Fasting and prayer is the discipline of doing without earthly sustenance and replacing it with God’s. How does this apply to your website? Try replacing something man-made with something that is from God. It is often hard to let go, get out of the way, and let the Lord work. So I challenge you to take a stance with a bold statement. Remove things from your homepage that are “of this world”. Allow people to set their eyes on the person who will ultimately change their life, Jesus.
Here are some examples of where you can put God’s glory in the spotlight of your homepage:
Display God’s Word
One example is to use the scripture that is guiding one of your important high-level business goals. Move that photo of your church on the homepage to your Contact Us page, and replace it with an image of that verse laid over a beautiful local landscape. Instead of your generic “Welcome to our website” content, highlight how that piece of scripture is guiding your church. Close the deal with a link to a page that details the amazing results that God-given guidance is providing.
Reflect Christ’s Love
Show how you’ve taken Jesus’ teachings and are affecting the world around you. Your church’s ministries should have plenty of examples of how people’s lives are changing. Show pictures and/or videos where your church is demonstrating His love. For more information on this, check out a previous scripture-inspired article I wrote on showing Christ’s love on your website.
Showcase Miracles
Has there been any miracles in your congregation? Why not showcase an article about a healing that ended with one of the members of your congregation walking out of a hospital with their doctors baffled? With these tough economic times, maybe there is someone who found an answer to prayer in a new job. Showcase articles, photos, and videos that demonstrate how prayers at your church have been answered. Boldly tell your audience that God is still in the business of performing miracles.
Just for a While
Remember that fasting is temporary. Your experiments can be on a trial basis. If you have doubters in your committees, promise that if statistics (website traffic, church attendance, and/or tithes) do not change; you can go back to another design. Even if those statistics do not change, the experiment of fasting should be able to help determine your next steps.
Action Item
During this Lenten season, pray, plan, and prepare a new homepage that fasts from distractions. Gather your baseline website usage statistics, so when you implement your update you have a good idea of the amount of change your updates had. Finally, publish your updates and keep them live for a few weeks and see how God rewards your faith. Perhaps this Easter will be the most amazing one your church has ever seen!
Special note: This article was inspired by yet another great sermon by Kent Chevalier at North Way Christian Community.
Photo courtesy of Olly Bennett
