Trying to Obey the Copyright Laws
Life on the Pasture
One of the challenges that comes with having online worship opportunities is the whole matter of obeying copyright laws. While we do pay fees to licensing services to be able to reproduce music in the bulletin and on the screen, those licenses do not necessarily cover everything that is done online. Thus, the music we’ve been using is done with special permission.
I fully understand that copyright laws are broken every day. (Shall we just say “YouTube” or “Google Images”?) It may seem trivial to be concerned about it in such a time as this. After all, there probably won’t be tons of people watching our content. But there is the matter of integrity and doing our best to honor our Lord as we honor laws that have been enacted.
As you know, this is the copyright symbol: ©. Can you imagine if God would have placed one of those on each of us? In other words, we are God’s exclusive property. Yet because of sin that property is not always used properly. Paul reminds us, “Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.” (1 Corinthians 6:19–20, NIV)
But here’s the cool thing about God’s copyright system: He encourages the spread of His work free of charge. The Holy Spirit is always working through the Word of God to change lives as people are brought to faith, and those whose lives are changed encourage others to know Jesus as they now know Him.
No confusing legalese there. Just the simple plain words of a loving God who sent His Son Jesus that we might, to quote Luther again, “be His own and live under Him in His Kingdom and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness, just as He is risen from the dead, lives and reigns to all eternity. This is most certainly true.” (Explanation of the Second Article, Luther’s Small Catechism with Explanation, ©2017 Concordia Publishing House, p. 17. 😊)
– Pastor Schmidt
Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash