It started as a desire to do something for his local church. Jerry Pine of the La Sierra University Adventist Church in southern California decided to post the church’s weekly worship services on half a dozen podcast directories. This is what began churchpodcast.net, a podcast directory service that offers audio and video files with a “progressive and strong grace orientation.”

This grace-centered message is important to Pine, who explains that “Sixty percent of our young people finally got the idea that their salvation was safe ... they believe they can have confidence in their salvation.”

Though this number has been praised as high by some church leaders, Pine feels it is still low, and wants to spread a message: “There is nothing that a person can do—no act of barbarism, no crime too heinous—that can in any way diminish God’s love for each and every person on planet earth,” he says on churchpodcast.net.

He adds, “This axiom in no way implies one is free from moral and ethical responsibility just because God loves all of humanity unconditionally and equally.” This thinking, he says, is called “cheap grace.”

“We have to be responsible as Christians,” he says. “But if you feel you have to need to make a contribution in some form or fashion to your own salvation—by what you eat, what you wear, or where you go—you’ll probably be happier going to a different Web site.”

With these thoughts, Pine is at work posting links to various Adventist church’s podcasts, which can include anything from a music service to a sermon to news on current issues.

“If you do not subscribe to a particular faith system and are (rightly) turned off by what you see of Christianity in the media, I think (and hope) you will see a difference in what we have to offer here,” he says on the Web site.

When one thinks of a church podcast, they may think “sermon.” But, Pine says, podcasts do not necessarily need to take this form. “We [the Adventist Church] have huge resources at our disposal. There are all kinds of things we could be doing, such as [podcasts about] money management or health.” Get creative, he says.

Living in southern California, just an hour outside of Los Angeles, Pine says the cultural diversity is huge. La Sierra University reflects this, being ranked number one for campus diversity , according to the U.S. News & World Report’s America’s Best College’s 2006 issue. And with the diversity found in the Adventist Church, Pine also wants to see variety on the Web site. “I encourage people from different languages and cultures” to submit their podcasts.

He will listen to podcasts with “a critical ear” and check “sermon titles with a critical eye,” and then make a decision as to whether he will post them. “If I see something I’m not comfortable with, I’ll turn down the request.”

Podcasts are audio files, usually in an MP3 format, that can be automatically downloaded as they become available. They can be loaded to a portable audio device, such an as iPod, from a variety of podcast directories online, including the popular iTunes. “Think of it as subscription internet radio,” Pine says on his Web site.

More Adventist organizations are catching on to the possibilities podcasting has to offer. It Is Written, a church-owned media ministry based in southern California, just began a video podcast; the Public Affairs and Religious Liberty department for the church in North America provides a variety of information via podcasts; and Ground 7 News, which began in October, comes from the Communication Department of the church’s world headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland. Other local churches are posting podcasts as well.