The Lord has called us all to be fishers of men. Our job is to be in the soul-winning business of bringing the lost to salvation through Christ.
So I’m doing what the disciples did when Jesus told them to cast their nets on the other side of the boat. I’m asking you to come on over and help bring the harvest in so that you can share in it as well!
When the disciples followed Jesus’ fishing advice, their nets and boats were filled to capacity. “They caught a great number of fish, and their net was breaking. So they signaled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both the boats, so that they began to sink” (Luke 5:6, 7 NKJV).
Becoming a better fisher of men is what drives our ministry forward. It causes us to try new creative things … explore new opportunities … and go places where no one else is proclaiming the gospel.
And the place to do this is on the internet! I received an email from a 15-year-old girl in Australia this month. Her name is Hannah. She simply thanked us for making easy-to-understand Bible studies available online.
I felt the Holy Spirit deeply impress me. If we can help a young girl on the other side of our planet study the Bible through our websites … how much more could we do … how many more people could we reach?
The answer is MILLIONS! Right now at Amazing Facts, we literally have “fish” jumping into our “boat.”
Every week, 35,000 people are hitting our sites on the internet to discover the truth of God’s Word and understand the plan of salvation!
Do you understand the significance of this? 35,000 people … every week! Our nets are OVERFLOWING with people who are enrolling in our Bible correspondence School, requesting prayers and Bible help, and watching sermons online. Our internet ministry is booming with responses!
So the opportunity to spread the gospel through the internet today is wide open and growing! It’s not hindered by geographical boundaries … travel limitations … or even person power. And compared to other forms of communication, the internet is relatively inexpensive!
The business world understands this potential and is spending millions of dollars to better use internet technology to interact with their customers. I’m convinced we need to do the same to reach more people with truth! Why?
Because millions of people everywhere are searching. In fact, each month there are more than 6.4 billion “searches” on the internet!
Like those famished and frenzied fish along the Mequens River, people are essentially “JUMPING THROUGH THE AIR” looking for anything that looks like it might feed their spiritual hunger! They’re looking for answers about God, Jesus Christ, the Bible, heaven and hell, Bible prophecy, and many other spiritual issues.
What does this mean for you and me? It means we need to have our fishing nets ready and get our “boat” into position for a huge catch!
Let me give you an example. When you search Google for “Sabbath Day,” there are more than 1,270,000 websites that pop up. Amazingly, our Sabbathtruth.com website is the third site listed out of more than a million possibilities! That’s a direct result of our work together!
But we can’t be satisfied with what we’re doing right now. It simply isn’t enough!
In the near future, there are several things that we must do to prepare for this catch.
A New Universe!
First, we’ll start by substantially updating our BibleUniverse.com website. BibleUniverse.com was one of our very first evangelistic websites, and it still gets a huge number of visits each month. But honestly, it needs a major upgrade — better technology and tools.
My vision is to see www.BibleUniverse.com made into one of the most cutting-edge Bible study sites on the internet — where the Bible is brought to life through software, video, and audio, along with devotionals and a virtual universe of Bible information.
Then like a light on a dark river — or rather an entire ocean! — the fish will flock to this spot and we will lead them through one of our many Bible study courses. In addition, all of our websites will be revamped — giving them a fresh and new look. But more than that, we’ll be using powerful tools like Google Ads and Yahoo Ads to attract people to these eye-opening Bible websites!
These sites can also serve local churches. Imagine being able to take all the great teachers at our AFCOE evangelism training classes and broadcasting their messages across the internet! What a wonderful way to train laypeople all over the country in evangelism!
Second, we must greatly expand our reach. We’ll start by putting the three angels’ messages out into the world’s market — places like MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, Google Video, and Friendster! We’ll be shining LIGHT into the heart of DARKNESS!
Today, more than 35,000 people visit our sites every week. Imagine it! That’s a virtual stadium full of people watching, hearing, and reading the gospel from their homes. That’s phenomenal reach!
But I confidently believe that if we put our minds … hearts … and prayers toward this work, we could reach 10 times more people! Filling our boats!
Expanding Our Team & Tools
Third, to build these attractive and powerful websites, we need the very best creative people. That means we need to grow our staff and hire some technically savvy and brilliant men and women who want to use their skills toward advancing the gospel!
This is also going to take equipment. We have great equipment — but to meet the growing demands, we need more cameras and recording equipment, computers, servers, and bandwidth — things that do cost money. I know some of this “techie” language might be confusing, but trust me when I tell you that this work can’t be done without these things.
Our internet team here at Amazing Facts is small but extremely talented, and they know exactly what it is going to take to have the kind of impact we want to have.
Finally, Amazing Facts has more than 100 other registered internet domain names that have not been activated. We have a vision of how to reach people for Christ, but we lack the funds to fully develop these ministry concepts. These domains are like boats tied in the harbor. Without the needed funds to launch these websites, we’re not catching fish.
I’m talking about reaching people — not just a few — not many — but hundreds of thousands of people each month with the life-saving message of Jesus Christ and the power of the three angels’ messages.
In September 2000, an enormous 444-pound Bluefin tuna sold at Tokyo’s fish market for a record $173,600. This was the most expensive fish ever auctioned. It’s hard to believe someone would pay so much for a single fish. How much more valuable is a man than a fish? (Matthew 12:12).
So please pray about this … pray about making a gift that will catch boatloads of people for the Lord. This is the glorious cause for which we have all been called! And this work has to be done before Jesus will return. I don’t know what kind of gift you could give toward this internet ministry outreach — so I want to ask you to take it to the Lord and ask Him to lead you in your giving this month.
Whatever you can give, I want you to know it is important. This work of growing our reach on the internet is going to take you, me, and all of our friends working together.
Thank you for your desire to stand with Amazing Facts and reach people with the gospel. Together, you and I are making a difference in the lives of people every day, everywhere.