DEPLOYMENT OF NEW TECHNOLOGY (NT) IN DISSEMINATION OF THE GOSPEL (A CASE STUDY OF DEEPER LIFE BIBLE CHURCH)

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

Being able to constantly stay in touch with the rest of the world by whatever means possible is unarguably one of the desires of humanity, regardless of status or beliefs. This has consequently made New Technology (NT) a tool of choice in the hands of every individual towards salvaging this desire. It is no more news, however, that we are in the final days of earth’s history, as many notable scholars of theology and religion continue to emphasize (Bolu, 2011); and the sacred duty of dissemination of the gospel of Christ to the world given by Jesus Christ Himself to every believing Christian as one of the pre-pointers to His second advent (see Matthew 24:14) has become more important now than it has ever before been. It thus becomes necessary to focus evangelism efforts towards where people would most always be found using New Technology (NT) platforms like the social media and a host of others; and to use the most formidable tool to reach out to them in this zone(s) (NT). New Technology (NT) can be used in many ways to spread the gospel within and outside the church. In Nigeria, young people are turning to the internet to find personal, [professional], social and religious information and ecclesiastical institutions are devoting more resources to improve their presence on the web (Bolu, 2011). “The great commission of Jesus Christ is that the gospel should be taken to the ends of the earth through various evangelistic activities (Bible, Matthew 28: 19 – 20, c.f. 24:14). Today, however, the New Technology (NT) platforms like the Social Networking Websites and the Internet have emerged as utilities that can be tapped into, providing a method of communication that is fast, powerful, and interactive. Today, the world is shrinking into a global village through the Internet and the outreach strategies used by Apostle Paul of old can now be achieved through effective use of the worldwide web. In order to capture the potential of the Internet in dissemination of the gospel, Christians and churches must learn to use the power of these new Technologies to propagate the everlasting gospel, (James Nored, 2009: Ogu E.C., Ogbonna A., Omotunde A., Izang A., Ajike E.O. 2014). Murray, J. (2011). defined New technology(NT) as “a term that stresses the role of unified modern communications (achieved by synergizing telephone and computer networks) and the integration of telecommunications (cable and wireless communication media), computer systems and enterprise soware, middleware, storage, and audio-visual systems, in enabling users [or clients] to access, process, store, transmit,and manipulate data and information.” According to Asserman, Stanley; Faust, Katherine (2014). “A Social Network Websites is a social structure made up of a set of social actors (usually individuals and organizations/brands) and a set of the dyadic [two-way interactions] ties between these actors.” Popular examples of Social Network Websites platforms as at the time of this research include: Google+, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Email platforms, Blogs, LinkedIn, Vimeo, Flickr, Tumblr, Skype, Myspace, hi5, Digg, Orkut, Friendster, to mention but a few.