A Most Unlikely Tech Pioneer

If God wanted to start up a technology mission, you’d think He would have chosen someone like Elon Musk – brilliant, entrepreneurial, technologically savvy. But as we know from 1 Corinthians 1, God doesn’t look at these things as we do. And so in order to start up a ministry in 1939 that would remain technologically important until the present, He chose Joy Ridderhof.

Joy was the youngest of a large immigrant family, not the most organized or dripping with ability. She was famously known for finding herself sitting on the edge of her bed in dim light, uncertain as to whether she’d been dressing or undressing. She chose to continue undressing and go back to bed… only to have older siblings burst into the room and demand to know why she wasn’t up yet on a school day!

From Vinyl to Smartphones: GRN’s Tech Journey

But God is way more brilliant than us. He instilled in this determined young woman the idea of sending audio recordings where no one else (such as herself, due to illness) could go. And he gave her such a passion for this, and such a win-me-over smile, that almost willy-nilly executive secretary types joined her to run the office, and brilliant inventors and engineers used or created the most modern technologies available at the time, and strong men came along to press records and run print shops and ship pallets of records and… everything else needed. Oh, and cadres of young adventurous people joined the ministry and fanned out over the globe to continue the task of “Capturing Voices” that Joy herself (with two faithful sidekicks) had begun.

When vinyl records were the latest technology, God raised up record-pressing centers in multiple locations around the world. When plastic tape in small cassettes came along, the mission switched (over some years) to that technology. Then CD’s and, later, SD cards.

Built by Prayer, Fueled by Faith

These advances were reflected on the recording side as well. From imprinting the voice directly onto wax discs to wire spools to paper tape to plastic coated reels; from car-sized recording equipment requiring its own generator to mission-built smaller machines to the faithful Swiss-made Nagra and batteries. For recorders as well as players, God provided creative engineers where nothing was commercially available. They invented usable and sturdy hand-wound players, from the unforgettable CardTalk to the simple Sabre, still in use today.

And then when recording went digital, GRN was able to ride that tsunami. All recording is digital today; all our recorded messages are available online. It is the largest treasure trove of audio messages in over 6,500 languages, all available through free apps on the ubiquitous cell phone.

Technology, through the years, has been GRN’s middle name. If you would like to read more about all this, our 2024 Magazine called “Then and Now” features several stories in depth. Suffice it here to say that God indeed “chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise and… the weak things of the world to shame the strong.”

The Heart Behind the Innovation

But Joy was known for something else besides technology. Remember that passion, that winning smile? People most remember Joy for her attitude of trusting faith and rejoicing in every circumstance. She knew God came first, and therefore “Faith, Prayer, and Rejoicing” were the three pillars of Gospel Recordings, later Global Recordings Network (GRN). “Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain” (Ps. 127:1), so GRN was built first with prayer and only then with the use of timely technologies. Faithful rejoicing paved the way to creative inventions. May it always be so with GRN!

What about you? Education and training are fine things. Intelligence and determination are important. But even more crucial are a willing heart and open ears to hear what God is telling you to do. Will you be like Joy and use whatever gifts you have for the furthering of His Kingdom on this earth?

As always, “the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.”

(cf. 1 Corinthians 1:25-27)