Internet Relay Chat (IRC) information page

EVANGELIST JOEY KELLY
New Orleans, Louisiana USA

Internet Relay Chat (IRC)

IRC (Internet Relay Chat) has been around around for years, far longer than the World Wide Web, in fact. Users chat back and forth in channels (chat areas set aside for special interests, hobbies, topics, ect.). IRC can be a lot of fun --- meeting people that share your interests, catching up on the latest political discussion, asking questions on how to run a particular piece of software --- you can find channels that explore just about any topic.

It should come as no surprise, therefore, that many christians are on IRC. Friendships are made, doctrines are hammered out, Bible studies are taught, sinners are converted --- you name it, and chances are someone has done it on christian IRC.

Speaking of winning souls, I have had the privilege of leading 3 people to the Lord last year (1998), right here on the internet, using this very medium of communication! The opportunities for serving the Lord are almost limitless.

Why don't you give IRC a try? You will need to download a client to talk on IRC. The most popular application by far is a neat little program called mIRC, or if you run Linux you'll probably want to use xchat. Once you have it downloaded and installed, use the help files to set mIRC up to work on your computer. Once you get it running, you can connect to just about any server (there are hundreds), but the biggest server network is EFnet. Scroll down the list of servers, and log on to one (there are about 2 dozen to choose from). Once connected, you have to select a channel to join. Below is a list of channels that my friends and I frequent. Come on in and get to know people!

By the way, the nick (nickname) I use is "mmlj4".

Christian channels on EFnet:

#biblebelievers
#Christian_Discussion
#christian

There are many more christian channels on EFnet, but these are the ones I frequent the most. You can ask someone in one of these channels or use the /whois function to find other channels if you like.

More thing I must mention --- not everyone on the Internet lives for God, and sometimes you will encounter off-color language and the like. We try to police our channels as best we can, however. If it becomes a problem, ask one of the channel regulars how to deal with the annoyance.

Happy chatting!