By Ben Wilson
“Weekly inspiration and spiritual nourishment, through personal stories and inquiry about life’s biggest questions, for seekers, believers and curious hearts.”
Six Ways From Sunday is the online faith community that came about as an offshoot from a collaboration between Bashaw United Church and Ponoka United Church. These two rural Alberta congregations decided to share their resources, strengths and ministry personnel in some innovative ways!
When the two churches launched their partnership, Rising Spirit Ministry, they began sharing Bashaw United Church’s full-time minister, Rev. Robin King. Live-streaming technology is used to broadcast Sunday morning worship services back and forth between the two church buildings which are roughly 50km apart. Robin alternates Sundays, leading the service in Ponoka one week and Bashaw the next, while the opposite congregation is led by a layperson worship leader and streams the Learning Together and Robin’s Message portions of the service on the big screen.
With all of this live streaming video content archived on their website, the Rising Spirit Ministry team decided to add a third dimension to the ministry collaboration, and the Six Ways From Sunday online community faith was formed.
Six Ways From Sunday uses weekly blog posts, sermon videos, social media posts and a weekly podcast to reach seekers, believers and “curious hearts” and build community online. The podcast is now in its second season, and a total of 66 episodes have now been broadcast through iTunes and the risingspiritministry.com website. The group also uses Facebook and Instagram to promote the podcast and engage with listeners.
Topics of the podcast’s episodes range from exploring biblical stories and themes to conversations with guests ranging from a yoga instructor to a grief and loss specialist, a naturopathic doctor, a 10-year-old farmer, a retired minister and a business executive who summited Mt. Everest. The format of the podcast is a casual conversation over a cup of coffee that usually ranges from 40-60mins in length.
A direct link to the podcast page can be found on the Rising Spirit Ministry website: http://risingspiritministry.com/category/podcasts/
The Instagram handle is “sixwaysfs” which you can find at https://www.instagram.com/sixwaysfs/ and our Facebook Page
Interested in more information on Six Ways from Sunday? Contact Ben