I’m not sure I believe it, but it brings a very interesting perspective on the potential future culture that the church will exist in. Are we prepared to minister to a world who think as a group or tribe more that individually?

I see software development styles doing similar things. The corporate style of software development is to lock small group of coders into a small room and every year or so come out with a new version. The open source style is to let everyone add in a few lines here and there under community review. Release new versions frequently so that everyone can benefit from the small changes over time. Open source software, when managed well, often has compelling advantages, but also comes with its own challenges compared to corporate developed software. However, they both have some incredible potential that the other lacks.

Perhaps the group versus individual think thing is really the same. American Christianity seems to be pulling out of a time of a deep individual approach to soul care to a more group oriented soul care. I might argue some of that has to do with the technology that shapes our thoughts.

Anyway, I applaud church leaders who are considering the impact of technology on ministry as you are. Praise God for that. Our culture is going through some major shifts and the church has some great opportunities to help form our culture if we can step in and help people deal with the issues that arise. For example, with group think we do not get true friendship at the heart level often. People are lonely, how can the church help?