October 2026 | Silver Spring, USA [Jounghan “Justin” Kim]<\/p>\n
A life-sized dinosaur fossil stands in front of Google\u2019s headquarters in California. Of all things\u2014a dinosaur, greeting the people of a tech giant.<\/p>\n
For a long time, I wondered about it until an Adventist friend who works at Google explained: The fossil is part of new employee orientation. The message is simple: dinosaurs are gone because they failed to adapt to a changing environment. Google reminds its employees that, as powerful as they may be today, if they fail to adapt, they too will disappear.<\/p>\n
What about us? The truth of the Bible cannot be changed. It is the same yesterday, today, and forever. That is our message. But the way we share that unchanging truth can adapt to each new environment.<\/p>\n
What do people talk about most in the digital world? According to a Statista survey, politics ranks number one and celebrities number two. But the third may surprise you: religion.1<\/sup><\/p>\n Look at Google Trends. For many years, online searches for \u2018second coming\u2019 remained relatively modest. In recent years, however, search interest has increased steadily, reaching its highest level during the period examined.2<\/sup> When the world trembles, it types its questions into a search bar\u2014and it is searching for the distinct Adventist message of the Second Coming. The digital world is our new mission field.<\/p>\n Ellen White wrote, \u201cLet every worker . . . study, plan, devise methods, to reach the people where they are. We must do something out of the common course of things. We must arrest the attention.\u201d3<\/sup> She wrote that a century before the smartphone. If she stood in our pulpits today, she would point at the device in your pocket.<\/p>\n A few years ago, the General Conference brought together a digital evangelism team with one simple mission: find the best way to reach people online. In 2019, we ran a global digital marketing campaign to present the gospel in ways we know best: Bible studies and health seminars. Each came with a clear invitation, and each bore fruit\u2014about four responses per dollar spent for Bible studies, six responses per dollar for the health message. Encouraging numbers.<\/p>\n Then we presented one more thing, and it changed everything. Out of a sample of more than a million people, this single invitation drew thirty-three responses per dollar\u2014almost eight times the interest of our traditional approaches.<\/p>\n It involved prayer. \u201cWe are your neighbour. We want to pray for you. Send us a message.\u201d<\/p>\n Three lessons emerged from the experience. First, people need your prayers. Second, we can reach our communities not only with Bible studies and health seminars but also powerfully with prayer. Third, prayer opens the door to follow-up conversations. When someone asks, \u201cMay I pray for you?\u201d\u2014who says no?<\/p>\n The reason this works especially well online is that researchers have found that people open their hearts more in digital communication than in person\u2014and prayer is precisely the act of opening the heart. Online, prayer becomes the most natural bridge of all.<\/p>\n When someone shares a prayer request with you, it is more than a request. It is a golden moment\u2014the beginning of a spiritual relationship. So do not just say, \u201cI\u2019ll pray for you,\u201d and then pray quietly on your own. Actually send your prayer through your digital device: a short, personal, written prayer with a verse of Scripture, one they can read with their own eyes. As they read it, the Holy Spirit speaks. Within three days, reach out again: \u201cI\u2019m still praying for you. How are you today?\u201d As you share something sacred, a spiritual friendship is born. In this way, you deliver a personal message of blessing in prayer\u2014and you become a digital missionary.<\/p>\n Why do so many assume digital ministry belongs to the younger generation? Because when we hear digital ministry, we think of content creation\u2014filming, editing, designing. While content is a big part of digital mission, there is something even more important that we often ignore: engagement. The digital world is built for two-way conversation, and without engagement, our content rarely travels from the digital world to the local church.<\/p>\n Digital ministry is not the responsibility of just the young. It is the work of the willing. Although not everyone can be a content creator, everyone can be an engager\u2014a prayer warrior who sends prayers continuously and leads a soul toward the Lord\u2014a friend who reflects God\u2019s love in every message.<\/p>\n Some years ago, I preached about digital evangelism to a small country congregation. Most heads in the pews were white-haired, and the church\u2019s media system was, to put it kindly, vintage\u2014the projector still ran on an old VGA cable. At the end of the service, a senior in a wheelchair approached me. \u201cPastor,\u201d he said. \u201cYou are the answer to my prayer. Because of my health, I cannot go out. I cannot visit anyone. But I have a phone\u2014and I know how to pray. I can send my prayers to others.\u201d<\/p>\n He may never film a video. He may never send a Tweet. But he is an engager\u2014connecting hearts, click by click, to one another and God. The member who cannot leave her home can still pray, write, and knock on the door of a heart around the world every day.<\/p>\n I have helped implement digital prayer ministry in about 50 local churches and followed up with each one. The results fell into three groups. Some congregations saw wonderful fruit\u2014new people, new energy, real excitement. Some saw modest results. And some said, \u201cIt did not work.\u201d Same method, similar communities, similar settings. Why the difference?<\/p>\n Two observations\u2014and they are connected. First, leadership. Where the pastor and head elder were highly motivated, it flowed to the members. Their ownership was full\u2014and it worked. Second, that motivated leadership opened the door to something more. The fruitful churches never treated this as one department\u2019s initiative. It was a whole-church initiative, naturally combined with the ministries they already had\u2014community services, prayer ministry, Bible study groups\u2014and it was far more effective as a result. I call this the hybrid approach.<\/p>\n A single mother sent a prayer request: she was discouraged, unable to find an affordable plumber. The church prayed and sent her a written prayer. Then they did more\u2014the church\u2019s volunteer service team offered to help her for free. She said yes. Online engagement became in-person engagement.<\/p>\n A Buddhist woman kept sending the same request: \u201cPlease pray for my faith.\u201d Months later, she wrote, \u201cI want to read the Bible. Where can I buy one?\u201d The member who had been praying for her asked for her address, bought a Bible, and delivered it in person. \u201cThis is my first Bible in my life,\u201d the woman said. Later, she came to church.<\/p>\n If someone writes, \u201cTomorrow I have surgery. I\u2019m scared. Please pray for me,\u201d not only send the prayer but also offer more: an anointing service, a visit, or prayer in person.<\/p>\n Because a critical broken link often exists between online engagement and the local church, the hybrid approach is the bridge. When you combine digital prayer with in-person care\u2014visitation, service, presence\u2014people do not just receive our messages. They walk through our doors. And that is the purpose of digital ministry.<\/p>\n Jesus said, \u201cSeek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you\u201d (Matt. 6:33, NKJV). If we are honest, most of our prayer time goes to \u201call these things\u201d\u2014family, health, jobs. But Jesus asks for something prior: evangelistic prayer. Prayer that asks God for souls before it requests anything else.<\/p>\n So, choose one name right now: a friend, a neighbour, a coworker, whoever the Holy Spirit just brought to your mind. Then send something like this:<\/p>\n Hi, [name]. I thought of you today, and I want you to know I just prayed for you: \u201cDear Father, thank You for my friend [name]. You promised, \u2018I am with you always\u2019 (Matt. 28:20). Please stay close to [name] today and strengthen [his\/her] faith. In Jesus\u2019 name, amen.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n That is the whole ministry: a greeting with their name, a prayer of just a couple of sentences with one short verse. Short and sincere is more powerful than eloquent.<\/p>\n Now three things. Send it today, while the name is still warm on your heart. Make it continuous, not a one-time gesture. Within two or three days, write again: \u201cI\u2019m still praying for you. How are you?\u201d The harvest is not in the first message. It is in the faithful, day-after-day knocks on the door of a heart.<\/p>\n In September 2027, the worldwide Seventh-day Adventist Church will mark the 2,000th anniversary of the moment Jesus began His public ministry at the Jordan River. The church has set aside that month for one of the largest unified gospel proclamations we have ever attempted: OneVoice27. The theme is \u201cAll things new: hope starts here\u201d (Rev. 21:5). The vision: Mission for All.<\/p>\n How does a worldwide church speak with one voice? Through every method. Carried by every member. Personal visits. Family Bible studies. Health ministry. Literature. Public evangelism. Radio and television. And now the screen is already in our pockets. Five billion people currently live part of every day on a screen, and we cannot leave that field untouched\u2014not if we are the people of Revelation 14:6, sent \u201cto every nation, tribe, tongue, and people.\u201d<\/p>\n The months before September 2027 are a runway for takeoff, and the engine underneath every method is prayer. Imagine more than 24 million Adventists and 185,000 churches and companies sending one message: \u201cWe are your neighbour. We want to pray for you.\u201d Imagine our neighbours knowing the Adventist Church as a house of prayer\u2014and Adventists as men and women of prayer. If that happens, I believe Jesus will return sooner.<\/p>\n Today, when young people lose hope, they do not write their last words on paper. They record their last words on social media.<\/p>\n A young man in California had lost all hope. He was about to end his life. As he opened his social media, he felt completely alone\u2014as though no one cared. But the advertisement he saw on his device was clear: \u201cWe care about you. The Seventh-day Adventist Church wants to pray for you. Send us a message.\u201d<\/p>\n Instead of writing his final words, he clicked on the ad and sent us his prayer request. We received it, and we prayed together. But here is the key lesson: we not only prayed\u2014we sent our prayers back to him through social media. When he read them, the Holy Spirit touched his heart. He survived.<\/p>\n When one of the most traditional practices of our faith meets the newest technology in human history, God saves His precious souls.<\/p>\n A church prayed\u2014and served\u2014and reached a single mother. A member prayed, and a Buddhist woman held her first Bible. A man in a wheelchair is praying right now from a home he cannot leave. Somewhere tonight, someone is typing what they believe are their last words\u2014and your prayer may be the message that reaches them first.<\/p>\n OneVoice27 does not begin in September 2027. It starts with one prayer, sent today, in Jesus\u2019 name. And the question we cannot avoid is:<\/p>\n Are you in?<\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1<\/sup> Statista Research Department, \u201cTopics on Which Internet Users Have Seen Trolling Online According to Internet Users in the United States as of August 2017,\u201d Statista, August 2017, https:\/\/www.statista.com\/statistics\/380051\/topics-witness-trolling-behavior-internet\/<\/a>.<\/p>\n 2<\/sup> Google Trends, \u201cSecond Coming,\u201d worldwide search interest, accessed August 4, 2026, https:\/\/trends.google.com\/trends\/explore?date=all&q=second%20coming<\/a>.<\/p>\n 3<\/sup> Ellen G. White, Evangelism (Washington, DC: Review and Herald Pub. Assn., 1946), 122, 123.<\/p>\n [Photos: Nastyaofly \/ Envato]<\/em><\/p>\n The original version<\/a> of this article was posted on the Ministry Magazine<\/a> website.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Digital evangelism that welcomes people into your church<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":43,"featured_media":26756,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26753","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ted.adventist.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26753","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ted.adventist.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ted.adventist.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ted.adventist.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/43"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ted.adventist.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26753"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/ted.adventist.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26753\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26807,"href":"https:\/\/ted.adventist.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26753\/revisions\/26807"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ted.adventist.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ted.adventist.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26753"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ted.adventist.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26753"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ted.adventist.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26753"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The Most Powerful Way to Reach the Digital World<\/h2>\n
Everyone Can Be a Digital Missionary<\/h2>\n
The Bridge From the Local Church to Online Engagement<\/h2>\n
Your First Digital Prayer<\/h2>\n
OneVoice27: Mission for All<\/h2>\n
The Last Words Never Written<\/h2>\n
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