F4F | Announcement RE: The Podcast

Podcast Announcement and Why the Show Is Returning to Audio

Hi, this is Chris Roseborough from Fighting for the Faith, and this short video is an announcement video. It's an announcement video to let you know some of the changes that we're making to improve the things we do here at Fighting for the Faith.

If you've been a follower of my teaching for any length of time, then you know that I originally started off as a discernment blogger and then made the switch over to podcasting, and then over the past couple of years have migrated my work over to YouTube, but a lot of people have requested that we bring the podcast back.

And so this video is to announce the return of the Fighting for the Faith podcast and what our plans are moving forward for the podcast, because one of the things we've been struggling with is to figure out how best to implement and to utilize both the YouTube platform as well as the podcast.

Finding a way for the two of them to work together has been challenging, and what has ended up happening is that, well, we've learned where the limits of YouTube are, and so let me kind of explain what we're going to be doing.

How YouTube Episodes Will Also Become Podcast Episodes

Moving forward, every episode of Fighting for the Faith that shows up on YouTube will make its way into a podcast version. If on some of the shorter YouTube versions, we might put two together into one podcast episode.

Now, that being the case, here's where the big change is going to be. There will be some podcast episodes that will not be available on YouTube. You say, what? Yeah. So, in fact, there will be some episodes of the podcast that are specifically for the podcast, but that being said, there will always be a video version of even a podcast episode.

What our thinking is that we want to make it so that we are able to go deeper into the teaching that we are offering here on YouTube, and the only way to effectively do that is to utilize the podcast.

But because the podcast misses a visual element, what we want to do is make the visual element available for both the podcast as well as the YouTube channel. I know that sounds kind of odd, but the idea then is that because of some of the rules, the community guidelines as they exist for YouTube, there's video content that we cannot put on YouTube without running the risk of running afoul of their rules.

So what we're going to do is we're going to make everything available over on the podcast, and then when we have something that's available only in the podcast, we'll announce it using the Communities tab here on YouTube.

So we'll send out a story or put a link up to let people know that there's podcast-exclusive content available over at the podcast at the website. Now with the new format being the case, one of the things we're also going to try to do is to start putting episodes of Fighting for the Faith together that not only work well together on YouTube as well as the podcast, but also group them together by topic or by series, and then do a better job of curating those topics in series so that you can have access to them in a way that's easy to share as courses and things like that.

Building Teaching Series for YouTube, Podcast, and Courses

So I'll give you an example. We're currently working on a series called Hearing the Voice of God, and the first episode of that will be on YouTube. Of course, the audio version will also be available on the podcast as well, so we'll make an audio version of that available.

But then there are two full-length sermon reviews that we are doing in that series that will be available over at the Fighting for the Faith website as part of the podcast. But there's also going to be a second in-depth Bible teaching that will be on YouTube.

So the idea here is that we're going to kind of offload certain portions of our teaching and what we're offering. It'll either be on YouTube or in the podcast, and always know that everything will be available in the podcast.

But that being the case, once we're done with the Hearing the Voice series, Hearing the Voice of God series, we're going to put it all together and make it available as a course, a course with at least four videos, maybe even five, and it'll be its own unit.

And you can actually sign up for the course, you can share the course, you can take the course, and here's the thing, it's going to be free. One of the things that I have felt very strongly about, and I mean this, I felt very strongly about in the past and now, is that I want the teaching that I present to the church publicly to be available for free.

That doesn't rule out that maybe someday in the future I might write a book or something like that. But as it is, the podcast, the media, the YouTube, the videos, and things like this, I want them to be available for free as a resource to the church, and I don't want to create a barrier for people.

So the idea then is that I've always believed, and I've never been proven wrong, that people who find the work that we do to be valuable, to be helpful in opening their eyes to what the truth is, opening their eyes to deception, that they will always support what we're doing in order to make it available for other people to have that same experience.

And so we're going to continue to make these things for free, even though we will be adding significant expenses to what we're doing here at Fighting for the Faith in making our content available in these ways.

Why the Content Will Focus More on Lasting Value and Clear Doctrine

But we fully trust and believe that the people that we're serving, and that's you, that you will continue to support us so that we can continue to do that. Some of my thinking along these lines is, and you'll note that the podcast in the past has had been a lot of reaction to or bringing news regarding whatever heretical doctrine of the day or teacher of the day was present, but in the 15 years that I've been doing Fighting for the Faith, either in podcast or blogging form, one of the things I've noticed is that the teachers who were super big 10, 15 years ago, they've all disappeared.

But the one thing that stayed the same is the false teaching. The false teaching has remained, even though the popular faces continue to roll out. Some people have retired, other peoples have left public ministry in shame.

And so as a result of this, nobody's talking about, you know, Mark Driscoll being a big teacher anymore. He washed out, if you would. Perry Noble, he's barely a shadow of what he used to be as far as the influence that he has.

And the idea is that we want to create content moving forward that will have a longer shelf value and won't be so dependent upon whatever the weird exotic teaching of the day is. We'll still put videos out addressing those topics, but always and again, we're looking for ways to compare what people are saying in the name of God to the Word of God in a way where a right handling of God's Word will become the focus and the center of what it is that we're offering, rather than just a side piece of it.

And that's always been my goal and part of the way in which I operate and think. So look forward to the changes ahead. If it doesn't make sense now, once we get past the first series, again, the first series we're doing in this new format is called Hearing the Voice of God.

Launching the Hearing the Voice of God Series

Part one will be released, I think, the same day that this announcement video is put out. Part two later in the week, and then on the podcast, you'll get part one and part two, as well as the in-depth sermon reviews that we're offering, one by Erwin McManus and the other by Rick Warren, probably in reverse order there, but you get the idea.

So and you'll see how it all works. And once it's all done, then I will announce how you can get the Hearing the Voice of God series, the course itself, so that you can have access to it in that way and share it as its own individual unit.

So stay tuned. It'll all make sense once we kind of work through it. But big announcement that, yes, the podcast is coming back, and I'm excited about that. I'm a little worried about how much work it's going to be, but oh, well.

So hopefully this was helpful to you. And so until next time, may God richly bless you in the grace and mercy won by Jesus, Christ is vicarious death on the cross for all of your sins. Amen.