Sunday Services Are Now Live...Again!

For the past many months, we've produced and broadcasted fully pre-recorded services in an effort to provide higher quality online worship experiences to our church family. I was watching how other churches were creating these dynamic, visually engaging Sunday services and based on how I saw people responding, I was like - maybe we should do that too.

So I set things in motion for Pleasant Hope to have that kind of Sunday presentation. It was cool for a while, but eventually, things seemed to get stale - at least that's what our metrics and your feedback suggests.

Therefore, we made the decision yesterday to go back to live services online. What this means is that instead of watching a pre-recorded service, you'll be invited to participate in a lives experience online.

Yes, there will be screen freezes, computer lags, and internet issues that interrupt our services; and no we don't have smoke machines, eye-popping graphics, and studio quality song selections, but what we do have is far more important.

Pleasant Hope has long been a church that specializes in hospitality, compassion, genuine relationships, social justice, courageous vulnerability and deep care. That's who we are. That's what we do. And even on a computer screen that shines through.

So yesterday, leaning into our strengths, we livestreamed our services. I did one at 8AM, another at 10AM, and then provided a little tour of the building around 12:00PM. It was fresh and new every time and I personally spoke to those who were watching as if we were a family having a video call.

One of the highlights of this past Sunday was the impromptu, spontaneous testimonies that members of the church shared at 8AM. Their testimonies really provided the "sermons" for that service.

Rev. Korcoran Smith started it off and then one-by-one others stepped up too. It was so beautiful! Check out Rev. Smith's testimony and then head to Pleasant Hope's YouTube page to see the rest.