MP3, Oral Learners and Christian Mission
Pastor Ojoli Moses takes Proclaimer MP3 players throughout rural Uganda. Cybermissions funds this outreach ministry. Most of those Pastor Ojoli Moses speaks to are partially literate, they are not comfortable with reading and writing, but they love listening, They are oral learners! Solar-powered MP3 players, radio, podcasts and downloadable audio files (for mobile phones) are among the best ways to reach them!
Who Are Oral Learners?
“An oral learner is someone who chooses to learn and communicate by oral means rather than written. They can be completely illiterate, functionally illiterate, visually impaired, or hearing impaired, or simply part of an oral culture. Oral learners are people all over the globe whose mental processes are primarily influenced by spoken rather than textual forms of communication. Two-thirds of the world’s population are oral learners.” (from Bing search)
Oral communicators are people from all over the globe, from all walks of life and all levels of education who communicate primarily or exclusively through oral, not textual means. Their lives are therefore more likely to be transformed through stories, songs, drama, proverbs and media. (orality.net/about/who-are-oral-communicators)
Scriptures In Use estimates there are an estimated 5.7 billion people who are oral learners. This includes 3 billion adults, 900 million very young children, and 450 million children.
The wonderful folk at the International Orality Network and Visual Story Network among many others have made huge contributions in helping the Church to become focused on developing strategies for oral learners, who, according to ION, constitute at least 80% of the unreached.
A Proclaimer MP3 layer is the “preacher” during this service in rural Uganda
How Does Cybermissions Reach Oral Learners?
Cybermissions reaches oral learners:
- Through its Internet radio station called Eternity Radio which can be found at EternityRadio.org – this large website has two English language programs (Insights for Eternity – 30 minutes, and Uplifting Moments -15 minutes), an ISOM School of Missions in Sundanese (an Indonesian language), and church-planting training audio modules from Harvestime.
- Radio programs. We buy time on the airwaves in areas where God is calling us to minister the grace of God (mainly in the Majority World).
- Solar-powered MP3 player distribution and training
- Distributing audio on SD cards through our partner BibleSeed
- And soon we want to start producing audio books that meet Amazon ACX standards.
Why Not Video?
Audio is easy to produce, takes up much less bandwidth that video, costs less to download in rural areas where the Internet is still expensive, and takes up far less space on SD cards and mobile phones. MP3 files are also more private since the listener can use headphones and no one can look over their shoulder to see what they are watching like they can with video (this is important in areas which may be hostile to the gospel).
Reaching the Unreached
If 80% of the unreached are oral learners, and if the only technology they own is a radio and a basic mobile phone, then audio is going to be one of the best media strategies for sharing the gospel.
Category: Ministry, Spring 2025
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