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 Midwest
Christian Outreach has been on the World Wide Web since the mid-1990s,
shortly after the Web came into being. Like most who established
a Web presence back then, we spent the earliest days of the new medium
appraising its potential and familiarizing ourselves with its rapidly developing
culture. We were there as it emerged from digital obscurity, expanded
into an economic phenomenon, and escalated into a market mania of gold
rush proportions. And we were there when the Web endured the dot-com
implosions as virtual gold mines didn’t pan out and venture capitalists
withdrew their support, turning much of the Web into a landscape of digitial
sink-holes.
While the financial armchair quarterbacks
of 2000 and 2001 pondered the catastrophic failures of Web-based businesses
that never actually had viable business plans and wondered out loud about
the Internet’s future, we never altered our course. Like so many
other evangelism-minded Christian organizations, we knew that the
Web’s potential for communicating the Gospel of Jesus Christ was not limited
by entrepreneurial ecomonics. From the moment we first saw what a
web browser could do, we realized that a lot was about to change.
A fast, affordable, graphically-flexible
communication medium capable of reaching into every home that has a telephone
line and a computer? What’s to think about? Let’s do it!
Well, over time we learned there
was quite a bit to think about. In the beginning we had a basic,
functional site with all the standard equipment of an obviously amateur
web site: a few graphics, various background colors, mixed fonts and font-sizes,
and usually-functional hypertext links.
Eventually we learned the value
of having our own domain name and people who knew what they were doing
with HTML, and got them. In the late ’90s we acquired the midwestoutreach.org
domain, and were exceedingly fortunate to have the services of Chuck Plath
and his web site development company, MediaAntz. Chuck is a remarkably
talented artist whose work has enhanced the pages of our Journal over the
years. He did a wonderful job of bringing our site up-to-date just
in time for a period of steady growth in our ministry.
After a couple of years it became
obvious we were already beginning to outgrow MediaAntz’ fine work, so we
began a complete from-the-ground-up revision of our site in 2001.
The new version includes information on our branches, an updated resource
catalogue, more reference materials, an online supplement to the Journal,
and links to headlines in newspapers around the world on topics of interest
to our readers.
As the technological horizons of
the Web extend new opportunities to the cause of Christ, we will do our
best to take advantage of them for the Good News of salvation in Him.
Until now budget constraints have forced us to rely on volunteer and donated
services to make this happen. Because of the Web’s increasing significance,
one of our goals is to raise enough funds to support a staffperson who
is responsible to maintain and update this site regularly. If you
share our vision in this area, we ask you to pray along with us for the
fulfillment of this goal. And, if you feel led to do so, we invite
you to participate by sending a gift designated specifically for it.
Meanwhile, as you browse through
the pages of this site, we ask you to remember all the spiritual and financial
needs of Midwest Christian Outreach in your prayers. |
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