Millions Reaching Billions: A Digital Call to Mission
Written for Jesus Film Project’s Digital Strategies Department in the Digital Strategies Quarterly
The evangelistic impulse is not foreign to the Church, it is the Church. Mission is not something the Church does as an activity; it is something it is by essence. Theologians from David Bosch to Lesslie Newbigin have long argued that the Church was chosen and sent from its very origin, carrying within its DNA the code of gospel witness. That calling belongs to every believer in every faith community, in every generation. Evangelistic potential is never absent in believers; it is only, at times, unexpressed.
Digital Strategies exists to activate that potential.
And the need is real. Research tells us that the global Church is not doing evangelism regularly — that in nearly every region of the world, fewer than half of Christians feel equipped to share their faith with the people around them. At the same time, studies consistently show that personal relationships are the single greatest catalyst for conversion, with 60 to 90 percent of new believers pointing to a family member or friend as central in their decision. The millions who already believe hold the key to reaching the billions who don’t. Our work is to close the gap between what the Church already is and what it is actually doing.
Our department operates at the intersection of three commitments that define Jesus Film Project’s direction: to align and design platforms, media, and content that activate the body of Christ to engage every person with a Gospel Encounter; to deliver AI-enabled digital products and distribution pathways, informed by regional audience intelligence, that help next-generation audiences discover and respond; and to scale and expand Gospel Encounters in unreached and least-reached countries — closing the gaps in the Top 12 nations that hold the world’s greatest concentrations of unreached people.
Everything we build flows through three pillars. Media and Content creates the short films, animation, and contextualized gospel presentations that communicate the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus across every heart language and culture. Product and Innovation builds the digital infrastructure that carries that message forward — websites, platforms, and emerging technologies like VR that push the boundaries of what gospel distribution can look like. Digital Engagement designs the distribution pathways, go-to-market strategies, and partnership frameworks that guide audiences from first discovery to meaningful response and lasting follow-up.
All three pillars are being shaped through shifts like: Artificial Intelligence, which multiplies our capacity to create, distribute, and personalize at scale; the Next Generation, who are forming spiritual curiosity in digital spaces we must be present in; and Empowered Networks, the conviction that the future of missions is not more professionals, but millions of ordinary believers equipped with simple tools to share what they know to be true.
We cannot separate the reaching of billions from the activation of millions. The most leveraged work we can do is deep — equip believers, curate meaningful media, and create products that meet the Church where it is and call it back to what it has always been. Our department can begin to speak the digital language of the global church, awakening its acuity toward proclaiming the Gospel, and trusting the Great Commission to whom it belongs: everyone, everywhere.
