Over the last one hundred years, we have seen the growth of various new forms of technology that have transformed the world into a fast paced one big global village. Inventions such as the radio, television, the computer and the internet have revolutionarised the world. But these inventions which have so much potential for good have also been used as tools to merchandise all kinds of evil and desensitise people from the fear of the transcendent God.
However, technology’s potential to harm society should not force us to shun it as essentially evil and retreat to the ancient caves in order to avoid its corrupting influence. Technology, like any other gift from God can be harnessed for our spiritual good and to the glory of God. As our world becomes more and more saturated with technology, the potential to reach great numbers of people with the Gospel also increases. We should not leave the ungodly to set the pace and dictate to us the value of technology, albeit only its functional and utilitarian value. As Reformed Christians living in a culture that is increasingly revolving around technology, we need to explore ways of using technology so as to bring glory to God. We need to consider it as a blessing and part of what it means to fulfil the dominion mandate. We must be thinking of ways in which technology can point us heaven-ward and recapture the sense of wonder at God’s ways and His world.
The internet is one form of new technology that has broadened our capacity to bring the Gospel to a lost and dying world. Imagine a pastor standing before his congregation of barely a hundred people, in a nondescript part of the world, faithfully exegeting and applying Scripture in his sermons, through what Paul calls the “foolishness of preaching.” And imagine these same sermons being able to influence countless others throughout the world via the internet! Now, this is precisely what is happening through the ministry of SermonAudio.com. That is using the internet to the glory of God!
According to the description on the SermonAudio website, theirs is currently the largest and most convenient library of audio sermons on the web with over 232,000+ free audio sermons in the highly popular MP3 format.
The mission and purpose of SermonAudio.com is “the preservation and propagation of great Bible teaching and preaching in its audio form for this generation and the next. It’s also a great personal evangelism tool as people may be more open to listen to sermons in their homes even if they never walk through a church door.” The motto for the website is taken from Romans 10:17 where it reads, “faith cometh by hearing.”
The sermons on the website can be streamed online for immediate listening or optionally downloaded to your computer or portable MP3 player for listening at a later time. It hosts sermons that are easily searchable by broadcaster, Bible reference, topic, speaker, date preached, and keyword. I have seen the number of broadcasters and sermons hosted on the site grow phenomenally over the years. There is a large, active, listening audience on SermonAudio.com demonstrated by the over one million sermon downloads each month!
It is this easy potential and opportunity to tap into this large worldwide audience that compelled us to sign up as members of SermonAudio.com and broadcast numerous sermons to the world, something which would be impossible for us to do since we presently do not have a church website to host our sermons. We thank God for this gospel opportunity to serve the world through the faithful preaching of the unchanging truth of the Bible. We join the only two other broadcasters from Africa, Kabwata Baptist Church, and Grace Unlimited from South Africa. We hope to upload two sermons every week from our morning and evening services. Those of you with access to the internet, can visit our homepage on http://www.sermonaudio.com/source_detail.asp?sourceid=ebcl
Our prayer is that the Lord will use this worldwide media ministry of our church through SermonAudio.com in a powerful way to save those who are lost, provide spiritual answers to those who are seeking Christ, and encourage and edify the people of God around the world. We also hope that this will also further the awareness and ministry of Emmasdale Baptist Church.
One cannot not help, but think of the prophecy of Habakkuk quoted at the head of this blog post. To Know God is to know His glory. Seen in the light of the New Testament, this points us to the full revelation of the glory that God has given “in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6), and reflect that the worldwide spread of the gospel is His chosen means of giving effect to the promises of Habakkuk. Indeed, this extends your pulpit beyond the four walls of your church.
Amen to that! I'm a great user of SermonAudio.com, though I am severely constrained by business-use-only rules for internet access at my place of work. I have more than 300 sermons stored away on my PC and my phone to savour at will. It is the very best site in the whole wide world. I promote it to all I can find who might be interested. We will work to get Lusaka Baptist Church its own home page as well... Thank you.
ReplyDeleteI am glad you have been using SermonAudio.com to great use. It's amazing the immeasurable resources, from gifted and choice servants of the Lord, is right within reach 24 hours everyday (with internet access of course). Apart from the unending study that every pastor must be engaged in, I have time after time downloaded sermons for my own spiritual food, but also to hone my preaching abilities by listening to the "experts" who do it better than my best efforts.
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