Bible Schools Online
Christianity continues to be the fastest
growing religion in the world, with an estimated 16 000 conversions
a day in India and higher figures in China and Latin America.
Here the demand for basic Christian education exceeds the
supply by far. In many of the wealthier nations Christianity
is experiencing explosive growth in new media, books and educational
institutions.
Christian chain stores such as the Family
Christian Bookshop now appear in malls across the United States.
The number of Christian publishing houses and authors producing
material continues to grow. Yet much of the content continues
to cover the same topics and often lacks depth when it comes
to issues specifically relevant to living in the post-modern
world.
The Internet has opened up new possibilities for the dissemination
of information and provides Christians with a vast array of
Christian literature. More and more people are turning to
the Internet for information, commerce, entertainment and
education. Many are preferring to stay at home to work or
study rather than face the inconvenience of commuting. However,
Internet sites often lack structured material on which the
Christian can build to grow in his or her faith. The result
is that most people still seek out respectable educational
facilities for effective Bible study. The main difficulty
that Christians experience when seeking an educational institution
or Bible School is that most of these institutions are geared
to prepare people for full time ministry. Yet most Christians
desire to learn more about how their faith and how the Bible
can be practically applied to their work, relationships and
family. The demand is not for seminaries and monasteries,
but for Bible schools that will equip them to face life's
daily challenges.
The ever-increasing demands on time leaves many mothers and
fathers with little time for their families, let alone for
attending a Bible school, no matter how much they desire to
get a solid grounding in the Word. Even with many Bible schools
offering evening classes, fitting it all into a week is close
to impossible for many. The limited number of options leaves
many Christian with a dilemma.
Certain worldwide institutions have successfully manuvoured
around these cultural changes and are making use of evening
courses on local university campuses to give practical Christian
teaching in structured part time programmes. Going one step
further, one particular institution has taken its Bible School
curriculum onto the Internet with a combination of Multimedia
technology and CD-ROMs.
The use of technology is the obvious next step in Christian
education. Most universities have realised that the world
has moved into the era of distance education and that the
ideal medium for this is the Internet. It is a bold attempt
to use the power of the Internet for administration and overcome
the Internet's bandwidth problems by sending material on CD-ROM's.
While the Internet proliferates in the developed world, Christianity's
growth is most exceptional in the regions of the world that
do not have great Internet infrastructure. The dilemma of
Christian educators in trying to harness the power of new
technologies remains in finding the balance between what Western
Christians consider an exceptional product and what many Christians
living in the East, on the African continent or in the South
Americas can utilize based on their limited resources. Having
broken through into cyberspace education, the next challenge
for Christian institutions is to develop new and innovative
ways in which to meet the overwhelming demands for Christian
education in the less-developed nations, where more and more
people are coming to a saving knowledge of Christ.
His People Christian Ministries - Online Bible School
on: http://www.hispeople.com.
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