The Sermon Browser Wordpress Plugin allows churches to simply upload sermons to their Wordpress website, where they can be searched, listened to, and downloaded. It is easy to use with comprehensive help and tutorials. Features include:
- Sermons can be searched by topic, preacher, bible passage or date.
- Full podcasting capabilities, including custom podcasts for individual users.
- Sermons uploaded in mp3 format can be played directly on your website using the 1PixelOut Audio Player.
- An optional sidebar widget displays sermons on all of your posts or pages.
- Embed videos from sites such as YouTube or Google Video.
- Other file types can also be uploaded, including PDF, Powerpoint, Word, text and RTF. Multiple files can be attached to single sermons.
- The full Bible text of the passage being preached on can be included on each sermon page (seven different versions, including ESV).
- Files can be uploaded to your own site through the browser or via FTP. Alternatively you can use other free audio hosting sites such as Odeo.
- Powerful templating function allows complete customisation to complement the look of your site.
- Simple statistics show how often each sermon has been listened to.
- Compatible with Wordpress MU.
- Extensive help and tutorial screencasts.
Download
Sermon Browser 0.37.3 (beta) (96 KiB, 168 hits)- Earlier versions and changelog
Installation
- Download the plugin, and unzip it.
- Place the sermonbrowser folder in your wp-content/plugins folder and upload it to your website. Wordpress MU users should put the contents of the folder in the wpmu-plugins folder.
- Activate the plugin from the plugins tab of your Wordpress admin.
- You may have to change the permissions on the upload folder (by default wp-content/uploads/sermons).
- Create a Wordpress page with the text [sermons]. The plugin will display your sermons on this page.
Tutorial Screencasts
These screencasts take your through the processing of setting up the plugin and entering sermons. Each one lasts for approximately 5 minutes each.
- Installation and Overview
- Basic Options
- Preachers, Series and Services
- Entering a new sermon
- Editing a sermon and adding embedded video
Demo
See Sermon Browser in action at Bethel Evangelical Church.
Screenshots
 |
 |
 |
 |
Frequenly Asked Questions
- I’ve activated the plugin, and entered in a few sermons, but they are not showing up to my website users. Where are they?
- What does the error message “Error: The upload folder is not writeable. You need to CHMOD the folder to 666 or 777.” mean?
- SermonBrowser spends a long time attempting to upload files, but the file is never uploaded. What’s happening?
- Why are my MP3 files are appearing as an icon, rather than as a player, as I’ve seen on other SermonBrowser sites?
- How do I change the Bible version from the ESV?
- When using the 1pixelout audio player, my pastor sounds like a chipmunk! What’s going on?
- How do I get recent sermons to display in my sidebar?
- My host only allows me a certain amount of disk space, and I have so many sermons uploaded, I’ve run out of space! What can I do?
- How do I upload videos to SermonBrowser?
- Can I turn off the “Powered by Sermonbrowser” link?
- What is the difference between the public and private podcast feeds?
- On the sermons page, what is the difference between subscribing to a full podcast, and subscribing to a custom podcast?
- Why doesn’t iTunes recognise the podcast links?
- Can I change the default sort order of the sermons?
- Why do I get a page not found error when I click on my podcast feed?
- Can I change the way sermons are displayed?
- The search form is too big/too small for my layout. How do I make it narrower/wider?
- Why is sometimes the Bible text missing?
- Why does my sermon page say I have exceeded my quota for ESV lookups?
- How can I change the icons that Sermon Browser uses, or add new icons?
Support the plugin
This plugin is provided free of charge, but that doesn’t mean it was without cost. It consists of over 4,200 lines of code, and a conservative estimate is that it took around 300 hours to be developed. If you have any ideas for future development, please leave a comment with your suggestion. If you are a programmer, perhaps you could write an enhancement. If you find the plugin useful to your church’s ministry, and can afford it, please consider a donation to support past and future development. If you are an individual and donate more than $25, or a church who donates more than $100, I will add your name to the list of Sermon Browser supporters, by way of a thank you.
Technical support
One of the reasons I spent a long time producing screencasts and FAQ’s is that like most people, I’m very busy! If you have a problem, I will help if I can, but please help me to help you by reading the FAQ, viewing the screencasts, and using Google a little. If you still can’t find the answer to your problem, leave a comment below and I’ll do my best to help. Other pages which may help you:
Popularity: 6% [?]
OK, I have another issue. The download link is working fine, but after it’s downloaded, the file can’t be played. Is this a problem with my encoding or with the plugin?
I have had a report of the same behavior as Josh is seeing. I’ve tested it thoroughly on a Mac, and the report came from a Windows XP user.
Hi Josh, I have the same problem, the problem is it isn’t saving the .mp3 at the end of the file, if you put it on yourself it will play, at least on mine it did…
Mike.
@Josh, @Jordan, @Mike: Hmm, this is weird. I downloaded the two most recent sermons from http://elimbaptist.org without any problems. I did the same at http://www.studytheword.net/ and my own website.
But I was not able to play the downloaded file from http://magaliapines.org/sermons?sermon_id=1 on Windows Media Player, though it loaded fine into Audacity. The file extension was present - Mike, can you post the page where it wasn’t?
I think I’m going to need some help therefore to work out what the problem is. If you are suffering with this problem, can you send me: (a) The original file - straight from your hard drive - that you uploaded. (b) The downloaded file that is causing you the problems. Hopefully, but examining the differences between those two files, I’ll be able to work out the problems. Please email them to mark in two separate emails (marking clearly which is which!).
I don’t understand, I downloaded two and both had the .mp3 but yesterday i downloaded the same one and it had no .mp3 extension…
also it created an image folder outside my root folder, my root is public_html and now i have a public_htmlimages outside of the public_html folder… I must have a trailing slash missing somewhere but where…
Mike.
I’d send you one of the files that isn’t working, but I haven’t been able to duplicate the problem. I’ll ask the guy who emailed me about the problem and then send the files on to you.
Hi Mark,
I did the experiment you suggested and edited that last sermon that wasn’t playable or downloadable by choosing to enter an URL in the attachment area. I put this in the URL: http://www.tpckearney.org/sermons_folder/2008-07-27.mp3
…and now when I view the list of all sermons here: http://www.tpckearney.org/sermons/ , nothing displays for the latest sermon, and when I go to the sermon details page here: http://www.tpckearney.org/sermons/?sermon_id=136 , both the player and the download link appear but the player just says “Connecting…” and never plays and the download link downloads a file with zero Kb in it. I noticed on the sermon details page, the download link was totally messed up reading: http://www.tpckearney.org/sermons/?download&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.tpckearney.org%2Fsermons_folder%2F2008-07-27.mp3
When I provide a URL for the attachment, am I supposed to enter the full address or a relative path?
Any ideas? I am kinda at a loss here. I am not sure If I should totally remove the plugin and delete everything and start over from scratch or what. I am sorry for bugging you so much….as if you needed more issues to resolve! (sigh)
Any suggestions are welcome.
@David: I’m not entirely sure of the problem. I added your URL to one of my sermons: http://bethel.markbarnes.net/sermons/?sermon_id=136 - you’ll see it works fine there.
That URL’s aren’t working for you, as well as files, suggests a deeper problem than I first suspected. Could you try adding another URL on an external site, and see if that works? (The download link that looks messed up is correct, by the way).
If it doesn’t, try deleting that sermon (not just the files) and re-entering it. Don’t delete the whole database - I’d like to know what’s causing this in case it’s a bug with my code
If none of that works, I’d be happy to have a look at your server if you were willing to provide me with FTP/Wordpress log-in details (and a link to PHPMyAdmin if you have it). If so, my e-mail address is in my previous comment.
OK, here’s the next version. It includes fixing a security loophole (only a hypothetical one, but nevertheless, you should update). I’m continuing to work on the download problems various people are experiencing, but being unable to replicate any of them is making progress slow. I’m hopeful this new version might help, though.
Here’s the changelog:
Hi Mark,
The most recent version of Sermon Browser fixed the issues I was having with large files. Thanks for the update!