by Andrew Lim with Marcus Lim

Contemporary church services are increasingly using projectors to display songs, Scripture and announcements on a screen. The presentation can take many forms, ranging from simple PowerPoint slides to rich multimedia presentations.

Over the years, worship software has emerged. These computer software packages are dedicated solely to the task of song and Scripture projection during worship services. Due to the large range of worship software available " both commercial and free " choosing the right software can be daunting especially if cost is an issue. One of our aims in this article is to provide the reader with the necessary information to be able to make an informed decision.

We focused on four software packages " two commercial and two free " and compared them on the basis of cost, features, presentation and ease of use.

The two commercial programs, EasyWorship and MediaShout, are the most popular of their kind. A survey conducted by churchmedia.net last year saw EasyWorship come out on top as the most widely adopted worship software by churches in the US. MediaShout was in second place.

The two freeware alternatives we chose " EasiSlides and OpenSong " are not as high profile, but are nonetheless viable alternatives to their commercial counterparts. This article seeks to provide an objective treatment of these four software packages, though the authors do admit a fondness for the free alternatives because they mirror the free gift of the gospel, and are something that Jesus encouraged his disciples to do " "Freely you have received, freely give." (OK, that was tongue-in-cheek, no need to correct our exegesis!)

PowerPoint v worship software

One might ask - isn't PowerPoint sufficient for most needs? What advantages does worship software provide over a traditional slideshow program like PowerPoint? It is true that PowerPoint can have a place in helping to illustrate sermons. However, the design of PowerPoint is geared towards a linear, unchanging presentation. Understanding the need for a dedicated worship software package requires a change in mindset from seeing a worship service as a linear A-Z presentation, to one where things are dynamic and can potentially change on the fly.

Consider the scenario where a guest speaker is scheduled to speak during this Sunday's service but hasn't given us an outline for his talk; so we don't know what Scripture he's going to use. As a result, we have to be ready to project Scripture as the church service unfolds. This is almost impossible to do with PowerPoint - by the time I copy and paste the verse he is reading, it would be time to switch slides. The operator can never keep up.

What if the music team suddenly decides to switch to a different song from the one originally intended? Or they would like to change the order of the song verses? The downside of PowerPoint is that it is harder to shift songs or the order of slides during the service. This is where worship software comes to the rescue!

With these programs, there is a library of songs, and you can pick a song mid-service, in the event of a change. For the case of the guest speaker, worship software will allow us to display all Scripture as the speaker goes through the sermon, with zero preparation on the operator's part.

These examples underscore the area where PowerPoint falls short, namely its lack of flexibility for on-the-fly display of songs and Bible verses. Worship software, by contrast, allows ad hoc pulling up of songs and Bible verses. With worship software, the main feature is that each of these songs and Scripture verses is stored separately in a searchable database and only displayed when needed. As a result, it becomes unnecessary to keep having to create PowerPoint song and Bible verse slides every single week, and so prep and set-up become much faster and involve less effort than the PowerPoint approach, because the connection between the library and the projection software makes it faster to set up an order of service.

Significantly, all worship software allows a dual-screen capability. This gives the projectionist better control of the projected image that the congregation actually sees.

Another time-saving feature available in worship software is the automatic importing of songs directly from CCLI (Christian Copyright Licensing International). A yearly subscription to the basic CCLI SongSelect lyric service for A$59 will allow you to download and import the lyrics for a song in a few keystrokes and you never have to type in the lyrics manually " just search for the song you need, import it into the program and you're done!

Last but not least is the aesthetics issue. Because of its ubiquity, all PowerPoint presentations look pretty much the same without extensive tweaking of templates. Most worship software offers attractive background templates that go above and beyond those provided by PowerPoint out of the box. A major selling point with the top commercial software is the ability to have moving backgrounds behind projected song lyrics. Done well, these can enhance the worship service dramatically. Then again, some might find that such use of visuals detracts from the words, so it's really about how the church views the use of media.

The use of worship software shouldn't preclude the use of PowerPoint as they both have their place. A typical church service set-up would be to have PowerPoint for sermons and announcements, and the worship software for song and Bible verse projection. Many of the packages allow PowerPoint presentation to be loaded into the worship software itself, so the entire order of service can be controlled from within the same program. This is a nice feature because it means that the projectionist does not have to constantly switch between the song projection software and PowerPoint.

Other packages take it one step further, to allow video integration, so videos can be played directly from the program too, giving an "all-in-one' solution. These are certainly convenient features to have, but not strictly necessary.

The road test

For close to a year, at Asian Bible Church we relied solely on PowerPoint for our weekly service. Recently we wanted to explore how to become more dynamic, how to present Scripture during a sermon when quoted, or change song lyrics if the service moved in a different direction. Basically we found that PowerPoint was adequate as long as the service stayed on a defined path (and as long as you don't mind the generic PowerPoint look). As soon as the service deviated at all, then PowerPoint was very ineffective.

So then, how do the software packages stack up in light of all their features?

The accompanying table provides a feature-by-feature comparison. All of them do the same when it comes down to basics; it's on the "edges' where they have different capabilities.

EasyWorship and MediaShout both offer all-in-one solutions out of the box at comparable prices. Of the two, EasyWorship provides a more intuitive interface that is easier for new users to pick up, and is also the best-of-breed for running PowerPoint. Both offer rich visuals including moving background capability.

The two free packages do not offer the same level of completeness in terms of features: EasiSlides is probably the one freeware alternative that is as close as it gets to matching the feature-set offered by EasyWorship and MediaShout, and it even handles moving backgrounds.
OpenSong is an example of a no-frills application that does one thing and does it well " namely song lyric and verse projection. It also has by far the best selection of Bible translations available in a free worship software package.

Recommendations

So, which is the best worship software to use? Unfortunately, we are unable to recommend a "one size fits all' software package because each church will relate to media in different ways.

A better question is, "Which is the best worship software for your church?' For instance, a very upbeat high-tempo style of worship service might consider moving backgrounds as a top priority in a worship software, while a more traditional service might focus more on the bare necessities, namely the projection of sermon notes and announcements and on-the-fly display of songs and Scripture. For others, it can be more a matter of convenience and ease of use.

EasyWorship is a good choice for its ease of use, though EasiSlides is also worth a look if cost is an issue. Yet, an all-in-one solution is not necessarily without problems. For instance, there is no guarantee that EasyWorship is able to play every video format-type out there; the open-source media player VLC is arguably better at handling all kinds of video formats.

If one is willing to put up with a little inconvenience, then a combination of PowerPoint (for sermons and announcements), OpenSong (for song and verse projection), and VLC (for video) will do the job quite nicely at no cost.

Currently we are running OpenSong in tandem with PowerPoint, with VLC on hand whenever a video file or DVD needs to be played. This set-up is good enough for us and at the moment we do not feel the need to upgrade to a commercial solution. However, this is partly because our resident projectionists (the co-author being one of them) are not that fussed about having to switch between different programs to get the job done; your own mileage may vary.

The more technically-inclined, like us, might prefer a series of lightweight programs that each does its job well, rather than one heavyweight program that is a jack-of-all trades but a master of none.

Don't forget that the best way to know whether a given solution is good for you is to trial it " both EasyWorship and MediaShout offer 30-day demos for just this very purpose. This article has merely given some pointers about what to look for in a worship program and the various choices that are available, but the rest is up to you. In the end, it's all about how the software can serve the needs of your church, and not about falling in love with technology for its own sake.

Andrew Lim is pastor of Asian Bible Church at St Andrew's Cathedral. Marcus Lim is the congregation's technical and technological guru.