Maintaining a Christian website often is a full time Christian ministry
by Don Koenig
I have come to the conclusion that many in the local body do not realize that keeping up a popular website is a full time ministry. Since 1999 when this website was started I have written and posted several million words. I have also key worded and tweaked each article so searchers can find them. It takes effort to get each article to rank high enough in the search engines for people to find it through their keyword searches. About 150,000 of my written articles are download each month from this website.
The emails and comments on articles sent to me require answers and take a lot of time. I also usually spend about four hours each day going through the news to find information to stay informed. Then there is the website administration that I do. All this takes a great deal of time. I usually spend somewhere between 50 to 80+ hours a week on this ministry.
It takes me as much time to do this job as does the job of a missionary or a pastor. I am not blowing my horn, I just want some who do not understand to realize why I do not do more to fit within their local church agendas.
All this effort has not been without results. This is a wide open ministry field to people all over the world. Many have not heard the gospel and do not have the freedom to hear it any other way. There are many others in the West that are not getting this information in their churches.
Many with websites as popular as mine have a staff to help. I do everything myself except for occasional proofreads. I would venture to say I am reaching more people with my website than local pastors and teachers unless they also have some popular media ministry. So please do not try to lay on me anything that you would not lay on any other Christian that is in a full time ministry position.
These facts certainly do not make my mission in the body of Christ any more important than the person who sweeps the floors at the local church. However, I know this website is the work that God wants me to be doing. This website in one way or another contains what I have learned over most of my lifetime.
Before I was called to start this website I often wondered what my obsession to learn these things was all about and what use I would be in the Lord since I was never one really equipped to be on stage to present it. I also came to understand that Satan wanted me dead or rendered totally useless so I could never be used by God. My only hope was that this obsession with prophecy, the state of the world, the church, and what scripture says about these subjects would bear fruit in my latter years. Now I am quite aware of why all the basic preparation took place many years before I even started this website.In addition to what I learned under others over the years, I believe God has given me additional understanding from the Bible on many Christian issues. So I take this website and the development of the articles and the links and the time I spend on this website very seriously and it has to be my first priority.
Please excuse me if I think that some local service in the Body is of lessor priority for me and perhaps better done by those in the local Body who were called to do it. I certainly am not saying I will not serve in the local Body, but I want the local Body to fully understand that this website is my foremost commission from the Lord. I am well aware that this website is why I am on earth and it also why Satan would love to thrash me and stop me from getting this information out.
I would be pleased to do any local agenda if there is a square hole for this square peg to fit into and their is time available. However, I do not like being pounded into round holes just to fill someone's pegboard (it is painful for me and it will split your pegboard). You must also understand that like anyone else in full time ministry I also need recreational downtime. Please do not expect me to be working 24/7.
As I told a recent pastor, "I wish to use the gifts God gave me to serve Him. I do not wish to work using gifts I do not possess."