Some time ago, a pastor of a 1,000 member church asked my opinion regarding the need for a server and local area network for the church. At that time I expressed that I believed these were essential tools for any church that is 650 people or larger.

It is very common for churches to add part-time and full time staff as they grow, yet fail to provide their staff with the tools they require to collaborate together as a team. In addition, when a church lacks a server/network, all important files must then reside on each individual staff member's computer. Often, when these staff members leave the church, these important ministry files leave with the staff member.

Microsoft offers organizations an inexpensive virtual server/network solution called “SharePoint Services”. SharePoint is hosted for your ministry by an external service provider, yet your data is secure and backed-up regularly to prevent data loss. SharePoint provides a very robust web-based virtual server and secure network so that your ministry team can collaborate together and accomplish much more than generally possible through a self-hosted server and Local Area Network (LAN). Features include:

• Synchronize team member calendars
• Store important files that are accessible by other team members
• Edit important files while keeping an ongoing record of all edited versions and who did the edits
• Complete integration with Microsoft Office (Outlook, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint)
• Complete integration with Microsoft Instant Messaging for real-time team-member communications
• Set up permission-access levels to various files
• All files can be easily “labeled” with meta-tags so that a file can be located by simply using the program’s search function
• SharePoint also includes a Windows-Explorer-Type tree control for structuring all your data folders
• Access your important files and collaborate with team members on any project from anywhere in the world…you do not need to be at church to use your virtual server/network.
• Back-up of important information
• Many more features 

An excellent webinar overview of SharePoint Services can be found at http://www.microsoft.com/sharepoint/demo/index.html.

 A company called 1and1.com hosts SharePoint Services for an introductory price of $10/month for the first three months (temporary offer), and then $20/month from that point on. This means that you could use SharePoint Services for 5 years before you would spend the same amount for an in-house server and network…plus your ministry will not have to deal with any of the IT hassles.

 To check out the 1and1 program offering, go to http://order.1and1.com/xml/order/Sharepoint;jsessionid=9FE228EEFF012958ED10929D4BA98B8B.TC61a?__frame=_top&__lf=Static. Your ministry will want to find out how much additional online storage may cost when you get to the point of needing more storage space.