Below is our experience since our inception 5 years ago.

You will have web developers and of course the business man of the church telling you that charging for your sermons is an easy revenue stream and can help pay the streaming bill.  Now it could be if you put the money behind it and advertise that you sell your sermons online, which means you have a business mind about it.  Or you can have a Kingdom mind about your streaming sermons; let's see what the bible says about it.  Most importantly, what does God want because it's neither about you nor me its all about Jesus.

Mark 16:15 He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. 

Mark 16:15 is the greatest commission that has been given to every person that preaches the Word of God.  What better way to do this then to stream your sermons.  Another benefit to streaming sermons is you're preaching 24/7.  You can be streamed to any place in the world that has Internet access at anytime of the day.

Matthew 10:8 Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received, freely give.  9 Do not take along any gold or silver or copper in your belts;

I think this scripture really clears things up.  You are to freely give as you have freely received.  To me he is talking about the good news of Jesus Christ.  You did not have to pay to hear it so why should you charge others to stream the word of God. 

We have one client who's church is on a working ranch in Katy Texas.  This pastor has about 30 people attending every weekend.  They have been faithfully streaming their sermons online for over 5 years now.  Each week they have a streaming crowd of over 1500 people from all around the world.  This pastor receives emails weekly thanking them for the streaming sermons they have on their website.  It appears that people in less fortunate countries that do not have bible colleges or Christian book stores down the road are forced to find resources on the Internet.  They listen to the sermons online, take notes and go back to their villages/congregations and preach what they have learned via streaming sermons.

Do you charge a door fee on Sunday morning when people come to church and hear you preach?  How many people do you think would go down the road to another church who does not charge to enter and hear the preacher preach?  So do you think people will go to another website where it's free to stream rather pay for them?

If you have a TV ministry, no doubt you spend a lot of money for air time.  So to help offset the cost, why not sell your sermons through the On-Demand feature of the cable company.  This is the same logic as selling your sermons online.

Would you rather have 1000 free streamers listening to your sermons then to have 10 paying people to stream your sermons?  You can place a donate button on your media player or web page and ask those that would like to sow a seed into the streaming ministry to do so.  We have one client that does this and he faithfully has a lady in the East Coast that sows 120.00 each month into his ministry (Covers his streaming cost and more).  This does not include the others that sow one time seeds.  This pastor average download per stream is little over a 1000.  However; when he holds his conferences they are streamed over 3000 times.  He feels better knowing thousands are being fed the word and not just 10.

We did have one client that charged to stream their sermons.  Less then a year, they had only 11 people signup and pay for the sermons.  Of course they were disappointed and have since abandoned the idea to stream. 

The examples above, we are speaking about On-Demand streaming or Sermons On-Demand (SoD).  If your SoD's are free then you should be consistent and offer Live Streaming free too.  Yes, Live streaming can cost some money, but keep in mind, the more money you have to spend for Live streaming means more people are hearing your messages.  Plus, the cost to stream Live is cheaper then any TV time and radio.  The best part about streaming over the Internet, you can get detailed analytics of your streamers, which you can't with radio and TV.

Should you have any questions or would like to comment on anything, please use the contact form and let us hear from you.