Holy Spirit Uses
Recorded Messages
To Increase Ministry Impact!
Pastor Michael Jernigan from The Church of God in Trumann, Arkansas says, “What blesses me more than anything about media ministry is to know that people have gotten saved and others have grown closer to the Lord by a recorded message that we were able to get to them. It is not about me. It is about God’s Word as He opens it up.” Pastor Jernigan never dreamed how God would use his media ministry to spread the Word.
Recorded sermons began to help the church, but soon expanded beyond!
Pastor Jernigan started the media ministry by recording church sermons on cassette for shut-ins and those who missed the service. Later, an announcement was placed on the church’s website that free recorded messages would be sent to anyone requesting them. The church was thrilled to get responses from their town, from other areas in their state and from other states. Each person was placed on a mailing list and sent recorded messages monthly.
One of the first out of state recipients of the recorded messages is now one of the strongest supporters of the church’s media ministry. This couple sends encouraging letters and gives sacrificially to the ministry regularly.
Pastor finds creative ways to distribute recorded Biblical message!
Pastor Jernigan distributes recorded messages of his sermons, guest speakers’ sermons, an occasional Sunday School class, and messages from his archives of guest speakers, even some messages that were recorded in the 1940’s.
A display rack was placed where church members pass by after the service so the recorded messages would be readily available to them. This led to more of the congregation taking messages with them. A fishbowl filled with recorded messages was placed in a local laundromat and refilled weekly. The church received comments from many interested individuals who picked up a message at the laundromat. After distributing many hundreds of recorded Biblical messages on cassette, in 2006, Pastor Jernigan started a CD ministry. The church still uses their first CD duplicator, which was purchased from Kingdom. Pastor Jernigan reports that it has duplicated well over 5,000 CDs and the church has never had a problem with it.
| Church member, Anita Walton, places a gift bag including a recorded message on a neighbor’s door. |
A pastor in another area of Arkansas decided to use one of Pastor Jernigan’s recorded messages for a Wednesday night service. A young lady came to the church for the first time that night. When the altar call was given after the message, the young lady came forward and gave her heart to the Lord Jesus Christ. Pastor Jernigan marvels that God would bring the young lady to church to listen to a message that was preached earlier over 2 hours away and use that message to draw the young lady into His kingdom.
You never know how many people will listen to one recorded message!
Pastor Jernigan was attending a funeral. A man from a different area of the state who had been receiving recorded messages was also there. He introduced the pastor to two ladies with whom he had been sharing Pastor Jernigan’s recorded messages. They said that although they had never met the Pastor before, they felt like they had known him all their lives. The ladies listened to the recorded messages and then shared them with their pastor who also listened to them. There have been times, when someone at the church played one of Pastor Jernigan’s recorded messages over the sound system for the church service. Pastor Jernigan was surprised to learn that his messages have been touching lives there, and that the church there was duplicating and distributing them.
Relatives move out of state and find pastor’s message in new home!
Family members of Pastor Jernigan’s wife moved to Oklahoma and rented a house there. The family was shocked to find that one of the things the previous tenants had left in the house was a CD with a message from Pastor Jernigan. No one knows how it got there. Pastor Jernigan stated, “I believe that the Lord had that there just to let me know that these messages are going all over in places that I would not even dream of. I am excited that the Word is getting out!”
Pastor preached in Africa, England and Iraq without ever being there!
In response to an e-mail from South Africa asking Pastor Jernigan to send as many recorded messages as he possibly could, the church shipped a large box of messages there. The church has also sent recorded messages to England and to our military in Iraq. Through his experience with media ministry, Pastor Jernigan has learned that God can meet the spiritual needs in one place through a pulpit in another. He is excited about what God may be doing with the messages sent abroad.
A hungry heart buys a CD player just to hear a recorded message!
One lady who receives recorded messages from the church has a sister who is a librarian. The sisters were at the library when another lady came in to check out books. The sisters got into a conversation with her and realized she was hungry for God. The one sister kept thinking that she would benefit from Pastor Jernigan’s messages. Both sisters saw the lady in the library the next week. The sister told her about one of Pastor Jernigan’s CDs, but the lady stated that she did not have a CD player. The sister wondered why the Lord would lay the lady and Pastor Jernigan’s CD on her heart so heavy if she was not able to hear the CD. The next week the librarian called her sister expressing that the lady came back to the library. She could not get the idea of hearing the CD out of her mind, so she bought a CD player just so she could hear it. As the sister was driving to the library to take the CD to her, she prayed that God would touch her through the CD.
| Charles, a patron of the restaurant finds spiritual food at the buffet. |
Pastor resists the temptation to just let media ministry fade away!
One church member owns a local restaurant. In 2006, the church put a display box in the restaurant and kept it filled with free CDs. Even though many CDs were distributed, over time the church stopped placing CDs there. One day a nurse approached a church member at a local doctor’s office and asked why they stopped putting recorded messages in the restaurant. She requested that the church start putting them there again, because she enjoyed getting one every week.
Early one morning while praying, the Lord impressed upon Pastor Jernigan’s heart to once again make free recorded messages available in the restaurant. The next day he took CDs to the restaurant. A lady called who was visiting from California and had picked up a message while eating at the restaurant. She expressed that she greatly appreciated the message and asked the church to never stop making the messages available. Over 600 CDs have been distributed through this one restaurant. Recently, while visiting another state, someone gave Pastor Jernigan a $500 check asking him to continue distributing the recorded messages.
Thank you for fighting the good fight of faith!
We at Kingdom thank you Pastor Jernigan and the Church of God in Trumann, Arkansas for continuing with a vibrant media ministry that the Holy Spirit continues to use. We truly believe many souls will be eternally grateful for your perseverance.
