EXPERIENCES AND PERCEPTION TOWARDS THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA FOR CHURCH ACTIVITIES AMONG CHARISMATIC CHURCHES IN GHANA
Abstract
Purpose of the study: The study sought to examine the experiences and perception towards the use of social media for church activities by the Evangelistic Ministry, North Legon and the Maker’s House Chapel International, Kwabenya in Ghana. The adoption of social media by churches is increasing as the world is preparing towards the Fourth Industrial Revolution and currently battling with the novel COVID-19 pandemic.
Research Methodology: The mixed-method approach which involves both qualitative and quantitative techniques was deployed to undertake the research expedition. The Charismatic Evangelistic Ministry, North Legon, and The Makers House Chapel International were purposely selected as a target population for the study. A questionnaire was used to collect quantitative data from a sample size of 152 respondents. Also, 2 head pastors and their deputies, as well as 2 IT personnel, were interviewed.
Findings: The study found that church leaders and church members, in general, possessed at least some basic computer skills to enable them to access and navigate social media platforms adopted by the churches. The instrumental contribution of social media to the churches was evident as the study revealed the positively perceived usefulness of the social media platforms. This can also be attributed to the fact that the basic skills directly influence the perceived ease of use that the church members possess.
Conclusions: The study concluded that is very cardinal for church members to receive constant training on the use of social media platforms since updates on social media is on the rise. This move will help the church to keep pace with updates on social media use.
Recommendations: The church should provide adequate continuous training for leaders since the functional features of the social media platforms functional features keep changing. Much emphasis should be put on the interface and functional features of the churches' social media platforms that church leaders and members will require to access church programmes. There should be a provision of strong internet connectivity. Internet is the gateway to access social media platforms. Church leaders should be provided with strong and reliable internet access for them to assist church members and keep monitoring the churches' activities on social media platforms. There should be continuous education on policies regarding the use of social media platforms, enforcing members to be abided by them and emphasizing its importance to the church.
Keywords: Social Media, Platforms, Churches, System, Leaders, Gospel, Charismatic
References
Adelaku, A. (2020). No god is punishing us with Covid-19. Punch Newspaper. Retrieved April 19, 2020, from HTTP:// punchng.com/no-god-is-punishing-us-with-covid-19/
Aduloju, S. A., Odugbesan, A. O., & Oke, S. A. (2009). The effects of advertising media on sales of insurance products: a developing-country case. The Journal of Risk Finance, 10(3), 210-227.
Ahenkorah-Marfo, M. (2015). Knowledge and use of social media by reference and user services librarians in public and private universities in Ghana. (Unpublished MPhil Thesis, University of Ghana, Legon).
Ahenkorah-Marfo (2017). Information on the Go: Perspective of academic librarians on use of social media in reference services. (Unpublished MPhil Thesis, University of Ghana, Legon)
Akanbi, P. A., & Adeyeye, T. C. (2011). The Association between Advertising and Sales Volume: A Case Study of Nigerian Bottling Company Plc. Journal of Emerging Trends in Economics and Management Sciences (JETEMS), 2(2), 117-123.
Asamoah-Gyadu, J. K. (2007). Get on the Internet!’ says the Lord: Religion, cyberspace and Christianity in contemporary Africa. Studies in World Christianity, 13(3), 225-242
Asare-Kusi, E. K. (2007). The Holistic Mission of the church in Northern Ghana. (Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, Asbury Theological Seminary)
Asur, S., & Huberman, B. A. (2010). Predicting the Future with Social Media. Web Intelligence and Intelligent Agent Technology, IEEE/WIC/ACM International Conference on, 1, 492–499.
Ayivor, D. A. (2015). Social Media as an Advertising Platform: A Case of Guinness Ghana Breweries Ltd. (Unpublished M.Phil Thesis, University of Ghana, Legon).
Badmos, K. (2014). Effect of social media on the church. Pastor ‘World Mission Evangelical Ministry, Ilesa Nigeria Paper presented at the 2014 Annual Conference of Theological Friends and Fellows, organized by the Redeemed Christian Bible College Lagos, Nigeria.
Bolu (2012). The church in the contemporary world: Information and communication technology in church communication for growth: A case study Christian. Journal of Media and Communication Studies, 4(4), 80-94.
Bonsu, S. K., & Belk, R. W. (2010). Marketing a new African God: Pentecostalism and material salvation in Ghana. International Journal of Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Marketing, 15(4), 305-323.
Brooks, S L. (2013). Social media usage: Examination of influencers and effects. (Unpublished Dissertation, College of Business, Washington State University)
Burnett, A. (2013). 8 Instagram marketing tips: Social Media Today. Retrieved from http://socialmediatoday.com/alexandraburnett/1680116/8-instagram-marketing-tips
Cheong, P. H. (2014). Tweet the message? Religious authority and social media innovation. Journal of Religion, Media & Digital Culture, 3(3), 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1163/21659214-90000059
Cheong, P. H. (2017). The vitality of new media and religion: Communicative perspectives, practices, and changing authority in the spiritual organization. New Media & Society, 19, 25–33. https://doi.org/10.1177/ 1461444816649913
Cheong, P. H., Fisher-Nielson, P., Gelfgren, S., & Ess, C. (2012). Digital religion, social media, communication technology acceptance. European Journal of Information Systems, 16, 54–65.
Crawford, T. (2017). Social media guide for churches. https://www.tnumc.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/SocialMediaGuideforChurches.pdf
Davis, F. D., (1989). A Technology Acceptance Model for Empirically Testing New End-User Information Systems: Theory and6 Results, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Edosomwan, S (2019). The History of Social Media and its Impact on Business. The Journal of Applied Management and Entrepreneurship, 16 (3).
Joshi, A., & Hanssens, D. M. (2010). The Direct and Indirect Effects of Advertising Spending on Firm Value. Journal of Marketing, 74, 20-33.
Lacy, K. (2021) How retweeting helps your marketing venture on twitter. For Dummies. from http://www.dummies.com/how-
Lane, M. & Coleman, P. (2017). Technology ease of use through social networking media. Retrieved from https://www.researchghete.net/publication/266352247
Lee, M., Cheung, C. and Chen, Z. (2007). Understanding user acceptance of multimedia messaging services: an empirical study. Retrieved from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/asi.20670
Lewis, B. (2016). How social media is changing the church. Retrieved from https://theconversation.com/how-social-media-is-changing-the-church-57405
Manning, J. (2014.) Social media, definition and classes of. In K. Harvey (Ed.), Encyclopedia of social media and politics (pp. 1158-1162). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Mateus, E. (2017). The Media and The Church: How the use of media has impacted the church. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/324843909_The_Media_
McKinney, D. (2014). Social Media in the Church: The Effectiveness of Social Media in the Church. Arkansas: ProQuest Dissertation Publishing.
McKinney, D. R. (2014). Social Media in the Church. (Unpublished Master of Arts Thesis, Department of Journalism, University of Arkansas).
Narayanan, A. (2012). A Critical Look at Decentralized Personal Data Architectures. Retrieved from http://arxiv.org/abs/1202.4503.
New Heights Student Ministry. (2013). Facebook. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/nhstumin
Obi-Ani, N. A., Anikwenze, C & Isiani, M. C (2020). Social media and the Covid-19 pandemic: Observations from Nigeria. Cogent Arts & Humanities, 7:1. DOI: 10.1080/23311983.2020.1799483
Okyere, N. Y. D., Agyapong, G. K. Q., & Nyarku, K. M. (2011). The Effect of Marketing Communications on the Sales Performance of Ghana Telecom (Vodafone, Ghana) International Journal of Marketing Studies, 3(4), 201.
Sago, D. (2013). Factors influencing social media adoption and frequency of use: an examination of Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+, International Journal of Business and Commerce, 3(1), 1–14.
Shereen, M. A., Khan, S., Kazmi, A., Bashir, N., & Siddique, R. (2020). COVID-19 infection: Origin, transmission, and characteristics of human coronaviruses. Journal of Advanced Research, 24, 91–98. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jare.2020.03.005
Strader, T., Ramaswami, S., & Houle, P. (2007). Perceived network externalities and communication technology acceptance. European Journal of Information Systems,16, 54–65.
University Communication and Marketing, (2020). Introduction to Social Media. https://www.usf.edu/ucm/marketing/intro-social-media.aspx
Valkenburg, P. M., Peter, J., & Schouten, A. P. (2006). Friend Networking Sites and Their Relationship to Adolescents’ Well-Being and Social Self-Esteem. CyberPsychology & Behavior, 9(5), 584–590.
Van Slyke, C., Ilie, V., & Stafford, T. (2007). Perceived Critical Mass and the Adoption of a Communication Technology. European Journal of Information Systems 16, 270- 283.
Vosko, R. (2011). Liturgical Technology, Social Media, and the Green Church’, Liturgical Ministry (Spring). Retrieved from https://www.sundaymag.tv/the-importance-of-a-social-media-policy/
White, P., & Tella, F., & Ampofo, M. D. (2016). A Missional study of the use of social media (Facebook) by some Ghanaian Pentecostal pastors. Retrieved April 20, 2019, from http://www.scielo.org.za/pdf/koers/v81n2/01.pdf.
WHO (2020). Practical considerations and recommendations for religious leaders and faith-based communities in the context of COVID-19. https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/practical-considerations-and-recommendations-
Wise, J. (2014). Social Media and Christian Ministry: Reaching the World for the Kingdom of God. http://www.chris
