So I’ve been searching for ways to get the Millennials (Gen Y) more engaged during Sunday Services. The struggle here for me is two fold. One, does making a service “more engaging” take away from the preaching of God’s Word? Two, there are a gazzilion ways to make it “more engaging” so do we just keep trying some until one works?

Here are some interactive service ideas (some good, some awful):

• allow people to text message in questions – some have done this fairly successfully, but can it work with the Millennials without destroying their attention span?
• use text messaging to see where people are on the confusion scale – they can text in ’1′ for not confused and ’2′ for confused and you can graph the responses to see it real-time during service
• leave time for a Q&A session after the message – I’m doing this now and people are actually asking questions, and very good questions at that. Of course this could put the Pastor in an interesting position, but a good answer will always be “I don’t know and I will find out for you.”
• break the usual environment; the movie theater format – this may not be possible logistically for some, but I’m currently sitting in a circle rather than the stage/audience format. Think outside the box and create something for your environment

Anyone have any more ideas or thoughts?