First off this is not my idea. I heard this idea from Gary Hamel (http://www.garyhamel.com/) at the Leadership Summit this past August. Gary talked about why we do not open source the sermons in the church. I like this idea. On a Sunday night the pastor would post the skeleton of his sermon for the next week. For the next few days people in the congregation could add in thoughts, stories, Bible references and thoughts. The pastor would then close off this discussion and create his sermon from this.
Talk about out of the box. Guess that is why the Wall Street Journal ranked Gary one of the world's most influential business thinkers. Thoughts?
Comments
we're going to try in one of our youth services letting students text in questions that they have regarding the message series they've heard. the questions will be answered by a panel of adult and student leaders. anything we can do to engage our audience and better communicate the world's greatest message is worth doing.
The Church "The Meeting House" also does something that reminds me of this... At the end of each sermon series, they invite people to send in questions for the final sermon of the series.... "Hot Seat Sunday". Then the speaker will go through the questions on that Sunday.
The idea of everybody contributing to a meeting is very biblical and this is an innovative way to incorporate this principal even in a large church setting. 1 Corinthians 14:26 MSG: "When you gather for worship, each one of you be prepared with something that will be useful for all: Sing a hymn, teach a lesson, tell a story, lead a prayer, provide an insight..."