Software

Live Via Skype – Part 1

A great thing Churches across the world do is support missionaries overseas. One way of supporting missionaries is by keeping congregations informed so they can pray effectively, and I enjoy listening to updates and praying together as a church for the those we’re supporting.

Mission is central to the life of the Christian Church, and so supporting mission and missionaries should be a priority. Thankfully this is something technology is making easier.

One of the many ways our church shows support is by occasionally interviewing our overseas missionaries, live, during the service using Skype.

Talking with a missionary is the best way to hear how they’re going. A live interview means the whole church congregation gets to be apart of that too. This helps the congregation connect with those they are supporting overseas and it can encourage the missionary by showing them that there is a church full of people praying for them back at home. It also gives an opportunity to pray for the missionary in church while they’re there.

Interviews like this have been possible in church services for years using the plain old telephone service. But VoIP services, such as Skype, make it far better than a regular telephone call.

For starters Skype is better because it’s either free, or at least dirt cheap. It’s also simpler to connect to the sound equipment and usually doesn’t require any specialised hardware – just plug the computer into the sound system. The audio quality can often be far better than a normal phone call too, and it makes live video a possibility.

So to help you get started doing this in your own church services I’m going to show you how to conduct a live Skype interview in another 3 parts over the next couple of weeks.

These will be broken into:

1. The Requirements: what you’ll need to be able to get it up and running.
2. The Setup: how to hook Skype up to your sound system.
3. Show Time: what to do during the service and the interview to fit the interview in seamlessly.

© 2009 Check 1-2.