In This Issue: Internet Evangelism and Online Missionaries
- WORLD: Internet Evangelism Day
- WANTED: Online Missionaries
- WORLD FAITHS: A Primer for Evangelism
Missions Catalyst is a free, weekly electronic digest of mission news and resources designed to inspire and equip Christians worldwide for global ministry. Use it to fuel your prayers, find tips and opportunities, and stay in touch with how God is building his kingdom all over the world. Please forward it freely!
News Features, edited by Pat Noble, are published periodically.
Dear Reader,
This special 5th Wednesday feature should give you much to encourage and equip you for outreach using the Internet.
What are you waiting for? The world is at your fingertips.
WORLD: Internet Evangelism Day
Source: Internet Evangelism Day, Press Release, March 2010
“The last 15 years have changed our world forever,” claims Tony Whittaker, coordinator of Internet Evangelism Day. “Digital media are transforming the way we communicate, behave, and even think. If Facebook was a country, it would have the fourth largest population in the world.” Internet Evangelism Day is a strategic resource to help the worldwide Church understand these issues and use the Web to share the good news. It is both a year-round online guide and an annual focus day – to be held this year on Sunday, April 25.
Churches are encouraged to use Internet Evangelism Day resources to create a presentation for their members on or near that Sunday (or at any other time they choose). The Internet Evangelism Day site offers free downloads: PowerPoint, video clips, handouts, drama scripts, music, and posters. These enable any church (or home group, college, or conference) to build a customized program, lasting from 5-50 minutes.
2010’s focus day will be the sixth to be used by churches around the world since the initiative’s launch in 2005. Over this period, digital media have developed dramatically, with the advent of YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter, and the growing use of mobile phones to access online services. The outreach opportunities have multiplied too.
Internet Evangelism Day’s website is also a one-stop resource covering many subjects, including how to build a church website that is “outsider friendly,” using Twitter in evangelism, and blogging. Perhaps surprisingly, you do not need to be technical to share your faith online. And you can volunteer to be an email mentor to inquirers with several large online outreach ministries.
>> Full story here.
WANTED: Online Missionaries
Source: The Christian Post, March 15, 2010
“Global Media Outreach’s websites allow online spiritual seekers to directly knock on the ‘electronic’ front doors of participating volunteers, who can guide them in their faith,” the ministry reports.
Notably, however, as more and more people gain access to the Internet and visit GMO sites requesting more information, more and more “mature” believers are needed to respond.
“Google tells us that every day, two million people are making spiritually-related searches on the internet,” says Beeber. “Of those two million people every day, we are now reaching 300,000 a day … and they are communicating with us.”
To meet the demand, GMO says it needs at least 10,000 online missionaries – more than double how many it currently has. And so it’s encouraging believers everywhere to join the effort by devoting even just 15 minutes of their day to helping respond to the e-mail inquiries received – 80 to 90 percent of which reportedly are sent from outside of the United States.
>> Full story here.
>> If you would like to recommend an online church, check out Leadership Network’s blog. It lists almost 50 Internet campuses. And read their article Now There’s Church on Facebook.
>> Also read One in Four Facebook Users Come from Asia or the Middle East (O’Reilly Radar).
WORLD FAITHS: A Primer for Evangelism
Source: Lausanne World Pulse, March 2010
To equip yourself for ministry to people from a variety of belief systems, check out these themed articles:
Dr. Knud Jørgensen, dean of Tao Fong Shan in Hong Kong and associate professor at the Norwegian School of Theology, addresses The Uniqueness of Christ and Committed Pluralism: Part 1 and Part 2.
Dr. Kai Kjær-Hansen, international coordinator of the Lausanne Consultation on Jewish Evangelism and chair of the Danish Israel Mission, writes on the topic of Not Messiah to the Jews, Not Messiah at All: On Jewish Evangelism.
Dr. Chandler H. Im, director of Ethnic Ministries at the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College, encourages Interfaith Interface with Buddhists.
Dr. Lalsangkima Pachuau, director of the Post-graduate Studies Program and associate professor of the History and Theology of Mission at Asbury Theological Seminary, talks about Sharing Christ in Hindu Contexts.
Rev. Dr. John Azumah, lecturer in Islamics and director for the Centre of Islamic Studies at the London School of Theology, writes on Christian Response to Islam: A Struggle for the Soul of Christianity.
>> Source.
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