For more than two years, the Pacific Union Conference has encouraged and helped churches reach out on the Internet. Now the Union is offering free training for local pastors and webmasters—but only until the end of January.

For the next 30 days, the union has contracted with netAdventist designer Jesse Johnson to train local church leaders to make their websites active and to make them evangelistic. Johnson will work through:

Workshops at the conference offices.

Online workshops on Thursday evenings at 6 p.m. (Jan. 3, 10, 17, 24 and 31, with additional times available upon request).

Live video podcasts where users can interact, ask questions and get instant responses.

Newsletters with stories, successes, ideas and problems with their solutions.

Easy solutions for podcasting sermons, business card handouts, and more.

"By the end of 2007, over 575 Pacific Union churches had signed up for Union-sponsored netAdventist websites," says Johnson. And many other churches were using other web templets or custom sites.

Some of the sites—the ones actively using the system—are getting responses like these:

"I have really enjoyed your website. I feel my family and I are to attend this church. My wife is not so sure, would it be possible to have a home visit?" - M.

"I like your website. Thanks for the 3ABN TV access. I like the clean and uncomplicated look and the available information. I will be visiting your church very soon." - V.

"Would you please have someone contact me with more information about your church? We visited a month ago and are considering coming back." - D.

"From supporting and nurturing members to active online evangelism, a church website provides information and resources and a ready platform for the Holy Spirit to do His work," says Johnson. "How much more effective could we be if we had all our churches excited about using these tools to nurture and reach out to their communities? We need to do more to help those still complacent with what they're doing to take advantage of this resource, and to further empower those that have been using these tools to do more."

Johnson offers several quick suggestions on how churches can get started:

Record your sermons and upload them to your site. Choose any MP3 recorder—from a $20 basic device to a $500 machine. When you upload sermons recorded on an MP3 recorder, the sermons automatically become part of your podcast, no programming needed.

Take one of the online Bible studies yourself. If you don't have them on your website already, just add them through the drag-and-drop interface. Not only will you benefit from the study, but you will be more motivated to introduce them to others.

Print up business cards with your church website address and hand them out, or leave them in areas where they might be picked up and read. The whole church can get involved in this.

Learn more about the seminars at the Pacific Union website: www.puconline.org. Click on the Internet Ministries link.