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The Art of Cyber Church

Joel Hunter is known by many as part of President Obama's inner circle of pastors. Fewer know him as one of America's most innovative church planters.

Butternut Squash Soup is calling, but Joel Hunter stands glued to CNN in his living room in rainy Orlando.

Lunch can wait another minute, because details about President Barack Obama's meeting with a foreign leader might be coming. When the news anchor switches topics, Hunter, satisfied, quickly joins his wife, Becky, at their glass dinner table.

One of Hunter's megachurch staffers gleefully picks on his boss, recalling when Hunter sat next to boxing legend Muhammad Ali at Obama's inauguration: "You should've given him a little nudge on the shoulder, just to say you've been in a fight with Ali." "Oh yeah," Hunter replies sarcastically. "I can see the headlines now: PASTOR PUNCHES PARKINSON'S PATIENT."

Politics and media are strong siren calls, and Hunter doesn't ignore either's pleas. His national profile emerged after he resigned from the Christian Coalition in 2006, saying the organization was unwilling to expand its mission beyond fighting abortion and same-sex marriage. During the 2008 presidential election cycle, Hunter prayed at the Democratic National Convention last summer and with the President on Election Day.

Journalists often looked to Hunter during election season as the de facto voice of moderate evangelicals. But the Orlando-based pastor who helped Northland, A Church Distributed grow from 200 to 12,000 people in 20 years has established himself as one of the country's most innovative church planters.

"Politics is one venue in which the Lord can work, but his plan A has always been the local congregation," Hunter says. "My calling is to be part of that frontline ministry."

A Church Distributed

At first glance, 61-year-old Hunter appears closer to retirement than to the Blackberry addict he is. Wearing a black suit, white shirt, and blue tie with his white hair carefully combed to one side, he names Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice as his favorite book and classical music as his choice of tunes. "I've never really been a hip-hop kind of guy," he says with a laugh as he pretends to twist a baseball cap on sideways.

Most church planters value the vitality of youth, but Hunter sees his age as an asset. When members of his congregation become angry that he prays with a Democratic President or experiments with worship on an iPhone, he shrugs it off.

"It's like being a grandfather when your grandkids are throwing a temper tantrum. You say, 'They're having a bad day,'" he says. "Grandfathers have the benefit of having perspective without having the necessity of control."

Even with his grandfatherly perspective, Hunter quickly led Northland to use the Internet to plant a local church far beyond Orlando. Mark Pinsky, former religion reporter for The Orlando Sentinel, has written about Hunter for several years and describes him as a quintessential early adopter of technology—with a slight difference.

"There's a tendency for some in the church world to fall in love with technology as a magic bullet," Pinsky says. "If Joel didn't have a message and a presentation, all the bells and whistles in the world wouldn't make him what he is today."

Hunter began pastoral ministry at a Methodist church in Indiana after receiving his master of divinity from Christian Theological Seminary in Indianapolis. He and his wife then moved in 1985 to Orlando to lead Northland's 200 congregants.

Like many U.S. churches, Northland saw a surge in attendance after September 11, 2001. Finding the church feeling cramped in a roller-skating rink turned worship area, employees dragged fiber-optic cables across a field to create a second site at a high school down the road. This paved the way for an eventual multi-site approach; Northland now has three other sites in the Orlando area.


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Comments

Displaying 1–3 of 11 comments

Joe

September 21, 2009  1:37am

PS: Anything with the word "MEGA" in it is ANTI GOD. There is only "GREAT," and that word is exclusively reserved for God's greatness. In most circles that's called copyright infringement.

Joe

September 21, 2009  1:34am

Hmmm. The term "cyber church" seems like an oxymoron to me. Gen 2:1-->"Thus the heavens and the earth were COMPLETED in all their vast array. By the seventh day God had FINISHED the work he had been doing.." Completed. Finished. God's work was DONE--absent of cars, skyscrapers, computers, and/or "cyberspace." Just what exactly IS "cyberspace" anyways? I have to wonder if God's intention with natural resources was to make them accessible for man to build towers towards the heavens. Seems like he already took a position on that sort of thing with the tower of Babel...? Apparently we haven't learned that lesson yet. Seems to me "cyberspace" is just another attempt by man to play God by creating his own little universe with machines. If you accept God is the omnipotent and all knowledgeable Creator who created the world and "everything in it" in seven days, man's little "cyber space" almost seems like.. well.. another little feeble little achievement in vain ... doesn't it?

Gracie

September 19, 2009  7:40pm

I live in Tasmania and my church is in Norway, Iowa U.SA., so the only way that I can attend church services is through Paltalk on the internet. Without it, my husband and I would be unable to listen to our pastor teach live. And as for being active in my church and with the body of Christ, we indeed are! We update the prayer list for our weekly online prayer meeting with a group of church family on Paltalk and we also help to moderate the online room where our church is being broadcasted. If one does not live near their church, then listening to their pastor teach live on the internet is the next best thing. There are plenty of ways that one can still serve the body of Christ even if they do not live near their church. My pastor accurately and objectively teaches the Word of God by going back to the original languages, comparing Scripture to Scripture and going into the full historical context of the verse that we are studying. To learn more, go to http://www.prairieviewchristian.org

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