This past Sunday our church used the sermon time to answer questions from the congregation. We received the questions via text messaging from attendees cell  phones. In two services we got over 100 questions. Three pastors were on stage to answer questions plus one who moderated it and got the messages off his laptop.

This was the second time we did it and our people seem to really like it. Here’s what we learned.

1. probably best to stay away from the really ‘hot-button’ topics like homosexuality-just not enough time to address those issues

2. make answers short and sweet, 1-2 minutes

3. practice beforehand with those who will be answering (if it’s more than one pastor, which I recommend). Having in mind some possible questions helps.

4. set up the rules beforehand about adding on to an answer. I (the senior pastor) added too many comments after the other guys answered. It would have been better if they had also added to mine.

5. include some heart felt answers. One great question was, “what is your greatest regret in life?”

6. one pastor on the floor received the text messages through his computer, screened out stupid questions and then sent the remaining to the pastor’s laptop on stage. He sent the moderator too many questions. Would have been better for him to send only a half dozen at a time.