God calls us to be good stewards in exponential times

If you are acquainted with the video “Shift Happens” you’ll recall the term “exponential times.” Significant developments in communication technology are introduced almost annually. Changes in communication tools in human history sometimes did not occur for millenia or centuries.

Exponential times demand exponential decision-making.

In light of all of that, we have been studying the communication tools we use as a United Methodist connection in Central Pennsylvania and asking the question: Are we called to do anything differently in relation to what we understand is good stewardship of the resources entrusted to us?

Part of the discernment is analyzing what portion of resources are allocated to specific communication media. Media that has been in place for many years must then defend its share of the CPC communication budget.

The LINK, which you are reading, has required approximately 70 percent of our communication budget over the past ten years. Two years ago it began to cost more to mail The LINK than to print it.

The communication technology that fulfills information demand, changes constantly. While print remains the preferred medium for many, more and more readers have migrated to electronics. And it is a reasonable assumption that electronics are becoming a preference across our constituency.

Beginning in October, the LINK will be published bi-monthly with issues identified as October/November, December/January, February/March, April/May, June/July, and August/September.

This change frees resources to bring the LINK to playing a better role. The paper needs to continue to provide a certain amount of news that is less time critical, but also needs to move toward becoming more resource-oriented as we learn together how to “make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.”

Time-critical news will become more the role of LINK Xpress and QuikLINK. So it behooves us to encourage more and more persons to subscribe to QuikLINK/LINK Xpress. It will also be important that persons, electronically connected, will be willing, in some cases, to share news with others who may not be attached to electronic media.

We know that there will be an adjustment period to this change, but we are confident that our readers will realize benefits in the future. JW