then records its worship songs for the services on Wednesday nights and then Beatty records his message on Thursdays. That gives them Friday and Saturday to perfect the video and then upload it to their website (www.cccmv.com), Facebook and YouTube.

Youth Minister Lyle Baker took over most of the technical chores and uploading each week’s video. The first week’s learning curve was tough, as Baker worked Saturday night until 4 a.m. just to upload the 8-gigabyte video.

All that time is spent making sure the church’s members don’t have to change their routine on Sundays. Beatty said they can get up, fix breakfast and then be ready to watch the sermon at 8:30 a.m., just like they would normally at the Gambier Road facility.

“We always talk about giving our first fruit to God. We start every day serving God first thing by reading the Bible. The first couple of hours of the first day of the week are an important part of our lives,” Beatty said.

It’s also reaching more than just the regular membership. Facebook and YouTube has helped Central Christian Church reach nearly five times their membership number as people from all over are finding their way to the services.

“It’s been really cool. It’s nice that people across the country are able to watch. It’s like a long-distance church family,” Beatty said.

Sunday’s services are just the first way Central Christian Church is trying to stay connected to its members. They have been using Zoom, a video conferencing app, for youth groups and are now looking at doing the same for adult groups.