Andrew Lim, a self-confessed technology junky, says ministers hoping to keep in contact with the generations of the new millennium will have to learn to make advances in communication work for them.

Sydneyanglicans.net’s news story Caution: Minister Working shows how he is broadening a St Andrew’s Cathedral ministry to the inner-city Asian community through cutting edge communication.

Here are his top five tech toys for speeding up preparation, adding media impact to a message and keeping up that personal connection…

1. Bible and Theological Software
Essential stuff for rapid search, retrieval, and response. And a real space-saver for the minister with shelf space challenges. My favourite for Bible software is still QuickVerse " easy-to-use Bible search, and the beauty of picking up an older version is, with the faster processor speeds of new computers, you will find it much quicker than the new fangled Bible software! And for just-in-time answers to that tricky theological conundrum, it's hard to go past IVP's Essential IVP Reference Collection, comprising all their great dictionaries, atlases, and one-volume Bible commentaries.

2. Broadband Internet connection
How else can you most efficiently email, instant message, and research in cyberspace? Time is precious, so speed matters. "Nuff said. PS My absolutely essential ministry website? [url=http://bible.gospelcom.net]http://bible.gospelcom.net[/url]

3. USB Flash drive
These chewing-gum sized sticks are an excellent portable alternative to floppy disks, CDs, and other forms of data storage. The advantage of using one of these is their small size, but large storage capacity. Great for transporting programs and files to and from your work and home computers, sharing materials with colleagues, etc; especially as file sizes rapidly increase with the rise of multimedia content (the combination of text, images, sounds/songs, movies/video).

4. Mobile phone
Do you know the mobile phone networks each member of your congregation is on? The model or features don't matter as much as the mobile carrier. Some carriers offer free or 20c-for-10-minute-type arrangements to other mobile phones on the same network as your's! This can be a cost-effective way to keep in touch with the people under your care. On occasion, my carrier even offers free video calls. Great also for quick conversations in pockets of spare time.

5. PDA/Palm
Good for storing appointments, tasks, contact details, notes, but some also have a Swiss-army-knife-selection of sound recorders, movie players, digital cameras, word processors, e-book readers, etc. Not to mention the now-but-not-yet convergence between the mobile phone and the PDA.

Honorable mention
(ie. I'll-believe-it-when-I-see-a-church-with-a-budget-to-spring-for-one-of-these-babies).
BlackBerry
A device that provides instantaneous email-on-the-go for the minister who has too much email to write/answer and not enough time to do it. Why wait to log on to your computer, when you can read and reply to your emails in the taxi, waiting in queues, at the traffic lights, in the bathroom, walking the dog, and other pockets of thus-far wasted time?

Data projector
More for the church than for the minister. But OUCH! Quite an expense.

In the coming weeks Andrew will be taking readers through a step-by-step plan on how to make these tech tools work best in a ministry context.