I began this series this past March, in which I set out to look back at how we have responded to the events of 2020.

I am not going to focus on the medical or political aspects of the pandemic or the shutdowns. Rather, I am concentrating on local church ministry—zeroing in on how this has affected their outreach, both locally and online. Certainly, coronavirus and all that surrounded it has left a lasting mark on numerous aspects of our ministries.

I am also persuaded that we need to look back at this past crisis only long enough to learn from it and prepare for the next similar crisis. I do not believe that it is a matter of if—but, rather, when—that will occur. Specifically, are we poised to handle another catastrophe and to take advantage of the spiritual opportunities that it will doubtless bring to those who have organized themselves in advance?

We need to be in the best position possible to minister to hurting and confused people—and, ultimately, to address the substance of any forthcoming crises head-on. There will simply be no excuse to be caught off guard, at least by the onslaught of the next calamity—whether it is real or artificially produced.

We are blessed to live at a time, however, when ministry can continue to be multiplied, even in times of crisis, through the use of technology.

So, for help with these issues, I turned to Steven Lee, the founder of SermonAudio.com.

From its website, SermonAudio describes itself as “The largest and most trusted library of audio sermons from conservative churches and ministries worldwide”—with more than 41,000 speakers, 2.2 million sermons, 416 million sermon downloads, and an average of 2.8 million sermon downloads each month.

To conclude this series, I will base several columns on an interview that I conducted with Steven in which we discussed four areas:

• SermonAudio’s Vault project—which involves building technological infrastructure on the campus of, and in partnership with, Bob Jones University
• cybersecurity, and an attack that SermonAudio suffered earlier this year
• the expansion of online ministry since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic
• the threats posed by censorship and cancel culture.

https://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?sermonid=52822036563351

Lee is a graduate of Bob Jones, where he majored in computer science. He began SermonAudio in 2000. Originally, the goal was to distribute the sermons of Dr. Alan Cairns, then pastor of Faith Free Presbyterian Church in Greenville, S.C., more proficiently.

But Lee quickly saw an opportunity to broaden that same avenue in a way that would also allow other—especially smaller—churches “to reach the multitudes.”

“Back then, streaming audio was a novelty—it was rather new,” Lee said.

The Vault is the greatest project, by far, that SermonAudio has ever attempted since its founding. SermonAudio is currently remodeling a secure space on the second floor of Bob Jones’ Mack Library to house its new machinery and equipment. Lee’s vision involves mentoring computer science students as they participate in future projects.

“Our technology has grown and advanced to such a stage—like everybody else who is in the tech business—where we are depending on what are called ‘cloud services,'” Lee said. “These are services that are run by big organizations. They just make life easier for people in my line of work, where you don’t have to mess with hard drives and physical machines—like we were doing for the first decade-and-a-half of our existence.”

“It is no secret that they are left-leaning companies,” Lee stated. “They have a very progressive mindset. They are not neutral.”

Hence, the danger to online ministry is apparent. Jesus, in fact, predicted that in the days preceding His return, “Many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another” (Matt. 24:10).

“The only answer—and it is not something that we are particularly excited about—is to create our own infrastructure. We have spent a lot of years relying on these big players to do it for us, and so it is really hard to build from scratch. But I feel like there is a need for us to take a step. And that is what we are doing with The Vault.”

“It’s also about perpetuity,” said Lee. “How do we keep this thing going beyond me, beyond our team? How do we plant ourselves alongside a stream of new talent all the time? To me, that is an academic institution.”

“If we can mentor them, then maybe there will be more that we can do than just having this physical space,” he explained. “We can influence lives.”

—-

Paul J. Scharf (M.A., M.Div., Faith Baptist Theological Seminary) is a church ministries representative for The Friends of Israel Gospel Ministry, based in Columbus, WI, and serving in the Midwest. For more information on his ministry, visit sermonaudio.com/pscharf or foi.org/scharf, or email pscharf@foi.org.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version

We are hearing more and more about people that have been “swatted.” That is the term used for making a false report to the police department, saying that someone with whom you disagree is committing a crime with a deadly weapon, thereby bringing the local Swat team to the residence named in the reported red flag. Then when the local police’s Swat team comes to the accused person’s house to investigate, they come heavily armed and ready to do battle. The cell phone in your hand could easily be mistaken for a gun when you answer the door in the middle of the night. This kind of hoax is nothing less than attempted murder.

Such evil is usually perpetrated by someone from the deep state. A lunatic from the far left and on occasion by a deranged person on the far right.

This is happening on a now daily basis throughout the country. Supreme Court Justice Kavanaugh and Stew Peters were the first to be swatted for their supposed bias – namely conservatism. A woman who is running for office in Georgia was the latest to have this happen.

The only solution I can come up with is incarceration and a hefty fine for those who commit such crimes. Someone is eventually going to be killed if it continues. I would suggest a lengthy prison term for the perpetrator, and it should be made known to the entire populace so that the perp is without excuse.

Some inconvenient things happened in society during the late sixties when the mental institutions’ doors were flung open, and people were let out onto the streets to fend for themselves. Of course, a lot of these poor people were victims of the dark world of drugs. Free sex and hard rock only added fuel to the fire. Opioids opened the gates to the sordid world and gloomy world of atheism. The Times magazine screamed “Is God Dead?” on its glossy magazine cover.

After a time of restructuring in the United States, the radical left had decided that belief in God wasn’t all that necessary. And slowly but surely, they took over every cultural institution in the country, including our Federal Government.

Do you remember Barney Frank, the Godless homosexual man who played a big part in causing a huge financial crisis?  Also see here and here.

Barney Frank is a former American politician. He served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Massachusetts from 1981 to 2013. A Democrat, Frank served as chairman of the House Financial Services Committee from 2007 to 2011 and was a leading co-sponsor of the 2010 Dodd–Frank Act.

Political party: Democrat – In a third blockbuster scandal, Massachusetts Democrat Rep. Barney Frank admitted a lengthy relationship with a male hooker who ran a bisexual prostitution service out of Frank’s apartment. He denied knowing about this until his landlord informed him, but his sex partner says he knew all along.

The reason I bring this up is because this is the first time I ever heard of such blatant abuse of power. Here was a man who cared nothing about the welfare of others and instead raped the American taxpayers out of millions of dollars. Now this behavior is much more common in our country. We are facing the prospect of war and economic collapse, all in a blatant cover-up for the folly of Hunter Biden. Who can you trust?

Now more than ever, people are either taking heed to the Word of God or going so far as tearing up the Bible, trampling and kicking it and finally throwing it in a toilet set up for a homosexual pride event. Although it looks like many of these sexual perverts have made the ultimate decision to blaspheme Christ in this way, in many cases, the overall populous is still undecided about Christ. But with time running out – as I will bear out later, they still appear to be clueless about mankind’s state of affairs.

Having just gotten out of the hospital after having had three stents put in, I was just recovering from an allergic reaction to the dye they use, and the pain was so intense, I thought I was going to die and was in dire straits for three days.

My youngest brother K.C. called to see how I was doing, and the stomach pain was so intense I could hardly speak. K.C. always calls to see how I’m doing. My other two brothers have long since died. But with one of his two sons having died over a year ago, he is still morning his loss. Despite having been saved, he remains clueless about the state of the nation and how the world at large is coalescing into a one world order to usher in the One-World Government and prefers to avoid controversy. So, we hadn’t spoken since I mentioned some political point. (K.C. is a very sensitive person and just does the best he can – so he says.) Although I know he can do better.

Linda, my baby sister, called – out of the blue to offer to nurse me back to health – which I declined. She, along with the other two siblings, are the youngest of the bunch. She was a spoiled brat growing up, but none of us held it against her since our mother had abandoned us because of my father’s drinking, womanizing, and abusive behavior. We older kids recognized that she was dad’s favorite and let her get away with innocent bad behavior. She’s the sister I baptized several years ago after her cancer scare.

Just when I was still reeling from Linda’s call, my sister Joyce also called to see how I was doing. Joyce is the know it all in the family. After having raised two boys singlehandedly from a very young age – nothing moves her. Dave is a Fireman Captain, and Johnny is a lawman/criminal investigator, so I guess she did a good job. Both are fine gentlemen. We joked around a lot, and I told her that if I was found with two bullet holes to the back of my head in a park somewhere, that she should know that as bad as I feel, I won’t be committing suicide anytime soon. (Ala Vince Foster and today Mark Middleton plus many more.) I jokingly told her this because of my diatribes against the Liberal political establishment of today – in print – but I really wasn’t joking.

I also told her things she claims to not have known about some of the atrocities of the political establishments. Then, jokingly, I said she didn’t know about these things because all she did was eat ice cream and watch the nonsense on the “The View” day in and day out. Immediately, she let out a laugh and said, guess what’s on my television right now?! Yep, you guessed it – “The View.” I’m guessing there are many women in the nation getting their news from these unregenerated and uneducated women.

YBIC

Jim Towers

You can write me at jt.filmmaker@yahoo.com or visit me at www.dropzonedelta.com or visit my web site, www.prpoheticsignsandwonders.com.