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The Shepherd’s Path Volume Five

Get Your Church Reaching The Lost Online When You Stop Broadcasting To The Found

The Digital Ministry

Reaching The Ends Of The Earth Without Leaving Home

You livestream the service, post the sermon clip, and put the announcements on a story. Engagement comes almost entirely from people who were in the building on Sunday. That is not ministry to the lost. It is broadcasting to the found, and it is the default every church lands on because it is the only version anyone showed them. The mission field moved online. Most churches followed it with a camera and stopped there.

  • Length12 chapters
  • FormatsKindle and audiobook · paperback in production
  • SeriesBook Five of The Shepherd’s Path
  • Written forPastors and ministry leaders
Kindle Audiobook

Published as The Digital Ministry. It is Book Five of The Shepherd’s Path; the series retitle has not yet gone live on Amazon. Paperback is in production.

The Problem

What Most Church Digital Ministry Actually Is

This one you can read today. Each problem below has a chapter, and the book is available now on Kindle and audiobook.

You Livestream The Service And Call It Digital Ministry.

Livestreaming serves the congregation you already have. It is a service to the found, not an approach to the lost, and confusing the two is the default failure.

Chapter Four: “Reaching the Lost Online”

You Post Consistently And Nothing Happens.

Consistency against the wrong thing produces nothing at scale. The chapter is about stopping, which is most of the work.

Chapter Eight: “Pruning and Decision Making”

You Need To Hire For This And Have No Idea What To Look For.

Two chapters on exactly that, written for church budgets rather than agency ones.

Chapters Nine and Ten: “Staff Qualities & Digital Staffing”

You Cannot Tell What AI Changes For Your Church.

Written by someone who builds with these tools rather than reporting on them.

Chapter Twelve: “AI and Your Church”

Digital Feels Risky And You Could Not Name The Risk.

The exposure is real and worth naming precisely, which is what makes it possible to decide what is worth it.

Chapter Six: “Risks and Rewards”

Twelve chapters. The first half establishes the ground; the second half is operational. Full contents below.

What This Book Argues

  • Why the scale of the need online is larger than most church leaders have actually reckoned with, and what that implies about where effort should go.
  • How the digital world works as a place rather than a channel: the difference between broadcasting a service and doing ministry where people already are.
  • A real church marketing strategy: what to say, where, and to whom, built for people outside the building rather than announcements for people inside it.
  • The risks taken seriously: what a church genuinely exposes itself to online, and what is worth the exposure.
  • Pruning and decision-making: how to stop doing the digital work that is producing nothing, which is usually most of it.
  • What to look for in the person who runs it, how to staff it at realistic church budgets, and how to train them.
  • What AI changes for a church, written by someone who builds with it rather than speculating about it.

Inside The Book

The complete table of contents. The first half establishes the ground; the second half is operational: strategy, pruning, staffing and training.

The Digital Ministry

Twelve chapters, from the size of the need to the tools now available.

  1. Unfathomable Need
  2. Rise of the Digital Platform
  3. Understand the Digital World
  4. Reaching the Lost Online
  5. Digital Benefits
  6. Risks and Rewards
  7. Ministry Marketing Strategy
  8. Pruning and Decision Making
  9. Staff Qualities
  10. Digital Staffing
  11. Digital Ministry Training
  12. AI and Your Church

Who This Is For

Pastors Whose Digital Effort Is Producing Nothing
You have the accounts, you post consistently, and nothing happens. Chapter Eight is about stopping the right things.
Leaders About To Hire For This
Two chapters on what to look for and how to staff it, written for church budgets rather than agency ones.
Churches That Livestream And Stopped There
Livestreaming serves the congregation you already have. This is about the people who are not coming.
Leaders Trying To Work Out What AI Means For Them
The final chapter is written by someone who builds with these tools daily, not someone reporting on them.

Not For: readers wanting a social media tactics manual. Platforms change; the book is about the decisions underneath them.

The Mission Field Moved. Did Your church?

Twelve chapters on doing ministry where people actually are: strategy, staffing, risks and what AI changes. Available now on Kindle and audiobook.

Kindle Audiobook

The Plan

Three Steps, In This Order

The mission field moved online. Most churches followed it with a camera and stopped there. Getting past that takes three moves, and the first one is subtraction.

  1. Stop What Is Producing Nothing

    Pruning is most of the work. List every channel you post to, then find the ones that only ever reach people who were in the building on Sunday.

  2. Pick One Place Outside The Building

    Digital is a place, not a channel. Choose one place where people who do not attend already spend time, and do ministry there instead of broadcasting at it.

  3. Put One Person On It

    Not a committee and not an agency. Two chapters cover what to look for and how to staff it at a real church budget.

The second half of the book is operational: strategy, pruning, staffing, training, and what AI changes for a church.

Free — the complete book

Hear When The Rest Of The Series Lands

Six more books on the practical work of leading a church. The list gets them first, at launch pricing.

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Before You Start

Questions Leaders Ask First

Why Is It Called The Digital Ministry And Not Church Marketing?

It was published under that title before The Shepherd’s Path existed as a series. It is Book Five of that series, and the retitle has been decided but is not yet live on Amazon.

The book is the same either way. Buy it under the title you see there now.

Is It Out Of Date? It Was Published In 2021.

The platform specifics move constantly, which is why the book is built around decisions instead of tactics: how to choose, what to stop, who to hire.

That said, the pace of change since publication is real. The AI chapter in particular is the part most worth revisiting, and it is being reviewed as part of the series work.

Is There A Print Edition?

Not yet. Kindle and audiobook are available now; the paperback is in production. Join the list and you will hear when it lands.

Do I Need A Budget For Any Of This?

No. The staffing chapters are written for churches that cannot hire an agency, and the strategy chapter assumes you are choosing between a small number of things rather than doing all of them.

Do I Need To Read The Other Books First?

No. Every book in The Shepherd’s Path stands alone, and this is the only one available so far.

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Free — the complete book

Six More Books Coming

This is Book Five of seven. The list hears about the rest first, at launch pricing.

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