Preach Magazine Issue 4 - Preaching in the digital age | Page 18

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FEATURE

There are many ways of understanding the
phrase ‘digital preaching’, but I would define it as
the form of preaching that is created for a digital
medium and delivered through a digital device.
This type of sermon has been specifically designed
for the digital environment; it is to be viewed on a
digital screen and it is to be heard through digital
compression and amplification. What we are
talking about is not just a recording of a sermon
in a physical space which is then posted to the
web. That is a very different type of preaching.

DIGITAL PREACHING IS AN INCREASINGLY LARGE GENRE IN
THE CHRISTIAN MEDIA MARKET, AND WHILE ITS FORMAT
AND CHARACTERISTICS SUIT IT TO THE TWENTIES AND
THIRTIES AGE RANGE, THE CONTENT ITSELF IS RARELY
DIFFERENT TO A TRADITIONAL SUNDAY MORNING SERMON.

A

s we will explore, the genre of
digital preaching has a number
of common characteristics.
These include:

r hythmic and repeated word
patterns
 umerous layers of strong visual
n
content with an emphasis on
contemporary digital fashion
additional musical elements
short in length (3 to 10 minutes).

While this is a fairly broad list of
characteristics, the reality is that
digital preaching is a growing and
expanding genre, so any further
specificity placed on to it would be illadvised. As with anything innovative,
digital preaching is constantly
evolving, but by exploring digital
preaching through three examples,
we can start to learn more about its
ability to go further and reach more
people than our local Sunday-morning
sermon ever could.