Technological Advancement In the Church!

I was reading recently about the ancient days of the church and how they used their "technology" and "educational resources" to grow the church and make disciples. The advancements are amazing when you consider how far we have come. People use to hide the Word, and now the Word is hard to hide. People use to teach Christian education as classes, now Christian education is the sole purpose of colleges (seminaries).

1. Monasteries 500-1300 AD - The church ran away from the public who needed to hear the Gospel and lived in solitary places in the wilderness with the manuscripts of the Scriptures to copy and study on papyrus, animal hyde, and artwork. If anyone wanted the scriptures, you had to be a monk dude, travel insane distances, have cash, and know someone on the inside of the Catholic church.

2. Universities 1300-1800 AD - The academic side of the church blossomed and Christian education became a forefront stamp of being intelligent and poised to be a great figure in nation or local government. Only those who were rich typical received education that was a mixture of philosophy, arithmetic, science, and theology. Massive translations happened during this period to write the Scriptures and publish the Bible in different languages worldwide. This caused a Reformation, one of the most important events in all of church history, and a major split happened between Catholics and Protestants occurred, paving the way for the expansion the Gospel, development of Christian studies, and missionaries to go out to  into the world with the Bible. During this university era, teaching would only happen on campus and if you were not asked or could afford university tuition, too bad, you were out of luck and could not be educated. This caused a massive divide between the educated and uneducated.

3. Seminaries 1800-1900 AD - It was time to establish schools that focused only on educating men to be theologians and pastors in the growing United States of America. Churches began to sponsor men who wanted to be in the ministry and sent them to seminaries to be trained. This took away from the church-based leadership development and caused issues because of the elitism of graduates verses undergraduates who were serving in ministry. Ministry division during the Civil War broke out and seminaries divided on who could go and teach at their institution of Christian education. After the War, things settled down, but the emphasis on seminaries as "cementaries" is still an issue because of the lack of faithful shepherd leaders who go to school to gain an education for a life time of ministry.

4. Church-Based Ministries 1900-2000 AD
        A. Small Group Movement - Minimize the large church into a small church community of fellowship.
        B. Discipleship Movement - Make solid disciples verses decisions through expository preaching.
        C. Conference and Seminar Movement - Special gathering on biblical topics to defend, equip believers.
        D. Technology Movement - Sermons and books on Podcasts, iTunes, iPad, E-mails, YouTube.

Today we have so much technology we do not know how to deal with all of it. Starting a church and getting out information is easier than it has ever been before in the history of mankind. Churches are now able to make small groups more effective because of the availability due to technology. The best news, however, is that Christian education is available to everyone every day 24/7. The internet, iTunes, radio, and other technology provides opportunities to hear the Word!