Discover how The Vine, a digital United Methodist faith community, uses social media and online small groups to foster authentic connection, discipleship, and spiritual growth beyond traditional church walls.
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In this episode
Host Ryan Dunn sits down with Erin Beasley and Sean Stanfield to unpack the story behind The Vine United Methodist Church, a digital United Methodist faith community born out of disaffiliation. Whether you’re starting an online ministry, seeking fresh discipleship strategies, or looking to deepen authentic connections in a digital world, this episode is packed with practical wisdom, innovation, and hope for the future of church communications.
CHAPTERS
00:00 – Introduction: Reimagining Church After Disaffiliation
01:45 – The Origin of The Vine: Meeting a Real Need
04:14 – Going Global: Leveraging Social Media for Outreach
06:08 – Creative Content: Short Sermons, Podcasts, & Tough Topics
08:59 – Building Community: Engaging Feedback & Discipleship Pathways
11:53 – Online Communion: Creating Sacred Moments Virtually
16:40 – From Viewers to Disciples: Inviting Deeper Connection
18:38 – Vulnerability Online: Why Digital Spaces Foster Openness
21:06 – Branch Groups & ‘Branch Managers’: Small Group Strategies
23:10 – Digital Church Planting Models: From Branches to Congregations
26:18 – Hot Topics: Church Hurt, Justice, and Connecting the Margins
29:30 – Lessons Learned & Advice for Aspiring Digital Ministers
33:37 – What’s Next for The Vine? Dreams and Missional Expansion
38:06 – Social Media Tactics: Growth on TikTok & Instagram
41:09 – Key Takeaways & Episode Close
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Sponsored by:
Episode transcript
Ryan Dunn [00:00:02]:
Hello and welcome to the mycom Church Communications and Marketing Podcast. My name is Ryan Dunn. In this episode, I spoke with Aaron Beasley and Sean Stanfield and we explored the inspiring story behind the Vine, a digital United Methodist faith community born out of a need to reconnect and serve people affected by church disaffiliation. We're going to dig into how the vine uses social media to build a thriving global community, the innovative ways that they foster discipleship and authentic connection online, and what it takes to create meaningful spiritual experiences beyond the traditional church walls. Whether you're curious about starting online ministry or you simply want to hear some practical insights about nurturing genuine relationships in the digital age, this conversation is packed with wisdom, surprises, and hope for the future of church community. And this conversation is in part made possible by Rooted good Rooted in faith, leading the way in church property innovation. You can Learn more at RootedGood.org that's R-O O T E D G O O D.org Rooted Good.
Ryan Dunn [00:01:27]:
Aaron, Sean, thanks so much for joining us on the MICOM podcast.
Ryan Dunn [00:01:30]:
Let's start at the very beginning.
Ryan Dunn [00:01:32]:
What was the vision driving the Vine? Why did you start?
Sean Stanfield [00:01:39]:
We were told to. No, I'm kidding.
Erin Beasley [00:01:41]:
Yeah, yeah.
Ryan Dunn [00:01:42]:
It was a heavenly mandate, right?
Sean Stanfield [00:01:44]:
Absolutely.
Ryan Dunn [00:01:45]:
Yes, Lord, I will go absolutely.
Sean Stanfield [00:01:47]:
Well, well, you know, so originally the vine was started after disaffiliation. The Cabinet saw kind of a need. What was going to happen with all of these lay people who were wanting to remain United Methodists. And so originally they had chaplains who were going to call and talk to and have conversation with people who experienced disaffiliation. But then they felt like there was a greater need of, like, well, what if we appointed clergy to gather people in groups and also kind of set up online experience for people to remain United Methodist? One of the things we realized is that as more and more churches disaffiliated, there were also certain counties around the TWK that had no United Methodist presence. So how do people remain United Methodist but not a United Methodist church they could connect with? So that's where we came into existence. Is that how we provide an online experience for people to stay United Methodist? And so we would provide discipleship, we would provide sermons and a worship experience, and for people to stay connected and be that way. But also at the same time, too, we have what we call branch groups, small groups, via online, also encouraging them to also gather together wherever they may be, to where they could also remain also in discipleship too.
Sean Stanfield [00:03:27]:
And that's sort of the beginning stages of what we did.
Ryan Dunn [00:03:31]:
Has it changed now in practice? Because you've been doing it for nearly five years.
Ryan Dunn [00:03:36]:
Two years.
Sean Stanfield [00:03:36]:
Okay.
Erin Beasley [00:03:39]:
Well, what we realized, even when we started two years ago, that we had an opportunity to engage more people because we were online. And so while we've been committed to offering support for those who've lost their churches due to disaffiliations, we've also wanted to, just as a United Methodist church, do more in the online world and engaging everyone around the world. And we've seen a little bit of success with that globally, and currently we have members across four states, which we're really excited about.
Ryan Dunn [00:04:12]:
Okay.
Sean Stanfield [00:04:13]:
Yeah.
Ryan Dunn [00:04:14]:
How did people find you then?
Sean Stanfield [00:04:17]:
Social media. Yeah. So our social media presence has truly blown up. Right. And so, you know, it was kind of funny, you know, it's like, well, why don't we focus on the twk? And it's like, well, wait a minute. Next thing you know, we're starting to get emails and connections from different states, different countries. You know, I had an email from somebody from Germany saying, we really like your stuff. We want to start using some of your things in our church.
Sean Stanfield [00:04:43]:
I'm like, wait. And I'm replying back, going, well, how did you hear about. Well, we. We saw you on TikTok, or we saw you on Instagram. Is like, oh, great, well, here's how you sign up. And so now they're using our discipleship guides and using all our platforms there. So it's just amazing. It's like, wow, we weren't expecting that, but now it's out there.
Sean Stanfield [00:05:07]:
And so we're having lots and lots more people. And really, just in two years to have this explosion coming out of Tennessee, all of a sudden, now it's just everywhere.
Erin Beasley [00:05:18]:
And we're trying to utilize as many platforms as possible. So we're on Instagram, we're posting reels, we're doing the tick tock, the YouTube, the shorts, the Facebook Blue sky as well, and threads. So.
Sean Stanfield [00:05:33]:
All right.
Erin Beasley [00:05:34]:
Yeah, yeah.
Sean Stanfield [00:05:35]:
And we do different things, you know, everything from. So we do record sermons, and our sermons are not like the typical Sunday morning. They're very short, typically anywhere 10 to 12 minutes. It's real short, kind of impactful. We also do podcasts, which kind of centralized on whatever that kind of series we may be in. And sometimes we also talk very topical things that may not be able to be discussed in the typical church, you know, because you may be. I can't talk about this kind of topic in my church. But guess what? The vine is kind of Free to talk about these kind of things.
Ryan Dunn [00:06:08]:
Do you have an example of one of those topics?
Sean Stanfield [00:06:10]:
Well, what was one of the recent ones we talked about that we said about church that we said, oh, was it church hurt? Church hurt.
Erin Beasley [00:06:18]:
Religious trauma.
Sean Stanfield [00:06:19]:
Yes. Religious trauma and stuff like that? Yeah, yeah, kind of free. You know, we could talk about that and we could sat around a table and talked about that and it's like it was. It was great. So. And we got a lot of feedback from that one as well, too.
Erin Beasley [00:06:29]:
Yes, we really did.
Sean Stanfield [00:06:30]:
Yeah.
Erin Beasley [00:06:31]:
We've tried to address other issues like justice, and we've had some conversations on race and inclusion as well.
Sean Stanfield [00:06:41]:
Invited other clergy in that had expertise in those kind of topics as well. And they've really was great feedback from those as well too. So.
Erin Beasley [00:06:49]:
Yeah, and we recognize that while we are a team of pastors, we don't know everything about everything. And so we try to spend some time discerning.
Ryan Dunn [00:07:00]:
Can't let that get out, you know, it's true.
Erin Beasley [00:07:03]:
And it's important for us to bring in voices that are more read on certain issues.
Sean Stanfield [00:07:10]:
Yep.
Erin Beasley [00:07:11]:
We may not be.
Ryan Dunn [00:07:12]:
So, yeah, in a lot of churches, we're not intentional about doing this, but we do it by practice, where we set up the Sunday morning worship time as kind of the central part of our community life together. Would you say that these YouTube videos featuring the sermons are kind of the central part of Divine's community life together, or are you moving towards something else?
Erin Beasley [00:07:44]:
I'd say it's a big part of our ministry. What we have found, though, is that most of our people do not actually stream on Sundays. They stream at the most random times during the week. And so we love that it's new to us, but we love that people feel like they can just connect whenever they have the time or just. Just whenever they're in that spiritual head space to engage.
Sean Stanfield [00:08:08]:
Yeah. In fact, we've had some of our people who are in our branches, they'll say the first time they may watch it is actually one of our small group meetings on Tuesday nights or Wednesday morning. That's the first time they may watch it. It's with the collective group together. Or I'll have some that say, you know what? In fact, it was the bishop's assistant. She watches it with her daughter. In fact, at annual conference, they featured her as a part of our video. And she sits down with her daughter during the week.
Sean Stanfield [00:08:36]:
Her daughter is in competitive sports and the only time they can watch it's during the week sometime, whether Wednesday or Thursday night. When she's not practicing and they sit down together in the bed and they watch it together, and her daughter takes notes from the sermon. So you just never know. And to have that kind of platform for them to watch together on.
Ryan Dunn [00:08:59]:
So a big hiccup for a lot of churches engaged in this online ministry is getting a sense of feedback from the people who they're ministering to. Because sometimes it can feel like it's just a broadcast. Right. And you don't know what people are doing with that information once they receive it. How did you build back or build up some kind of feedback system where you're able to get a story like you just told us?
Sean Stanfield [00:09:23]:
Right.
Ryan Dunn [00:09:23]:
How do you know?
Erin Beasley [00:09:24]:
Well, periodically we send out surveys and we have quite a few people subscribe to us, and we'll just ask people to fill out the survey and share any feedback that they may have, as we're still learning how to do online ministry better. And we have folks who are very candid with us about their feelings, which is important for us.
Sean Stanfield [00:09:45]:
There's no doubt.
Erin Beasley [00:09:50]:
We try to ask our people, you know, pretty often how they feel about things.
Sean Stanfield [00:09:55]:
Right. And we're constantly. You know, again, part of online ministry, too, is that you're always constantly engaging in your online platform. So as people watch, you're always making sure that you're commenting and saying, hey, leave us a comment. And when they do comment, you always comment after. If you don't, then you just sort of leave them hanging out there. You can't do that. So if you're going to have an online presence, engage online as well, because that is your audience, that is part of your church.
Sean Stanfield [00:10:21]:
So, Right.
Ryan Dunn [00:10:24]:
In communications, they. They talk about models like a user journey, where you meet a user one place and then you invite them to engage on this next step, and then invite them to this next step. And in the church, an equivalent of that might be like a pathway of discipleship. Right. And it sounds like, I think I'm hearing that there's a pretty deliberate pathway of discipleship through what you all are doing. Can you take us through that pathway?
Sean Stanfield [00:10:56]:
Yeah. So for us, we have, again, our branches or small groups. And so we are constantly inviting people to be a part of one of our branches. Now, right now we have two Tuesday night, on Wednesday morning, it's via Zoom. And then we also do online communion first Sunday of every month. And so we're always constantly inviting. And every time that we do our welcomes, one of the things we comment is if you're not connected to a community we want to invite you, and we always put all our info out there to say, contact us. We'll make sure that you're connected in some capacity to one of these groups.
Sean Stanfield [00:11:32]:
Also, we would encourage you that if you're not in a local branch, reach out to us, and we will help you get connected to someone who may be in your local area, you know, because that's important. If you're not, you know, in some capacity, either online or in person, let us help you connect that way. So.
Ryan Dunn [00:11:53]:
What does online communion look like?
Erin Beasley [00:11:57]:
I think it's different. We both.
Sean Stanfield [00:12:00]:
Yeah, we both do it differently.
Erin Beasley [00:12:03]:
It's a somewhat short gathering. We may meet for about 30 minutes or so, and we open up, sharing how it is with our souls. And. And we like to have a devotion prepared for them as well. And so it's really just a time for them to connect and share with each other, because that communion is so important, and it's something that we do as a community, and it's really important for them to be able to have that opportunity to connect on first Sundays. Most of our members are from traditional brick and mortar churches, and so church has always been one thing for them. And so that's why we try to prioritize, offering them that space to gather together, and then we share the ritual together, and we encourage them to have their elements at home. And we have a funny story.
Erin Beasley [00:12:54]:
When we started out, we just decided to go with the virtual communion because we were told that we could do it during the pandemic. And so we thought, well, since we have permission to do it, then it should be okay now. And we'll just ask. We'll ask for forgiveness later if we need to. And I remember we did share that with the bishop when we talked to him before he retired, and he laughed. He thought it was funny.
Sean Stanfield [00:13:20]:
Yep, exactly. Yeah. And I'll tell you. So I did communion this past Sunday with a group, and there's a gentleman who was on there, and he has signed up for the rest of the year. Every single Sunday, we offer it. And kind of the devotion I was sharing one of the. I left it with a question to ponder after the devotion and says, you know, how has, you know, Christ sort of invited you to transform and change your life, or what kind of community group has sort of changed your life? And he says, one thing that's truly changed my life is his bypass surgery that he had. And that has truly sort of changed how he looks at life these days.
Sean Stanfield [00:14:00]:
And crisis has changed him to look at different things differently. And he's in a retirement home, and so he can't physically make it to any brick and mortar church. And he said, he basically was telling me that, you know, this online community means so much to him. And, you know, I'm sitting there going, that's why we do this. Yeah, that's why we do this.
Erin Beasley [00:14:23]:
It is so beautiful because our community is so diverse. It's intergenerational, it's multiracial. And there's just so much power in hearing them recite the liturgy together, just hearing their voices and seeing their faces. It's a huge blessing for us too.
Sean Stanfield [00:14:44]:
And we have other people who watch our stuff and we've gotten emails from them that are traveling nurses and they watch our stuff no matter where they are traveling and doing their work. And it's like, man, this is exactly why God has called us to do this. Yeah.
Ryan Dunn [00:15:03]:
How many, how many small groups does the vine have?
Sean Stanfield [00:15:08]:
2 online. Physically, I know of at least four. Okay, so, all right. The size, it kind of varies depending. So.
Ryan Dunn [00:15:16]:
All right, so obviously then you all are not facilitating all of those.
Sean Stanfield [00:15:21]:
No, no, no. The two onlines we do. Right.
Ryan Dunn [00:15:23]:
Okay.
Erin Beasley [00:15:24]:
Right.
Sean Stanfield [00:15:24]:
Yeah.
Ryan Dunn [00:15:26]:
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Ryan Dunn [00:16:28]:
Thank you for listening and following along. And let's get back to the conversation with Erin Beasley and Shawn Stanfield about the Vine United Methodist Church.
Ryan Dunn [00:16:40]:
How do you move people from being, I guess, really the online consumer, where they're just watching the sermon videos and the worship videos, to being engaged in those small groups.
Erin Beasley [00:16:55]:
So as we had mentioned before, every Sunday we encourage people to become part of a small group. And once they're in that small group, that's I think, when the discipleship journey begins. But really weekly, the priority is to just encourage people as much as we can to join a Small group and remind them that it's necessary and helpful for them, especially if they're not engaging in their physical context. You know that this is like community. You have to find it in some way. You don't exactly have to find it in person, but at least try to find that online if you can.
Sean Stanfield [00:17:37]:
Right. And we've heard this quote before. We can't do life alone. I mean, we hear that all the time. And it's true. I mean, and that's why we keep encouraging our branch groups. You can't do life alone. And again, it doesn't have to be physically in person.
Sean Stanfield [00:17:52]:
If you want to do life virtually and create, we are willing to set up a zoom group for you if that's what you need. But again, that's still community. And I think a lot of times the more traditional church doesn't look and say, well, is zoom group really a group? Yeah, it is. That's doing life together. Whether it's across the expanse of, you know, social, across the Internet.
Ryan Dunn [00:18:18]:
I've heard from a few different sources, people saying, I can't believe how open people are. When we started conversing online. You both have experience of kind of the in person gathering and now the online gathering.
Sean Stanfield [00:18:37]:
Do you.
Ryan Dunn [00:18:37]:
Do you find that people are really.
Ryan Dunn [00:18:38]:
Vulnerable in that space?
Erin Beasley [00:18:39]:
Yeah, we talked about that actually the other day. You know, I'm an avid tiktoker. I don't. You're on TikTok too, you know, and so we talked about how people are really vulnerable with strangers on the Internet. And we think that's part of the reason why they. People feel open to be vulnerable is because they don't know the folks that they're engaging and they feel like they're going to be less judged and criticized for whatever it is that they're sharing. And so you don't really know who you're talking to exactly. But someone who's not right in front of you and can't use what you're saying against you in any way, you.
Sean Stanfield [00:19:19]:
Know, and we get some stuff. Don't we ever either feel theologically we get stuff or heaven forbid, we have women that preach. Oh gosh, all the time.
Erin Beasley [00:19:33]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ryan Dunn [00:19:35]:
My. That's quick to the delete key on my moderation.
Sean Stanfield [00:19:41]:
What we have realized though is even the negative stuff is just upticks for us when it comes to clicks. So it's fine. We leave it.
Erin Beasley [00:19:46]:
Yeah, yeah. We leave everything.
Sean Stanfield [00:19:48]:
We leave everything.
Erin Beasley [00:19:50]:
There have been people going back and forth about things in the comments, theology, social stuff. And we're just like, hey, you're boosting our engagement. Go ahead, talk away, talk away.
Ryan Dunn [00:20:03]:
I was amazed. I posted something just the other day.
Ryan Dunn [00:20:07]:
And it was a link to an.
Ryan Dunn [00:20:08]:
Article and somebody had clicked through, read the article, obviously with the agenda of looking for something to point out that's in fault within the article. But I was just like, you've just completed the user journey doing exactly what we hope that you would do.
Ryan Dunn [00:20:23]:
And Facebook thinks that we're awesome because.
Ryan Dunn [00:20:26]:
You'Re now coming, coming back and commenting on it.
Sean Stanfield [00:20:28]:
I know I posted something on empathy and oh, gosh. And after that it was, it was like 28 threads later. I was like, okay, there we go.
Ryan Dunn [00:20:42]:
Well, let's talk a little bit about the small groups. Or you're calling them branch groups.
Sean Stanfield [00:20:46]:
Yeah, we're calling them branch.
Ryan Dunn [00:20:47]:
Very cool.
Sean Stanfield [00:20:47]:
All right. So to be honest, it came from the office. Well, we're the vine and so the branch.
Ryan Dunn [00:20:53]:
That's what I thought.
Sean Stanfield [00:20:55]:
And so we even have T shirts for people who lead the groups and they're called branch managers. We actually have designed T shirts. If you lead a branch, we'll give you a T shirt. You're called a branch manager.
Ryan Dunn [00:21:06]:
All right, so then does that make you then assistant to the branch manager? It does. It sounds like you give a lot of autonomy to those, to those branch groups.
Sean Stanfield [00:21:19]:
Yeah, some. But so what we encourage the branches to do. So we want them to watch the video again. 10 to 12 minutes roughly. We write a discipleship guide that basically gives you the scripture verses. And there's about five questions. Pretty self led. It's really easy.
Sean Stanfield [00:21:41]:
Again, anybody could lead the group. You just watch the video. Here's five questions. And they're very open, kind of. Here's what you ask. You walk through it as a group and talk about it. And it closes with prayer. And actually now we've actually kind of redesigned here recently.
Sean Stanfield [00:22:00]:
There's an actionable item at the end of it. So it says, so this week try to do this based on the sermon, to take away from the sermon. And so that's what we're calling for the branches to do. So that's what we do.
Ryan Dunn [00:22:20]:
I'm not a church planter. I know that there are many different models of church planting. One of those that I've seen in action is the idea of, of one church with many branches. But then other times it's, it's a form of planting in itself where the goal is to as you send out kind of a satellite or small group or a branch to have that become its own congregation in the vision of the vine? Are you leaning towards one kind of model where it's one church, many branches, or do you aspire that one of these branches might become a congregation? Especially in, as you were talking about, United Methodist desert, so to speak, where there isn't.
Sean Stanfield [00:23:10]:
Go ahead.
Erin Beasley [00:23:10]:
Well, we've danced around chartering, but right now we're just focused on our current identity as a digital church with physical expressions.
Sean Stanfield [00:23:21]:
Yeah, Right now. And we do now, underneath our umbrella, we do have Reverend Monica Maudi, who is in Cumberland county. And she. Now that's what she has done now she has Wellspring, which is basically small home churches all around Cumberland county area. And that is definitely her intention, is little small home churches. So that's kind of her. And it sort of sits underneath our umbrella. Some.
Ryan Dunn [00:23:50]:
You were launched out of this idea of providing a new connection for people who may have been displaced through disaffiliation. But it sounds like you've also started to build some connections with people who maybe had no church experience. Is that.
Sean Stanfield [00:24:08]:
Yes.
Ryan Dunn [00:24:09]:
Okay.
Sean Stanfield [00:24:09]:
Yeah. Yeah. I think that's probably a lot bigger, a lot more of what we've gravitated towards. I think.
Erin Beasley [00:24:15]:
Absolutely. Online, we've encountered a lot of people who identify as Christian, but would say they haven't really been able to find a church where they feel at home, essentially. And there's so many different reasons why they feel that way. It could be for sexuality reasons. We have someone who's a PK who had a little bit of trauma and some things that happened, and just others who are part of other denominations who've been kind of deconstructing some toxic theology. And so it's been beautiful to see them come together and finally have a space where they feel safe and welcome.
Sean Stanfield [00:25:02]:
Yeah. I just read an article about the mixed ecology of church, and one of the things they talk about in there is spirituality versus affiliation. And really what we're noticing is that there's a huge increase for people who are spiritual versus affiliating with denomination and the institution itself. And I think that's probably a lot more. What we're gravitating towards is people who are spiritual. And we're seeing a lot of that. And instead of gravitating towards a physical, actual building, those kind of things, and they want to have these kind of discussions and hear what we're saying. And we're very intentional, like when we record and we've had these kind of discussions early on about language, like when we say things online.
Sean Stanfield [00:25:52]:
And we've had to readdress and readdress. Like, if you're gonna say certain theological words, like, okay, if you're gonna say it, you need to define it, because our audience may not know what that word means. And you need to follow it up with, okay, here's what this word means, because you don't know who's listening. And it's going out there now we know globally. So.
Ryan Dunn [00:26:18]:
Have there been certain topics that you've introduced that you found really tend to connect with or invite participation from people who are maybe at the margins of the community of faith?
Erin Beasley [00:26:34]:
When we did the series on Church Hurt, we.
Sean Stanfield [00:26:38]:
It was big. Yeah, that was the biggest one.
Erin Beasley [00:26:40]:
We experienced a lot of engagement with that. And the title of that series was We're Sorry. And so it was an apology on behalf of United Methodist, but also on behalf of mainline churches, because there's so many people in pain. And I think it's healing to hear a group of pastors apologize.
Sean Stanfield [00:27:06]:
Right.
Erin Beasley [00:27:06]:
You know.
Sean Stanfield [00:27:07]:
Yeah, I agree.
Erin Beasley [00:27:10]:
Are there other topics that you can think of outside of that? We've done so much.
Sean Stanfield [00:27:16]:
I know, I know. We look at all the series. I mean. I mean, we've done topical things and we've done a couple books and. But I think that was probably the biggest one. And we got a lot of feedback, negative and positive from that one. So the racial justice one was good?
Erin Beasley [00:27:35]:
Oh, yeah, Was a good one.
Sean Stanfield [00:27:40]:
But.
Erin Beasley [00:27:42]:
I just think anything that's relevant to our current circumstances right now in society. So I think that's why the religious trauma was really important to people. But if we're talking about, you know, economic challenges that people are facing, that seems to resonate with a lot of folks.
Sean Stanfield [00:28:04]:
Right. And the one we're recording now is called basically this is Our Story. So actually, all of us are sharing our call stories. Okay. Yeah. So I recorded today. And just basically, so we want to share our story, but the intent is, as we share our story, we hope it sparks in other people. What about your story? How is God calling you? You know, how God is that divine spark in you? What is God calling you to do in your life? So.
Sean Stanfield [00:28:34]:
So we hope that inspires people. And then we're going to look at gifts, the gifts of the spirit and how God has gifted us in ministry. And so we're going to walk through those and we're going to have some conversations about some of the tougher gifts, those kind of things.
Erin Beasley [00:28:48]:
Yes, yes. Someone in our community said they didn't feel like anyone really taught them the spiritual Gifts. Well, and so we're going to tackle it.
Sean Stanfield [00:28:59]:
We're going to talk about those, see where we land.
Erin Beasley [00:29:02]:
But we also want to add a component of launching. And so we're not just explaining what the gifts are. We're encouraging our community to discern for themselves what their spiritual gifts are and discern how they can share those gifts with their communities.
Sean Stanfield [00:29:18]:
Right. And we actually have a link on our page now, I think from Discipleship Ministries. You can actually take the spiritual gift survey. So it's already on there. So you can take that. So it's gonna be good.
Ryan Dunn [00:29:30]:
Well, you're two years into this project now. If. If you were to go back to day one, knowing what you know now, what might be something that you would do differently? From the start, I asked this for the. For those who are in the listening audience who are thinking, I love this kind of setup and I love the idea of maybe connecting with people beyond the church through this kind of model. But I'm not quite sure of the best practices. So what advice would you want to offer somebody there?
Erin Beasley [00:30:11]:
I think for me, starting out, I was trying to do everything perfectly with my delivery, just with everything. And after two years, I realized I have not been successful at being perfect at this. You know, like, you just can't be with this kind of work. And so I wish I would have just given myself more of a break and just go with the flow and let the spirit lead me a little more instead of trying to be so, like cookie cutter with everything. So I'm a perfectionist. Three on the enneagram. So that's something that I tend to struggle with in life.
Ryan Dunn [00:30:56]:
So you do not need to be editing the videos then?
Erin Beasley [00:30:59]:
No. Oh my gosh, I have to give that away. Delegate that for sure. That is. No. I could do it, but I shouldn't, for my sanity.
Sean Stanfield [00:31:08]:
I mean, enneagram too. I'm the helper. So, you know, I think for me, I think from the get go, I wish we would have. We did not get started with the creation of branch groups initially. From the get go. And again, it was sort of very cantankerous, you know, especially with districts and getting us names and about who was disaffiliated and that kind of stuff. I wish from the get go we would have had a more solid plan about creating groups. Was it going to be online? Was it going to be physical? And I think if we had had like the first six months, like this is what we're going to do, then we wouldn't be kind of Catching up now.
Sean Stanfield [00:31:56]:
And we would have had probably a ton more group going. Now it's like, okay, now it's like, all right, let's. How can we gather these people in this area? How can we gather these people in this area? Let's gather these people. You know, like, looking at Memphis and where Christ disaffiliated, there's a ton of people out of Christ United Methodist Church. How can we somehow, if they're not going to another United Methodist Church, how can we gather these people? Or like, in Tullahoma, I went and visited that group in person, you know, and it's. We almost. We kind of lost traction with that group. And they've all gone to a Presbyterian church, and it's like, you know, how can we.
Sean Stanfield [00:32:36]:
There's some misses that we wish we would have done differently.
Erin Beasley [00:32:41]:
And some of that was beyond our control, too, I think. Yeah, we didn't have contact information for a lot of people. Yeah, yeah.
Sean Stanfield [00:32:51]:
We got a list of just names. It's like, I can't call, I can't email. Okay. Yeah.
Ryan Dunn [00:32:57]:
How do you ask people for that?
Sean Stanfield [00:32:59]:
Yeah. So on our website. Yeah. And so if someone submits, you know, that on the website, we immediately get, you know, email. At least an email. Yeah, we get that immediately. So.
Erin Beasley [00:33:11]:
Well, we ask them for everything, really. Their addresses, their birthdays and all that. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Sean Stanfield [00:33:18]:
So, but the basic we get is at least an email. And when you didn't email, you immediately start getting re news, period. And it has everything you want. Yeah, you immediately get the worship guide, you immediately get all the videos, you get, immediately start getting all the discipleship guides, you start getting all that stuff already.
Ryan Dunn [00:33:37]:
So one of the buzz questions when it comes to digital expressions of ministry is how do you. How do you know when somebody is a part of the community? Like, what constitutes membership? Do you. Do you have an idea of what that looks like in the vine? Like, once somebody gives you their contact information, are they now a member?
Sean Stanfield [00:34:00]:
Well, see, you know, with. Again, we can look on the WIX system and we can actually see who is opening what and reading stuff, who is watching videos, who is. We can tell by person, you know, how engaged they are. Okay. And so you can actually see how much someone does fully. If someone's not opening their emails at all, we go. And that's someone you reach out to. Hey, just want to check in with you.
Sean Stanfield [00:34:26]:
How's things going? You know, do you like the content? Is there anything we could do differently? And if you don't get a reply, then you go, okay, maybe they're not. I'm fully engaged.
Erin Beasley [00:34:36]:
And we do have a form for membership as well. And so a lot of people will fill that out and we'll respond to them immediately. And how we receive people into membership, we have Zooms for that. And we encourage people to attend those, even if they're curious about membership. So they could come to a membership Zoom and they don't have to join. They could just hear more about the vine and connect with some of our members who we asked to be a part of that as well. And we'll recite the ritual, the membership ritual together, which is really beautiful too. We did that last November.
Erin Beasley [00:35:12]:
Yeah, it went really well.
Ryan Dunn [00:35:13]:
So online. That was online.
Erin Beasley [00:35:15]:
Online on Zoom.
Sean Stanfield [00:35:16]:
It's all online.
Ryan Dunn [00:35:16]:
Okay.
Sean Stanfield [00:35:19]:
All right. Yeah.
Ryan Dunn [00:35:20]:
What are you dreaming of doing next with the Vine?
Sean Stanfield [00:35:28]:
I think it's like, hold on.
Erin Beasley [00:35:34]:
I guess living more into our goal of connecting people, because we're still figuring this out. We're practically babies with this ministry. And so as I mentioned earlier, most of our community have been raised in brick and mortar mainline churches. And as we're learning how to do online ministry, they're learning how to be a part of an online ministry. And so a goal for us is to help them become more self directed with their faith journeys. And, you know, they're so used to pastors kind of leading the way with everything with the spiritual formation, with the mission projects. And we want to encourage people to step out of their comfort zones more and take the lead with a mission project in their community and invite their friends and their families and maybe even their colleagues to that and find that time when they can connect spiritually as well and watch the experience that we share and use our worship guides and things like that. So because it's new to all of us, I think we still have so much more room to grow in that area of us just building on this online community and becoming more self directed with the faith walk.
Sean Stanfield [00:36:55]:
Right. Yeah. You know, I think for me also, yeah, again, more branches, whether it's online or the physical in persons, where we're collecting groups in different areas. I think from the missional aspect, besides, you know, we send out stuff like for umcore, you know, for them to do things at home, that kind of stuff. I would like to see more missional engagement, you know, like a project for all the vine people to do. Like, what I would like to see is like, all right, so let's come up with a missional project that the vine could do people even in their homes or in their branch groups. And while they do it, hey, once, say, say they're packing hygiene kits. Right.
Sean Stanfield [00:37:42]:
And they're doing it at home. Alright, now take a picture of it. Now post it online on the vine social media page. And as a whole community, these 1100 people, hey, we made 10 hygiene kits at home and had that be blasted out there. The vine community did hygiene kits. I would love to see something like that. That would be just the coolest thing ever.
Ryan Dunn [00:38:06]:
And for those who haven't come across the vine yet, where are they going to find you most easily?
Sean Stanfield [00:38:13]:
I would say our website. But social media really is. It really is. Yeah. Social media is our biggest thing.
Erin Beasley [00:38:19]:
Instagram and Tick Tock.
Sean Stanfield [00:38:20]:
Instagram. Tick Tock. Yeah, that, that has been our biggest numbers. Huge. Yeah.
Ryan Dunn [00:38:27]:
So I was planning on ramping up.
Ryan Dunn [00:38:30]:
But this opens up a whole new camera.
Ryan Dunn [00:38:33]:
Because one of the, one of the aspects of TikTok that I've noticed is that personalized accounts tend to get a lot more interaction and eyeballs than what I would call like an institutionally branded account like the vine might be. Are you finding pretty good engagement through the vine, the institutionally branded accountant?
Sean Stanfield [00:38:59]:
Yeah, because. And it's mainly because of the reels we put out there. Yeah, because it's all short stuff. It's all. Yeah. And Chris is very intentional, our tech guy. He's, he's very intentional what he puts out there. And it's a very systematic algorithm kind of thing of how many times he posts, you know, per week, per day kind of thing.
Sean Stanfield [00:39:20]:
And especially as he looks at like me recording today, he'll look at after it goes live that Sunday, he'll look at. All right, so what certain pieces of what I'm saying that week need to be broadcast again. Whatever that clip is, you know, Monday, Wednesday, Friday or Tuesday, Thursday needs to be heard again. Very short and it, it goes out and it, it just, I mean we're talking hundreds of percent uptick is what it's gone up for us as a community.
Erin Beasley [00:39:56]:
We just try to find something relevant to say that we think would resonate with people.
Sean Stanfield [00:40:01]:
Right. So it may be good or bad. That's the thing. And it's still an uptick. Good or bad.
Erin Beasley [00:40:06]:
Yeah, we're willing to say hard things for sure.
Ryan Dunn [00:40:12]:
Well, thank you both for joining us and for sharing the time and the experience.
Sean Stanfield [00:40:16]:
Yeah, thanks.
Erin Beasley [00:40:17]:
It's an honor.
Ryan Dunn [00:40:19]:
Thanks listener, for taking this journey with us. I'll have a few, a few key takeaways after this word from rooted. Good. What if you could use your church buildings and land to further your mission and ministry in your neighborhood and to generate new forms of income. Rooted Goods Good Futures Accelerator can help Rooted Good Rooted in faith leading the way in church property innovation. You can Learn more at Rooted Good.org that's R O O T E D G O O D.org Rooted Good.org A few key Takeaways first, embrace digital platforms. The vine. Strategic use of TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, and even blue sky has allowed them to connect with people all over the world well beyond their original geographic scope.
Ryan Dunn [00:41:09]:
Secondly, prioritize community and engagement and have a plan behind it. So they've learned that real discipleship begins when viewers become participants in branch groups or small groups, and they intentionally nudge their audience towards deeper connections, whether online or in person. Thirdly, vulnerability and relevant content matters. By courageously addressing topics like church hurt, religious trauma, race, and inclusion, the vine has seen higher engagement and stronger connections, especially amongst those who are at the margins or have previously disconnected from church. Get connected with the Vine Find some episode notes and other [email protected] mycompodcast if you haven't already, hit the subscribe button on your podcast listening platform or on YouTube. If you're ready to take the next step, then leave a comment, rating or review. That helps us know what's valuable for you in a podcast like this, and it helps us reach out to new people. Mycom is a production of United Methodist Communications.
Ryan Dunn [00:42:16]:
Thanks to Renee McNeil, Patty Dellabovi, AJ Thurman, and Andrew Schleicher for production and marketing support. My name is Ryan Dunn. Mycom comes out near the end of each month, so I'll be back with more support for your church communications and marketing in a few weeks. Until then, peace.
Sean Stanfield [00:42:38]:
Sat.