Getting The Message Out

  Samuel Morse was a lot of things. He was one of the foremost artists of the early 1800s, painting portraits for some of the most important people of the day. He was also America's first camera buff, popularizing it in America. He was a political radical, running unsuccessfully for mayor of New York and his anti-Catholic writings helped stir up hatred for immigrants. Yet he is known for the invention that helped launch an age of instant communication, the telegraph.

  Morse knew how important the telegraph could be but no one in Congress did. He needed their funds to put in the lines necessary to take the device to its fullest potential. Morse knew how to make them listen.

  He built a forty-mile line between Washington and Baltimore. It happened that year the Democratic convention was in Baltimore. Getting up to the minute updates on that year’s wild nomination process, that would eventually select a dark horse candidate James Polk, was something politicians could understand. Now they were interested in funding it.

  It was a lesson Morse had learned the hard way.

   In his first job as a painter, while creating a portrait of famous Frenchman and Revolutionary hero Lafayette, Morse got word that his wife was deathly ill. By the time he reached his home in Massachusetts, she had died and he had missed her funeral. Getting the word quickly was something he personally understood.

  When it comes to the most important message we need to be getting out, the Gospel, we should never be hesitant to use whatever technology we can to do it. The message is just too vital to wait around. We should be doing everything we can to get the Gospel to the world’s growing population. Are we using these new tools for that or for everything else?

 It should be personal to us. Without the Gospel’s saving message where would we be? The story of Jesus life, death, and resurrection is a tale we need to be telling in every way and ever means we can! Waiting around to tell our friends and neighbors could result in tragedy.

  Communication technology has come a long way since the telegraph, and so should our efforts to evangelize. TV, radio, satellite, cell phone, internet are all tools that should be put to use. The message is the same even if the means are different.