I was doing a little research today and reading God’s Secretaries by Adam Nicolson. One sentence captivated me: “The old church and the new technology were the closest of allies.” I know it’s a hobby-horse that I ride all the time, but the church has to be in the business of redeeming technology and using it to serve God’s purposes. We need to be turning iPods into GodiPods.

Hit the rewind button.

Martin Luther wasn’t just a theological genius. He was a technological genius. In fact, without the printing press, Luther’s genius would have impacted a few locals. But technology is what fueled the Protestant Reformation.

The Bible was unchained from medieval pulpits. Luther put the Bible in the hands of parishoners. It was the democritization of discipleship. The average Christian could read and study the word of God for themselves. We take it for granted, but the printing press was a Quantum leap in discipleship! It was the transition from oral to analog. What we are now experiencing is the digital revolution. We’re experiencing the shift from analog to digital.

Nicolson calls Luther “the first genius of mass communications.” His translation of the New Testament sold 3,000 copies immediately. A German printer estimated, forty years later, that he had sold 100,000 Lutheran Bibles.

There was a backlash from resisters. The first burning of a Prosetant Bible book was in 1521. A Protestant printer was burned in 1527. But technology fueled a revolution. The first Swedish Bible was printed in 1541. A Finnish New Testament was completed in 1548. The first Bible in Spanish was publihsed in 1569. A Polish Bible was printed in 1561. And a Hungarian Bible was published in 1590.

That theological revolution was facilitated by a technological development. Johann Gutenberg deserves some credit for the Protestant Revolution.

For what it’s worth, my passion for blogging and godcasting have historical roots. The Internet is to my generation what the printing press was to the 15th century.

Theology and technology ought to be the closest of allies.