Church Admin Plugin

Add Already uploaded sermon

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If you upload sermon audio files directly to your server — via FTP, your hosting file manager, or a tool like WP File Manager — rather than through the WordPress media library, this screen lets you register those files with Church Admin so they appear in the sermon listing and podcast feed.

Go to Church Admin → Media → Add uploaded file.

Why use this instead of the standard upload?

WordPress has a maximum file upload size limit set by your hosting provider — often 32MB or 64MB. Sermon audio files recorded at higher quality can easily exceed this. Uploading via FTP or the hosting file manager bypasses this limit entirely, allowing you to upload files of any size. Once uploaded to the server, use this screen to register the file with Church Admin.

This approach is also useful if you batch-upload several weeks of sermons at once outside of WordPress and want to register them all without going through the standard upload form each time.

Before you start

Upload the audio file to a folder on your server first. The recommended location is inside your WordPress uploads folder — typically /wp-content/uploads/ or a subfolder such as /wp-content/uploads/sermons/. Note the full URL of the file once uploaded — you’ll need it in the next step. For example:

https://yourchurch.org/wp-content/uploads/sermons/sermon-2025-10-05.mp3

Registering the file

File URL

Paste the full URL of the uploaded file. Church Admin checks that the URL is reachable and that the file exists before saving. If the URL is incorrect or the file isn’t accessible, an error is shown — double-check the path and try again.

File description

An optional label for the file — for example the sermon title or a descriptive filename. This helps identify the file in the media list. If left blank the URL is used as the label.

Saving

Click Save. The file is registered in Church Admin’s media library and becomes available to select when adding or editing a sermon — it appears in the WordPress media library option on the sermon upload form. From there, assign it to a sermon as you would any other audio file. See Upload sermon.

Checking registered files

All files registered through this screen appear in the uploaded files list at Church Admin → Media → Uploaded files. From there you can review the list, check URLs, and delete any registrations that are no longer needed. Deleting a registration does not delete the actual file from the server — it only removes the record from Church Admin.

Alternative — external URL

If your audio files are hosted on an external service — Amazon S3, SoundCloud, or similar — you don’t need to use this screen. Paste the external URL directly into the audio URL field when adding or editing a sermon. This screen is specifically for files that have been uploaded to your own server outside of WordPress. See Using Amazon AWS S3 cloud for sermons and Using SoundCloud in sermons.

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