Are you ready to evangelise on the digital frontier? At this summer’s Amsterdam 2023 conference, leaders from around the world told Ed Stetzer (pictured above) how they are seeing God move in the digital space.
“Digital technology will dominate the future, and if the people are there, we want the Word of God to be there,” Ed Stetzer told this year’s Amsterdam 2023 gathering.
Stetzer spelled out the enormous opportunity digital evangelism affords Christians today.
“Digital is a tool to reach unreached people groups in hostile locations, where unreached people find community. Some of the most impactful people are online – we see in this the call to the digital frontier.
“We’re on the cusp of something that will rewrite our world. Jesus wants his people riding that wave to tell the good news of the gospel.”
However, he said, many of our digital evangelism and discipleship strategies are as outdated as dial-up internet. Often, digital engagement is limited to pushing out content rather than actually reaching people.
There are three ways to address this, he said.
When it comes to mission, we need digital to move from peripheral to integral.
We also need to innovate and consider new ways of understanding how people come to a point of decision about faith, and how they then move forward.
“If the totality of our digital engagement is ‘click here if you want to follow Jesus’, we have failed in what it means to engage in evangelism as a process,” he said.
Lastly, we need to move from organisation-led mission to priesthood-led mission.
“Digital evangelism is too often confined to a few leaders. Take the next step of helping the church to recognise the power of digital spaces and to use tools that will inspire, mobilise and equip.
“If much of the world is rushing to engage in conversation there, why would we not want to be in that space?”
