This slogan comes from the global communications giant Vodafone. We live in an age saturated with media that can literally fill every moment of our lives, with 24 hours news simply illustrating how the world is only a click of a button away any second we care to press it. Not only has the world become more available to us (in 1990 we had 12 TV channels; in 2008 we could access 298 channels) but it is also more portable. Through mobile phones, netbooks etc the world is with us wherever we are.

I have just returned from 4 days away with colleague ministers from both Southern and Wessex Synods at Ashburnham Place. During our time together we heard from Andrew Graystone, a producer and presenter of Radio 4 programmes and TV, who is currently the Chair of the Churches Media Council as well. He helped us consider the impact of living in the digital age on the life and witness of the church today. I guess that the reaction of the ministers gathered reflects the range of responses that will be found in any of our churches to the rapidly changing technical age we all live in: for some it is to be resisted and can seem as damaging the nature of real human relationships; for others it is the age we live in and provides tools for engaging with people in a way that constantly offers new insights and new relationships. Caricatures of either end of the spectrum reflected in the ministers would be an ostrich at one end and the “road-runner” at the other: the one with its head in the sand, the other neck outstretched to try and keep ahead of what’s moving and changing.

In the front of my Bible is a photograph which spans 2000 years. Modern technology lets me have a photo of the stone in Athens where the Apostle Paul preached to the Athenians at the Areopagus: “Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious” (Acts 17:22). As he speaks to the Athenians he goes on to tell them how “in God we live and move and have our being” (17:28). The Gospel, the Good News of the love God has shown in Jesus Christ, is something that the church today continues to communicate today and to demonstrate how “in God we live and move and have our being.” One of the challenges that I see for the church is for us to be effective in striving to communicate Good News today, using every tool at our disposal to engage with the world in which we live. One of the exciting opportunities for the church is that we have amazing tools to enable us to communicate Good News. I’m very much a road-runner! How about you?

Yours in Christ Jesus, the Lord of heaven and earth,

Andrew

For those who like an alternative cyber- ending……

Technology brings many challenges but also many opportunities. One such opportunity is to meet other Christians from across the world, and to gather with them as a “community” on-line in the virtual world of cyberspace. Meet St Pixels ~ here is the map of the church and some of those who attend it each week:

They’re a great bunch.. meeting whenever there is someone else there to worship with, to chat to over coffee, to share struggles with. If you want to look at the church go to www.stpixels.com.