When I mentioned giving up blogging for Lent I was joking. However, a quick glance at the number of posts here would beg to differ. Time has simply overtaken me and I've ended up being busier than normal. Perhaps I should have taken the call slow down and focus on God a little more serious (That's rhetorical).
So, what have I been up to? Well, I've been looking at where we go with WordLive and some other digital ideas too. It is a time of strategy and planning for the future, but our story begins a long time ago in a galaxy quite close.
It is June1927 and instead of getting an email from WordLive you've just received your 'Daily Notes on the Scripture Portions'. One of the interesting things about looking to the future is taking a glance at the past.As we've developed Wordlive we have been aware that we shouldn't simply be offering an 'online' version of our printed Bible reading guides.
These guides, as you can see, have been going for quite a few years and although varied in design and content style, the approach is pretty much the same.
Read a Bible passage and then read a short comment about it. The danger is that WordLive can become the same. We provide a Bible reading and then have some comments about the passage.
While this is all well and good, and helpful to a great many people. It doesn't work for everyone. Our aim is to help people meet with God through the Bible and prayer. To help people do this we are offering visual approaches to the Bible passage. This allows people to think about the passage in a different way and discover more about God.
We have also used video and animations to explore topics and themes found within the passage. Through these we are able to explore more than we can with the 200 or so words that are found in our printed guides.
Audio meditations and reflections offer yet more ways to discover what the Bible passage is saying and we also use a little bit of humour now and again to prompt thought.
But what else is there that we can do to help fulfil our aim? It is this question that I've been looking at over the last few weeks. There are an almost infinite number of possibilities but our resources, both financial and physical are limited.
The growth in social media sites like facebook and twitter would appear to give us some idea of where things are heading. WordLive already has a presence on those sites and if you haven't already, it would be great to see you there.
Once again though, this future has some links to the past. If you look at the cover image from 1927 you'll see that they are headed 'The Scripture Union'. Way back then, the idea was for everyone, or most people, to be looking at the same passage. The Scripture Union was a community of people joined together for the purpose of meeting God through reading the Bible and prayer.
As we enter the second decade of the 21st Century, social networks are once again allowing us to create a community of people meeting God through the Bible and prayer.
Members of these communities can, with the use of new media, interact with the Bible passage, the content we provide and with each other. People can create their own content and share their own thoughts, enriching the community environment. Social networks can allow us to become a true union, united in our desire to meet with God.
So, that's what I think. And in true social networking style, it's now over to you. What would help you meet with God?
5 comments:
I really valued the use of perfume as an aid to meditation and worship in todays WordLive. God gave us senses, so why not use them all? Some people find that feeling a wooden cross in the palm of the hand is a real aid to prayer. I must confess that I am wondering what the first readers[including my grandfather] of SU notes would have thought of all this!
I enjoy and get a lot out of all the multi media you use. I have recommended it to all my friends.
Spending hours on the computer every day means it is the best way for me to get in my "quiet time" too! I love your creative multimedia approach and value having access to so much without going to a Christian bookshop - or buying notes - which is quite expensive in South Africa.
Thanks for the cooments peeps, it is quite humbling to hear what you're all saying. I'll pass your comments on to the rest of the team. And I thank God for the creativity given to those who are making the content and pray that the ideas keep coming.
The trouble with email/the internet and blogging in general, is the aspect of passive observation without any pressing need to respond, we the reader are invisible, mostly no one knows if we are reading what we receive.Imagine the earliest readers of Scripture Union not replying to a letter!Back then it was the greatest discourtesy to ignore a written communication! We all know people who dont get round to even a brief response to an email-I stand convicted! Therefore, let me say that it is not possible to convey just what a blessing it is, to see that Wordlive message line pop up every day.The content is always so well written, not compromising on anything, but always ringing out with the grace of God.Even if one only has a second to grasp the "front page" as the day begins, later one can go back and dig deeper and deeper when time permits.Thank you and blessings on all of you who are contributors. May the Lord Jesus Christ richly bless you.
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