14 Apr Spreading the Byte – The Need of Digital Missionaries in the Age of Connectivity

Education had its origin in our Omniscient God. The Apostle John beautifully expressed this in the opening lines of his gospel: “In the beginning the Word already existed. . . and the Word was God,” Jn 1:1, NLT. In the 21st century education is digitalized and we call it, ‘Digital education.’

As of July 2024, there are 5.45 billion internet users in the world, i.e. 67.1% of the global population. Of those, 5.17 billion people or 63.7% of the world’s population are social media users. The number of internet users has increased by about twice since 2013. The global internet user base is growing at a rate of 3.2% annually, but the growth rate is even higher in many developing economies.

We are all digital missionaries. Yes, technically. You may not be running a full digital ministry strategy but every time you’ve shared a gospel message and an image in Facebook or WhatsApp, you are serving as a digital missionary.

We are all digital missionaries if we use digital tools for the purpose of connecting to lost souls, hoping to lead them to their Savior Jesus Christ.

At this point the world is connected through mobile phones with wireless technology and it is not exclusive to the wealthy or developed countries. When the internet providers emerged across the world, the rural areas are no longer a problem for connectivity.

One click to know Jesus:
“I read everything about Christ and I want to become a Christian.” That was Zahid’s* Instagram message. Zahid was a Muslim living in Baghdad, Iraq. Months earlier, he clicked on one of the Christian Instagram ads and was interested to learn about Jesus and the Christian faith. Afterwards, he found a Christian and discussed faith with him. He had a growing sense of urgency to accept Christ and finally texted through Instagram to take that step. Zahid has begun walking with Jesus, watching videos on YouTube for more encouragement. One of the online Mission organisations approached him and connected him with other believers within his city.

Even though fundamentalists had taken the charge, more mission organizations explored an outreach for Arabic speakers. They met many people and started online Bible Studies to teach more about Jesus Christ.
Iraq was a country getting less focus, primarily because its digital infrastructure was weak and it was just beginning to grow. Mission organizations prayerfully considered this as an opportunity, launching their Arabic ministry with a focus on Iraq in late 2018.

Over the past few years, Iraq has invested and developed its digital infrastructure. Recently the government announced that it was going to provide free internet for the entire country. Today, ‘Search for Jesus’, Facebook page has almost half a million followers from Iraq. Several Muslims in this country have come to faith in Jesus Christ through digital media, run by a team of online volunteers, who had powerful testimonies of courageous faith.

This story is encouraging and faith-building, but it also illustrates an opportunity. I began with an overstatement: we are all digital missionaries. Yet, there are billions of people, who are online to whom the gospel should reach. While this is the current reality, the global picture is clear. At this point, there are mainly two groups in the world: the digitally connected and those who are not connected.

One means to take up:
There are over 275 million internet searches each day and 80% of all internet sessions begin at a search engine. Religion is one of the main topics people search for. Few internet surveys found that 38 million Americans get religious information online. 4 million of them do so daily, and 28 % of net users search for religion-related topics. One research estimates that up to 58 million Americans may worship solely over the internet by 2020. There is every indication that the internet is a major source of religious information where people of many cultures and languages collect their spiritual facts and opinions in private. Thus, it is a place where missionaries must be active.

The mission of ‘Billy Graham Evangelistic Association’ (BGEA) has always been a great model in using every effective means possible like radio, TV, satellite, and digital technologies as tools to share the gospel.
BGEA launched its first testing of an internet evangelism strategy in 2011, followed by a fully developed ministry model called ‘Search for Jesus’ in 2012. Trans World Radio (TWR) spread the gospel in many languages by using radio. After that, many TV channels spread the good news throughout the world. Now many evangelists are using YouTube, emails, Blogs, Podcasts, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter (X), etc for sharing God’s Word.

Likewise, we should utilize cyber space, equip volunteers to engage in online conversations, disciple visitors through online resources, and connect them to local believers when they are ready. We need to propagate these methods through workshops, practical talks, seminars, plenary sessions, etc.

UESI Literature Department has not conducted workshops on creative writing and tools for cyber evangelism for a long time. We have excellent and brilliant resource persons in our community. We have to use them to equip our generation for the upcoming challenges in evangelism and discipling.

One call, to obey:
It is evident that the Word of God convicts us, gives us confidence and hope. God is at work. The Great Commission (Mt 28:19) exhorts us, that we should serve not just our generation, but generations to come.’ Henry Martin, missionary to Iran rightly said, “The Spirit of Christ is the Spirit of Missions. The nearer we get to Him, the more intensely missionary we become.”

As new regions suddenly get access to internet, they come into a digital ecosystem that has already matured. Their starting point is our current experience. So they dive in quickly and explore thoroughly. The noise will rise quickly with messages from all kinds of religions. While it can be confusing and difficult, it is exciting to know that there is equal opportunity to know the Good News of Jesus Christ. In such situations, develop a clear and compelling presentation of the gospel that will already be available when they take their first steps online. Be a welcoming voice.

Evangelism can effectively take place in chat rooms, i-cafes, WhatsApp communities. It can also take place in email discussion groups, presentations on web pages and in dozens of other online avenues. Tony Whittaker of web-evangelism.com has extensive resources and his web-evangelism guide can be found at http://www.aibi.ph/articles/webguide.htm. The use of anonymous or pseudonymous email addresses makes web evangelism possible. Follow-up can be done by sending lessons through email and enabling converts to download Bible and discipleship resources. (http://www.aibi.ph/articles/gospel1.htm). As with all evangelism, integrity is a must. “Spamming”, aggressive pop-ups, and other approaches are unappreciated by most visitors and should not be a part of web-evangelism. The unique thing about web-evangelism is how specific and focused it can be.

An evangelism page called, “How To Become A Christian” targets people who want to become a Christian but don’t know how. It is read by thousands of people each year who have searched “How to become a Christian” on internet. Most of them give their life to Jesus (in 2007, 98.5 thousand people made decisions for Christ on this simple web page).

You can even target very specific groups e.g. with a web page in Hindi or in your mother tongue with a testimony and a specific title that will show up in the search engines and attract those towards conversion. Internet has also begun to be much more supportive of non-English scripts such as Tamil, Hindi, Japanese and Chinese. It is quite possible to be a full-time and a very productive internet-based personal evangelist.

Understanding the pressing need of a person is important in mission. Missiologists call that as ‘felt needs’. When these needs are met there is an opportunity for that person to discern his/her greater need of forgiveness of sins and reconciliation with the Lord. The needs could be physical, material, mental, emotional, social, spiritual or psychological. When an evangelist tries to meet the need, people respond to the gospel positively.

May the Lord find us faithful digital evangelists or missionaries to proclaim His truth, and may He give us the wisdom we need to do it well.

Jason Battula, a teacher in a government school, was active in the Indore ICEU and is now a part of the Chirala EGF, AP. He is married to Sneha Latha Madasu and they are blessed with 2 daughters, Eliza Shunemi doing MS in UK and Jane Shiza Samuel who works in a mission hospital. He can be reached at jasonbattula@gmail.com.