William, those are great questions. Many online churches are too new to be able to answer them, but I'd love to hear from pastors of online churches that have been around for a couple years or more.

I realize that this is looking beyond saving / teaching a particular site visitor to having them actually doing something with what they are taught, but isn't that one of the goals of making disciples – that they be well enough versed in the Bible and filled with the Spirit to be able to go out and grow the kingdom?

If you can't point to people who you have taught who have gone out and started building their own on-line church for God or actively witnessing in non-Christian forums in polite and appropriate ways that end up bringing in new people to be saved (or do the equivalent in the physical world), then regardless of whether or not it is possible to create disciples in a virtual environment, it isn't happening in reality.

If it is happening, are the virtual church plantings and fruit bearing of new believers occurring at the same rate, a slower rate, or a faster rate than brick and mortar churches. You would think it would be faster because the cost of entry is lower and the easy of access by the world is claimed to be easier. I'm not sure you should count convincing an existing brick and mortar church to develop an on-line presence, but even if you count that – how are you doing?

For those that have both a brick and mortar and on-line presence, which is doing better at getting people saved and is the on-line presence just an extension of the standard service via video feed or a completely separate entity? Which is doing better at keeping people saved once they've made the decision? How do the return the next Sunday rates of on-line churches exceed, match, or fall short of those who make decisions for Christ in a physical church?

Exactly!

… and there's the nub of the argument.

I simply believe that we were made in God's image – a God who is three-in-one, a communal being by His very nature. I believe we NEED physical community.

I think the apostle Paul did too. He wrote letters to teach, exhort, encourage and correct but often talked about visiting. If he could disciple completely by mail, he would never have had to visit!

So the discussion comes down to: do we as human NEED face-to-face contact or not?

If we don't need it, then online discipleship alone is perfectly OK. If we DO need it, then Online discipleship can never do the whole job.

My initial reaction to the question was that discipleship should be one of the easier functions of the church for an online church to accomplish because the web makes it easy to post and link to study material, discuss issues, and even do accountability.

But then I started thinking… much of becoming like Christ is caught rather than taught. Jesus didn't start a school or a Bible study for his disciples. He lived with them. He went around ministering to people – healing them, loving them, teaching them while his disciples watched, helped, and later asked why he did what he did. That kind of discipleship is tough to do online.

>>why are their brothers and sisters in Christ not going to THEM?

That's a great question. Some people will argue that in person visits are not necessary because they believe discipleship can be done just as well online as offline. If a person believes that, then you can make the case that online discipleship is more convenient for everyone involved.

Hmmm, that reminds me… I haven't see my 80+ year old next door neighbor for quite a while.

Hi Paul,

Ah, now I was going to mention them but I didn't want my post to get too long.

I think that for people in remote locations online churches can definitely be an effective means of discipleship, however, face-to-face meetings, when possible, are still essential.

There are, of course those who are stuck in their homes for whatever reason but are not in remote locations. Online discipleship can help them but the issue there is why are their brothers and sisters in Christ not going to THEM? Why should they suffer a lack of physical fellowship just because they are unable to go out?

I think it's easy for us to essentially neglect people by saying "I'll do all my ministry online" when the people next door are desperate for some company!

Hey Peter, thanks for your comment. So, what do you think about those who are unable to physically gather with other believers? Can online churches effectively disciple them?

Sharon, thanks for stopping by and sharing your thoughts. Proponents of online church would argue that millions of people already have difficulty gathering together physically – those who are sick, have physical disabilities, or living in countries closed to Christianity. Is there no hope of discipling them online?