The congregation in T. D. Jakes’s network is one of the biggest to shutter its doors due to COVID-19 constraints.
Online church and virtual campuses have become mainstays during the pandemic, and one Denver-area megachurch is making virtual services its only options—for good.
Last week, The Denver Post reported that The Potter’s House Denver will sell its property in Arapahoe County and continue to worship exclusively online.
The church—led by the daughter and son-in-law of T. D. Jakes—is one of the first and most prominent megachurches to move one of its locations online permanently without operating other in-person campuses in an area.
“COVID-19 forced every church in America to rethink how to best serve their parishioners and the broader community,” pastor Touré Roberts told the Post. “Due to the inability to gather and the economic instability of the pandemic, our church, like many other churches in the nation, experienced declining donations.”
As a result, The Potter’s House Denver decided to abandon its 32-acre property and 137,000-square-foot building, first built in 1989 and the church’s home since 2011. Another pastor at the Denver campus said the church had averaged 10,000 worshipers in live attendance and 300,000 weekly YouTube views.
Roberts cited the building’s condition and need of repairs, saying, “We decided that the best way forward would be to sell the property, continue our online offering that had proven a successful alternative and maintain our hands-on community outreach operations.”
Even with another round of COVID-19 infections disrupting services, experts don’t predict that many others will follow suit.
“Black churches … whether historical African or classically evangelical traditions, emphasize not forsaking assembling ...
from Christianity Today Magazine
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