Dear ministers- a letter to online ministry

-Rev Melissa Fain-

Dear Ministers,

I've been reading the shock at discovering more hours are being put into putting content online, than the time taken to do live worship.

Here are few points to remember:

1. Doing anything new will necessarily take more time. Wanna become a runner? It will take longer to accomplish that first mile than the mile six months into running. Wanna play a scale on an instrument? It will take longer to accomplish that first time playing through that scale than the 2,000th time playing through it. Online ministry is a learning curve, and requires practice. You're new at it, so treat it like something new. Don't discount the potential. Muscle memory will eventually kick in and you'll start to feel the rote of it. What took 60 hrs the first week might only take 30 hrs eventually. 
2. The internet doesn't have time for your filler. Go ahead, write you 16 minute sermon. Clean it up. Make it catchy. Then cut it in half. I know, it's like taking Monet and cutting it up with craft scissors. It's just your Monet looks like trash online. It's not you. Your Monet looks like a masterpiece behind your pulpit, in front of a live congregation. I can't express this enough- live worship doesn't translate online. Everything you did has to be tightened. Your physical space feels like deserts of space when recorded.  Normal recorded spacing is actually far more intimate when brought into IRL. Tighten your space. Your words, your objects, you. Less is so much more. When you cut the space, you cut your work. Work that didn't need to exist to begin with.
3. I look like trash. Yes, that statement is supposed to make you feel better. Listen, I've taken multiple acting classes, including acting for the camera. I've even taken a standard and Biblical storytelling class. I was a student assistant at the music department for Kennesaw State University. I set up lights and tore down sets. I've been doing livecasts for 6 years and been online for 8 years. I don't produce gold 100% of the time. I've been watching very talented actors not produce gold all the time either. The camera is an unforgiving mistress. It will amplify whatever you're doing in front of it. Roll with it. Every church is learning this at the same time, so your trash looks normal to every one watching it. When I looked like a hot steaming pile of garbage I was the only one looking like that. There's something for you all doing this at once. Revel in the fact that you are just one of many. 
4. Stop drawing attention to what you are considering failures. I have an undergraduate in Music with a concentration in Theater. A clarinet professor told his class to find a tick to keep from saying "um." Like tap your leg when you feel like you need to fill space with a useless sound. Very helpful. I rarely say "um" now. But my vocal professor gave me the ultimate best tip I've ever carried over from my undergrad: Most people don't see mistakes. We are hardwired to apologize or correct when we make a mistake. We're used to being tested. Only, when it comes to the camera, most people don't see mistakes if focus isn't drawn to them. Did you skip over your note on John the Baptist? No one knows. If you draw attention to what you did, now everyone knows and it becomes the focus of worship. Just keep going. Draw attention to what is working, and then everyone sees that instead.