XtianNinja took his name online from Matthew 6: the things a Christian does that nobody else should see. He was a preacher for 16 years. At the end of that, with a podcast and a wish to hear back from people rather than only send information out, he looked at who is on Twitch and available to watch for six hours at a time, neurodivergent, socially anxious, people who have to stay home to work all the time, and said those were people he knew. He started streaming full time from day one, with no other plan and no other job. That was five years ago.
Soon other Christian streamers were stumbling into his stream, many with no support and some who had left a church that told them streaming was not a real ministry. That led him to put together a leadership development class for them, and then to the two roles he holds now: content creator and digital community maker with Power to Change Canada (Cru in the US), and director of missionary care for Hope Digital Missions, which is exclusively digital, with a Discord of more than a thousand people.
Asked where digital missionaries really are, XtianNinja says they are hard to find, generally not connected to a local church and so without accountability or pastors, generally not funded, and facing things in their communities they are way under-trained for. God tends to call people to serve the people they were, he says, which is the strength of the work and also its cost. Hope Digital Missions answers with a community, counselors, small groups and HopeCon, a camp where people from the Discord meet in person, and then the question of whether there is a church near them. As sold out to digital missions as he is, he still thinks the best representation of church family is a local church.
The second half of the hour is about the church. XtianNinja has the degree, the experience and the credentials, and every time he approaches a region, a church or a leader the answer is no. Digital ministry brings a church no local return, he says: those people will never show up or be baptized there, so there is a disincentive to send its own disciple makers into the digital space. Even so, he says the hardest part is not hardening your heart against the body of Christ. He reads the great banquet in Luke 14 as the job: the invited make excuses, the servants go and get more, and then the third invitation goes to the highways and hedges, to people who did not know there was an invitation. And he offers some hope from sports ministry, once unthinkable on a Sunday and now welcome in almost any church, adding that by God's grace this change will not take 70 years.
Jeff says the conversation felt like looking in a mirror. XtianNinja's closing advice runs both ways: if you know the church, be kind to it and bring it along slowly; if you are part of the digital realm, find a community, because you don't have to do this alone. Find XtianNinja at https://xtian.ninja, which links to his work with both Power to Change and Hope Digital Missions.
Jeff Reed: All right, hey everybody, welcome to episode, well, you know what, I probably should have looked at that before I jumped on the phone today. Episode 370, let's call this 370, let's call this 379. Episode 379 of the Church Digital Podcast. I'm Jeff, founder here. I know we probably got, we probably, listen, I got somebody here coming on the stream today. Big, big, important guy.
Jeff Reed: A guy people know. And so probably got some new people in the audience. Welcome to the stream here. This is YouTube. Yes, YouTube can stream. I know we do a lot of Twitch, and Leighton does a great job with the Church Digital Twitch channel, twitch.tv slash thechurchdigital.
Jeff Reed: But over here on YouTube is kind of where I hang out. It's a little more of a gray crowd. A little older, a lot less emojis flying around the chat. And to be honest, this is what I call home. And so thanks for hanging out with us today for the stream. But we've got the Christian Ninja, Alan Deschanaux, jumping on.
Jeff Reed: I hope I pronounced that last name correctly. I just said that off the tip of my tongue. And I'll have to ask him in a second if I... Once again, butchered his last name, as I'm known to do. But hey, we've got 379 here. Going to talk with Alan about some of the work he's done historically in digital mission work and what he's currently working on now.
Jeff Reed: He's got one of these guys that's been around for a long time. And just off the cuff, before the stream, he said something about digital missionary member care, which immediately was red flags for me. So definitely going to be talking about that. Right around the corner. Hey, listen, we are doing a Bible study coming up right now.
XtianNinja: can we
Jeff Reed: We actually recorded it last night, daily devotionals and things. If you're on the church digital and you're not familiar with what we've got launching here on Monday called Scattered, we would love for you to join us in this. We're going through... 1 Peter, as a network, as a group. It's a 100% asynchronous Bible study. No time that you have to be on for a live thing to see.
Jeff Reed: You get the daily devotional sent to whatever inbox you're on, Discord, WhatsApp, email.
XtianNinja: And.
Jeff Reed: Yes, people do still email. Slack, Meta's Facebook, Meta's Instagram, whatever. We're not on TikTok yet. I got to figure that one out. But you get the daily devotional sent to you. You can interact in an asynchronous channel to connect with people and talk about what you're learning.
Jeff Reed: 1 Peter is an incredible book. We did the study last night, came together with some people as a team to create some of the content around it. And oh my gosh, as a digital missionary out there, if you're doing digital ministry and you're frustrated with what's going on in ministry and you need encouragement, Join us for this 1 Peter study. You are scattered in these platforms, and you may be exiled, but you are still chosen in what you're doing, and God sees value in that. So join us for the 1 Peter study.
Jeff Reed: thechurch.digital. It's right there on the homepage. Or check out thechurch.digital.com for more information on that. And so I think that's it for my commercial bit. I've made the Christian Ninja wait way too long. So let me bring him on the screen here.
Jeff Reed: Welcome. Welcome Christian Ninja to the conversation.
XtianNinja: hello my friend before we start your music is still on and it's pretty loud it's loud for me i love i love me some lo-fi but it's gotta stay low to be lo-fi
Jeff Reed: Is it loud for you? Okay. By the way, all right, I'll kill it. That was, I should give credit to that. That was, who are we listening to today? Chili Hop.
Jeff Reed: Chili Hop music. And Chili Hop is going goodbye. Thanks, Chili Hop. Yeah, sorry about that, man. I'll have to look at the tech on that. Why that's loud?
Jeff Reed: Yeah. Yeah, I've had it down. Anyway, that's my problem. I have always said, yes.
XtianNinja: It wouldn't be a stream if something wasn't broken.
Jeff Reed: Yeah, listen, there's always ways to make it better.
XtianNinja: Okay? Yep.
Jeff Reed: And I know you're no stranger to the streaming experience. So why Christian Ninja? Like, let's just start with that. Why Christian Ninja?
XtianNinja: So that came straight from Matthew chapter 6. So I was, you know, doing devos and whatever, and I came across Matthew chapter 6 for the umpteenth time and saw the words, you know, like, when you pray, go and, you know, don't let people know. And when you give, don't let people know. And when you, you know, like when you are... connecting to god go to a closet you know and so it got me kind of thinking like what what other things are christians supposed to do that nobody else should see right what are the what are the ninja ask you know things to do i started thinking about ninjas and their whole job was to go and infiltrate and to work among the people and sow discord and you know go and assassinate you know the right person through being, you know, the right, you know, like through trust and then, and then leaving like a ghost, nobody know where you went.
XtianNinja: And I started thinking about that along with the Christian realm. And that became a book called the art of the Christian Ninja. And then I just, I'm like, you know what, that is, that's what I want to be. That's who I want to be. I don't want, it's not about me. And it's not about what I can, you know, show on camera, give me the microphone.
XtianNinja: It's, it's all the stuff that matters is the stuff that nobody sees.
Jeff Reed: Wow. That was actually very, what sort of like legit, that was a legit response. I was expecting you to show me like a cool snake eyes tattoo or something kind of underneath, man.
XtianNinja: I've been accused of taking it from, from, you know, our guy, Tyler, the, the actual Ninja, you know, but I had it before he had it.
Jeff Reed: Yeah. Wow. Very, very cool. I will admit, you know, like historically with the Church Digital, I just went through one day and bought a bunch of domain names, you know, trying to like claim space so nobody else can be the church, whatever. And one of the domain names out there was, you know, .ninja.
XtianNinja: Right. Ninja.
Jeff Reed: And so for a stretch, I actually owned like the church .ninja.
XtianNinja: I love it.
Jeff Reed: I think I finally gave it up because I'm like, if somebody wants to do that, more power to them. But do you actually own like Christian .ninja or something?
XtianNinja: Right? X-T-I-I-N dot ninja. Yeah.
Jeff Reed: It's excellent.
XtianNinja: As soon as I saw that, I'm like, dot com is out the window. Forget that noise.
Jeff Reed: Oh, to 100%.
XtianNinja: I'm going to be dot ninja.
Jeff Reed: Yeah. Dot Ninja, man. Well done with that. Hey, so you may be, you're new to, I don't know, you're not new to us with the Church Digital. I know you've done through Taco some work over the years and Layton and the Twitch sphere, if that's a word, very well connected with TCD. You're probably, and this is the first time I think you've been on this show with me, right?
Jeff Reed: I don't think we've had a time to connect before.
XtianNinja: I think we were on something, but I don't think it was.
Jeff Reed: Something, maybe.
XtianNinja: There were some other people involved.
Jeff Reed: Yeah, just tell us a little bit.
XtianNinja: But I've been on a lot of things, and you're a busy boy.
Jeff Reed: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Tell me a little bit about yourself. Like, do a little intro here.
XtianNinja: All right, so I've been a Christian for most of my life. My dad got saved when I was six. I have always been interested in technology. I actually wanted to go to school for it. But when they told me that the only thing I'd be allowed to do was program accounting software, I flunked out and said, forget that noise. Went to Bible school, and God got a hold of my heart there.
XtianNinja: When I went in there, I was angry and bitter and miserable because I was bullied through school and had a really bad year. And God just really changed me in that year to be able to connect with people and make friends and finally kind of open up and hear from him. And he just said, stay here. I went all the way through school, all the way through master's degree, got a bachelor's, got a master's, got to the end. And God, without asking me, that's for sure, said, you know, put me in to be a preacher. So I was a preacher for 16 years.
XtianNinja: uh before i got into this at the end of that i sat down and i'm like lord i'm pretty tired but like what do you want me to do next and as i started thinking and researching and looking a friend told me hey what are you doing now and i had a podcast my podcast was you know i was pouring all my energy in there and he said well keep doing that you know keep doing that and so you don't go crazy and see if god works through that and it kind of came on my heart that i was tired of sending out the information i wanted to you know hear back from folks which got me looking into into you know live streaming and then i saw twitch which i'd never really spent any time on before it wasn't my jam uh and as soon as i started looking for the demographics of who is on twitch who's available there who streams there who who's available to watch for six hours at a time i'm like dude those are my people man, like we're talking about, you know, the, the neurodivergent and socially awkward and social anxiety and people with, you know, mental health issues. And those are struggling with, or having to stay home to work all the time, or, you know, like just those kinds of folks. And I'm like, man, that's, those are people I know. And so Lord, what do you want me to do?
XtianNinja: You know? And so I went on there and I started streaming full time from day one, having never streamed before. And without any other plan and any other job. And I've been doing it for five years since. Yeah.
Jeff Reed: I want to back up because the one thing, I mean, first off, how old are you?
XtianNinja: Sure.
Jeff Reed: Because we look like we're the same age.
XtianNinja: I'm 48.
Jeff Reed: I'm 49, 48.
XtianNinja: I'm 48. It's true.
Jeff Reed: So I am the elder between us. I would not have called that, but that's okay. I'll sleep well tonight.
XtianNinja: Give me a couple months.
Jeff Reed: Yeah, you'll get there. Let's just back up and thank missional imagination. That's the technical phrase that I've been told. It was funny, you were interested in technology and computers, and when you were a kid, when we were a kid, that was the one thing we could do, write accounting software.
XtianNinja: yeah yeah
Jeff Reed: That was it. If you wanted a degree in computer science, the road that you had ahead of you was writing freaking accounting software. How can you use that in ministry? Nobody would tell you, nobody knew. There was no option for that. I see my audio's a little low.
Jeff Reed: That should be a little better. There was no option for us in that path. And now they're like, hey, you want to do something for Christ? They got all these different options and there's like support systems and excitement. It's like, man, this is a great time for ministry.
XtianNinja: Thank you.
Jeff Reed: Why did it suck so bad like 30 years ago?
XtianNinja: It was so new. Like, you go back to, like, your breakfast club where you got the jocks and you got the stoners and you got the nerds and you know what? That's real. That came from a real place.
Jeff Reed: Oh, totally.
XtianNinja: And so when computers came around, right, it wasn't like it was today where if you were into Marvel, you know, everybody watches Marvel movies. Or if you were into video games, everybody played video games. Or if you're into tech or having a really cool phone, everybody has a really cool phone. No, back then, that was still, you know... bleeding edge nerd stuff. And it was all very complicated and very technical because, and you had to really, really care.
XtianNinja: Like I remember grabbing the MS-DOS manual, you know, and I was 12 years old and I'm reading through this massive thing just to figure out how I can do anything on this computer because I was just fascinated by it. And if you weren't willing to put the time and the work and the sweat and the, you know, misery in, the computer really wasn't doing much for you, right?
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: And it wasn't until Windows 3.1 that we're... generally people were kind of able to maneuver around the computer and then it became more public. But yeah, when, when I started, when we started, uh, it, it was pretty minute, uh, knowledge and there's like one computer in the library, right? That's, that's what you got. Or you got the apple two E sitting there and all you can do is, you know, like play logo and an Oregon trail. That's it.
Jeff Reed: Yeah, Oregon Trail, man, what's his name, died of dysentery.
XtianNinja: That's all computers work forever. Yeah. All everybody, me included.
Jeff Reed: That's a good playback, yeah, yeah, yeah. Man, I tell you what, I'm just, coming from that season, you know, and I literally had, I described, I can honestly tell you, as a high school freshman, 1992, I was 14 years old, 15 years old, I felt a calling to be a digital pastor. Technology was described to me, the internet was described to me, and honestly, I had the thought,
XtianNinja: you you
Jeff Reed: this is what I feel like God's calling me to do with my life. What an incredible power that we can have. The church has got to figure out how to use that. And I've spent my life trying to help the church figure it out. I can remember my youth pastor at the time telling me, Jeff, there's only two churches in the planet that'll ever pay you to do anything in this space. Now, he wasn't wrong.
Jeff Reed: There's only two churches that will actually probably pay for that relationship.
XtianNinja: There's Life Church and probably another one somewhere. We don't know, but we're going to get another.
Jeff Reed: But that wasn't his point.
XtianNinja: Yeah.
Jeff Reed: The larger point is that, my gosh, there's so much opportunity that has opened up over the years. And, you know, Flat Cap actually just said, I saw it pop up on the screen. So thankful for, you know, the vision and the churches and the organizations that do have that digital foresight. And by the way, you know, there's been lots of chat coming in. And so please, if you've got questions you want to throw in, feel free to engage. uh with alan uh with uh christian ninja and i through this would love to see and hear for you thank you there was some feedback that the audio wasn't wasn't working and once again uh i will always find a way to screw up technology and so glad glad to do it um so
XtianNinja: jake man i yep got that in any stream yeah
Jeff Reed: So I knew you in taco standpoint. And so, and I know through taco, we've done some work and, and flat cap has. So maybe let's, let's talk a little bit. Cause there was a, there was, we were a taco and then there was a time where you step back. There was a time. And then during your time, stepping back, you came back and then I stepped back.
Jeff Reed: And so we've been kind of this where I'm like, actually, I don't know what you're actually doing right now. And half of this was, I wanted to catch up with you. So give us a, like a life update, a taco and, and, and, your time away and coming back and like, what's been going on?
XtianNinja: so to continue sort of that story about three months into when i was streaming not not even i started having content creators other other christians come in and this is back in the day you know when i started there weren't tags the christian tag didn't exist you got there's like i don't know like a list of maybe 10 tags or games. There wasn't much to work with. And so we couldn't find each other. The search engine was garbage and everybody was using it wrong anyway. And so the people would kind of stumble into my stream and they'd be like, wait a minute, you're a Christian?
XtianNinja: There's other Christians on here? And wait a minute, you used to be what? Your pastor? What? And every one of them was... uh i can't believe there's another christian i also am a streamer i have no support i don't know what i'm doing my church doesn't support me i left my church because when i told him i wanted to be you know digital missionary or reach the gaming community they laughed at me or they mocked me they said that it wasn't you know that wasn't a real ministry and so i just left the church to stay here and i haven't been back since and it broke my heart uh when i when i first started the stream it was basically i'm gonna be a you know say like everybody else would be a safe place for people to kind of hang out and you know maybe do a little bit of pastoral counseling but kind of be chill you know not be like like really christiany uh but when that started to happen i just felt god go i haven't taken you away from your previous ministry you're still supposed to do what i built you to do what i trained you to do what you've been doing for the last 16 years you're supposed to be doing organizational leadership development helping christians helping people become better believers helping people grow in their faith understand their gifts like do that take care of these people that are have been you know left twisted in the wind for however long and so that made me wonder what do i do and so that became
Jeff Reed: Hmm.
XtianNinja: uh well maybe i'll do some leadership development with them so i went and put together the leadership development class which became the taco class which became you know like we need to network these guys so they take care of each other i need help i need to you know people around i need a board i need people to come and help me should we be 501c2 you know i guess sure why not let's do that too and then it just kind of grew from there and and as i was uh trying to serve all we not even i we were trying to serve all the the christian content creators we could find from everywhere um it wasn't like after a few years i was trying to figure out you know what that what that kind of looks like i realized i'm not a great executive director i shouldn't you know like i'm just not good at it and so i stepped back i said to the guys you know i'm not a i shouldn't be leading this this thing like it's a good idea i believe in it and i want to be the pastor part of this we someone else needs to figure out all the ideas because i have not led this well to a place where people know what it is and understand half the planet who knows taco existed doesn't know what taco even means so that means i'm not doing a very good job so i stepped down into the pastor position and i kind of took some time away and off and then when uh like within a week of me doing that i got a call from a friend who just happened to set up a call and she was she she works with for launched uh the hope digital missions I hope Digital Missions has been around for a few years. And she said, you know what? We've had a position waiting for you since we started this thing.
XtianNinja: It's only been for you. It's been waiting for you. We didn't want anybody else in it. And so therefore, do you want it? And I'm like, yeah, sure. Let's do it.
XtianNinja: But as that was happening, at the same time, I had to figure out, I lost my, not lost, but my time with my denomination had come to a close. Because I was the first and only digital mission pastor that they had. I was on a one-year and then two-year kind of trial program.
Jeff Reed: Mm-hmm.
XtianNinja: And then they didn't know what to do with me, man. I wasn't a church plant. I wasn't a drop-in center. They still had no clue. And they're like, well, you can't be in the... We don't know what to do with your program forever.
XtianNinja: So go figure out what to do with yourself. And so that led me to talk to Power to Change Canada, which you guys would know in the US as Crew. And so I started joining up with them. I'm like, what does that mean? And so I did all the tests. I did all the stuff.
XtianNinja: And Hope Digital is like, we're US. We don't know how to pay you even if we wanted to. and so because that's a big pain in the butt because you're canadian and power to change uh wants me but they were like we we want you to you know do digital community stuff but but we're not totally sure what that means so you i guess you're gonna have to figure it out yourself write your own job description but we know that god's in it so sure you know and so that those two things merged to be like this perfect kind of union of things that help me, right? Because Power to Change Canada is able to run the finances and give me Medicare and all the rest of that stuff. Hope Digital Missions is a perfect counterpart to what I do with Power to Change.
XtianNinja: Power to Change, I am a content creator and digital community maker, right? That's what I do. I help digital community, build my own digital community. And I take care of people on the internet and create content for people and train people. With Hope Digital Missions, they brought me in as the director of missionary care.
Jeff Reed: Wow.
XtianNinja: So they have pastoral, they have missionaries, like digital missionaries, content creators, people that are like guerrilla missionaries and like Reddit, that they don't go online. They're just kind of in there like, hey, what about Jesus though? You know, that's, that's what they do. And so they got all these additional missionaries plus a discord of a thousand plus people that are all kind of in the same zone, but they need a pastor. They need someone who understands them, understands online, understands what it means to be a content creator, understands the internet and social media, but also has a pastor's heart and has a pastor's training. And they're like, that's you.
XtianNinja: And so it leads you like both of those things work. I get to do all of the coolest stuff. From the beginning, you've never met Jesus and you don't know anything about the church to the people who are actively in ministry, serving, taking care of their own community. I get to touch all that. It's unbelievably cool.
Jeff Reed: Ben, that's awesome. What sort of challenges? What are you finding with the digital missionaries? Where are they? What would you say the state of the average digital missionary you're connecting with is?
XtianNinja: So I would, they're, A, what's the hardest part? Finding them because they're, you know, but they're hard to find. Easier now, I would say, because you can kind of search them up. But there's a lot of different, I guess, issues with digital missionaries. They generally are struggling with mental health issues. They are generally, almost always, not connected to a local church.
XtianNinja: So they don't have accountability. They don't have pastors that are there. They're generally not funded, not anything to do with paying for the thing. So they're doing it all volunteer and they're getting things, having things happen in their communities that they're way under trained for, right? Folks coming in like, I want to off myself. What do I do?
XtianNinja: Like, I don't know, man. I'm here playing. you know fortnight i don't know what you're supposed to do like it's so like that that responsibility is high and they got their own stuff going on and no resources and no support system and no church take care of them that's generally what it is and so there are some that have taken off and when i started
Jeff Reed: Mm hmm.
XtianNinja: you know they these things kind of didn't exist like you didn't have support systems you didn't really have the networking and whatnot but it's gotten a lot better in the last five years where you've got people that have launched in sort of different spheres like i take care of commute or this this is communities that that take care of that they're specifically for like families and then this one raised up more like a digital church for people who don't have a church and another one raises up we take care of uh of people who are in any kind of digital like like like you guys right and then there's taco that raised up it's like we take care of content creators specifically like that now sort of exists which is way better and so being able to get to know
Jeff Reed: Mm hmm.
XtianNinja: the other leaders of this stuff. God has done something remarkable in this space in that we generally don't step on each other's toes. I was a pastor for a long time. Everybody in the same town, we're all kind of pulling from the same pool. We're all kind of doing the same thing. Even though we're different denominations, it's kind of the same.
XtianNinja: So there's kind of an underlying competitive, underlying comparative kind of thing. But when it comes to these digital missions, um like really supportive systems they're very diverse and everybody you know loves working together loves each other it's so so cool to be able to watch and then now they've just launched reach uh reach conference which last year was the the biggest conference for christian content creators in the world ever and it brought together hundreds of them i was able to be the uh the first speaker that was there that was super awesome and um people you know just finally meeting each other finally taking care of each other finally networking and weeping and laughing and playing like vtubers who who are by themselves off camera aren't known uh it's hordes of them come into Reach Conference and they're meeting and they're taking care of each other and they're loving each other and they become friends, which is what else do you want, man? That's exactly what you want.
XtianNinja: That's super powerful. God's doing awesome stuff out there.
Jeff Reed: Yeah. How do you, and this is, I'm kind of phrasing this on the negative side. Obviously, there's two sides, there's a shadow side to every question. But it's interesting, digital missionaries, and one of the things that you said is, like, there's some mental challenges, there's some mental health challenges centered around that. And then you're talking about a conference, ReachCon, where they come together and you get to hug and, you know, and engage. And it's great to be able to see some people physically.
Jeff Reed: It's a very difficult thing that we're doing as digital missionaries.
XtianNinja: it is yeah so
Jeff Reed: Why is that? And how do you counterbalance that as somebody that's providing member care?
XtianNinja: God, in my experience, God generally calls people to serve the people that you were.
Jeff Reed: Sorry.
XtianNinja: right like you were an alcoholic and now you have art for alcoholics you were abused now you have a heart for abuse people you were you know uneducated now you have a heart for you know education that kind of stuff i so i believe that the people who who are going through um social anxiety abuse ptsd uh neurodivergence difficulty with with finding friends uh part of the loneliness epidemic where they you know they they have been seen for a long time Or they're aged out, now they're 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, and they're by themselves or off on their own, but they don't hang around with a lot of people. Those are the ones that I believe God is kind of working in the heart of to go, you need to go care for people that are like you. and of course that's great because that's what you want like any missionary any any anybody is like yeah know the culture understand the people become one of them show love build trust and who better to do that than one of them right that's what you want and so but the problem is those people have their own
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: have their own baggage and have their own issues. Not to harp on the point, but they don't have support.
Jeff Reed: Sure.
XtianNinja: They're not coming from a church where they're feeling healthy and filled up on a Sunday and then pouring out of a full cup. They are also alone and also lonely and also struggling and also having a hard time just to get to stream.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: That's them too. So, of course, they're going to be doubling their struggles as they go public.
Jeff Reed: Yeah. To be honest, that's my story over the past year. And there were outside elements that were influencing it. I mean, I had open heart surgery in January, February, March. In March, I thought I was actually going to die.
XtianNinja: Wow.
Jeff Reed: Funny stories involving my Tesla driving me to the emergency room. because I didn't even have the awareness to think, oh, I should call an ambulance. And literally my blood pressure was so high, I thought I was going to die and the car was going to deliver me to this place with me being dead. Like I said, it's funny now, yeah, pretty much.
XtianNinja: rerouting to morgue.
Jeff Reed: We can laugh about it now, but at the time it was pretty morbid. But the reality is, as a digital missionary and a guy who the majority of his contacts were digitally, and this is the dark side, and I've shared with my digital friends, hey, you know what? When I sat in that hospital for a week, nobody actually physically came to visit me.
Jeff Reed: And honestly, there was one stretch where I had bronchitis as well, and doctors were concerned about so much, it was like even my parents weren't able to come and visit me in the room. And I was like, I'm alone. I've done all this work, I've poured myself into things, and in this moment, I'm just being blunt here, I'm alone.
XtianNinja: yeah yeah yeah yeah
Jeff Reed: Did anything I do actually matter? And, you know, I know it does. I know it did. And I know it will be. And I've got faith in God for these situations. And I'm seeing clearly now.
Jeff Reed: But I'm guilty of being clouded. In that, and I know it's so easy to be overwhelmed by that. Do you see, you know, I feel like I see that in so many other stories where life strains gets us down, much less the ability to then multiply it and share that with others. Do you feel that?
XtianNinja: So I think the hardest part of this ministry is that it is all dependent on the person that you're ministering to, right?
Jeff Reed: Do you see that in others?
XtianNinja: Like you, when I was an old school pastor, right? And all of a sudden you didn't come to church for a couple of weeks. I could go knock on your door. Hey, what's going on? You know, or call you on the phone or go talk to your mom. Hey, you know, what the heck is happening?
XtianNinja: Not so with digital missions, right? So if someone, I've had it, I've had it, man, where people, going through a bad time. I'm trying to manage, trying to talk to them, trying to help them. And then we get on a, on a voice call and they, you know, they're really opening up their heart and it's, it's crushing stuff like really bad. And I'm like, dad, you know, like that sucks, dude.
XtianNinja: And then get off the call and, you know, I'd love to talk to you again. And, and, you know, and then all of a sudden gone, gone from discord, gone from the stream, gone from everything, not returning any.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: And I'm like, That dude is gone, gone, right? How do I check? I don't know what city they're in. I don't know anybody they know that can't follow up.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: I can't help. They could be lying in a ditch somewhere and I don't know. They could be having just spiraling like crazy and need someone to come and take care of them. And there's nobody that can know because they. have been convinced by the enemy, by themselves, by their depression, by their medication, that they shouldn't reach out because they're like an infection. They're just going to make everybody miserable and whatever.
XtianNinja: They're tired of being that person. So they don't want to ask for help. And so there's lying there miserable and there's nothing I can do to get to them. It is heartbreaking. And that is actually what one of the cool things about Hope Digital Missions is that that's really the ministry. it is gathering people and trying to convince them a this is a safe place that we care for you you know come and hang out what you know we got sheriffs to make sure you're taken care of but also counselors and small groups and and you know like like help you with porn stuff and if you're a woman help you with that kind of stuff and and you know place for you to serve and try to build that trust to be able to say when you do have a freak out You know, they're people who do care that ultimately leads.
XtianNinja: And this is the cool one of the coolest things that about Hope Digital Missions. I think it's the coolest thing ever. Hope is they do HopeCon, which they try to convince. Folks on the Discord, digital folks, those folks that don't need to come to a camp and to come and live together for a few days and talk to each other for a few days and get to know each other, you know, skin on so that you can say to them, hey, this is pretty great, right?
Jeff Reed: Mm hmm.
XtianNinja: You know, like you guys and it's always, yeah, this is amazing. I wish I could do this more. And then you're like, yeah, well. there's probably a church in your area. Should we find you a church? Because you could have this every single week because there are people like this who will love you.
XtianNinja: Not everybody's bad. Not everybody will reject you. Not everybody is what your brain says it is. Like, let's get you connected to some place that was going to care for you locally. Because as sold out to digital missions as I am, as powerful as I think it is, I still think the best representation of church family is a local church.
Jeff Reed: Mm hmm.
XtianNinja: We can do like 90% of the one another's in Scripture online, right? But we're a great Dandade. We're a great in-between place. We're a great ER. We're a great burn unit for taking care of stuff. But we shouldn't be the final destination.
Jeff Reed: Yeah. I mean, that's a completely different side conversation. I don't know that I want to go for that one. Let's just say there's pros and cons on both sides. Yeah.
XtianNinja: Dude, I pastored three churches and two were abusive. I'm well aware that there are churches out there that you shouldn't go to for sure.
Jeff Reed: Yeah. Is Hope Digital Missions, are they exclusively digital? When you first said it, I thought it was like Hope Missions that just had a digital arm. The focus was aimed at...
XtianNinja: Exclusively digital.
Jeff Reed: So what do they define as a digital missionary?
XtianNinja: So people who, it's actually kind of cool because when I first started the job, I asked the same question, right? Because they're like, your job is to take care of the digital missionaries.
Jeff Reed: Mm-hmm.
XtianNinja: I'm like, cool, what are them? They're like, what do you call that, right? And their answer was, was, you know, like, well, it's people who do ministry online. I'm like, cool. So we've been having meetings.
XtianNinja: I've been writing stuff up. I've been talking to the team and whatnot to really define what it is. And essentially, for me, it comes down to anybody who is intentionally engaging in an arena online. for the sake of trying to build relationships that lead towards the gospel or lead towards trying to uh you know build a bridge of trust which is anything that could be that could be twitch right that could be just doing youtube videos that are pre-recorded that could also be somebody who goes into discords or goes on to reddit doesn't record anything doesn't turn on a camera but is kind of like a gorilla christian in these really rough environments these really rough subreddits being just trying to be salt and light and bring a little truth to a place that is really really wild and they just feel the heart for those people and they want to see if they can you know maybe change a few minds and open a few open a few conversations right that's a digital missionary too
Jeff Reed: Yeah, are you guys engaging much globally? Is it mostly Canadian, US, North American? Like what's your, you've referenced a lot of Discord and Twitch. So like what's your typical?
XtianNinja: as with any like like so power to change for example that that i work for is canada right but it is also campus crusade for christ also the billy graham association right so like i i can access if this is the coolest thing man i know it's not what you asked but this is the coolest thing um because i work for power to change now if someone comes into my stream and says i'm from
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: any city in the world man and they're like i just want to meet another christian or or i want to talk to somebody i can find someone because there's missionaries everywhere with with kevin crusade which is the hardest part right i've back when i started it you know you got someone that comes into into chat and they're like yeah they're talking and they mean all these other christian streamers then they get saved then their username changes and they become a super cool person then they say to me what church should i go to
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: And I'm like, well, where are you? London, England. Can't help, man. I have no idea, right? And so that, you know, is it global? It's as global as any digital thing, but really the majority of it is happening, you know, within US stuff.
XtianNinja: And in truth, the power to change is pretty old school. Like, like part of my job is the digital strategies to try to figure out how to engage with online.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: Cause they're still like on campus going to soup kitchens, you know, walking into, to senior centers like that, that they're still doing old school ministry. And they're just like, we really need to figure out the digital side of things. And so that's where I came in. So that's where all the things are gonna happen now.
Jeff Reed: Yeah. Excuse me again. I know I've had some conversations on the power to change side. I've talked with the North American crew, I think once or twice. Actually, I'm probably more connected with the Australia, New Zealand crew, which is a weird thing to say, but I'm just friends with one of the guys that's over there and he's pulled me in on a couple of things.
XtianNinja: You know, it's not online. It's not.
Jeff Reed: I'm just curious, what are you guys doing in Canada? What's the strategy piece you've been working on with power to change?
XtianNinja: So really, when I first started, this wasn't that long ago, the digital missions segment of Power to Change, the entire digital strategy, they created a mentoring software, right? And a mentoring site where it had a bunch of articles and training and whatnot. And the mission was use ads, right? Use like AdSense or whatever to drive people to the... mentor site so that they can either be connected to a live mentor one-on-one or kit or to become a mentor so they can serve others right that was the strategy And when I came in, it was a lot of me yelling at my computer.
XtianNinja: I got real excited. And I'm just like, you're missing so many steps, right?
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: Because the folks that you're trying to serve and the folks that are online, they do not want their first meeting to be one-on-one over a phone. Or in Facebook, there are so many things that need to happen in between. You got to meet them as an individual and they got to learn to trust you so you can introduce them to a digital community that is people like them, that is in between, not face, not anything, not voice, just text, that is asynchronous communication until they can build a trust that you can meet them in a DM. So when you're talking in the DM, you can maybe have a voice call if you built that far, which maybe leads to talking about, can you maybe think about doing mentor? think like there's so many steps that aren't represented in the plan right now and so i'm just bang bang banging that drum and everybody i've talked to is like you're absolutely right you're absolutely right uh and and we need to have a meeting about that so that's that's what i've been doing for the week for weeks you know oh yeah
Jeff Reed: Yeah. God bless Canadians. Oh, my gosh. For a second, I thought I was staring at myself, looking at myself in the mirror listening to you talk because it's almost like you're parroting everything I've said about the immediate admission type model. And everybody's like, well, how do we get the conversion rate, the business conversion rate up? It's like, well...
Jeff Reed: actually care about people, interact. Boil the frog slowly. Don't just assume people are going there. You've got to build the relationships and actually invest into it. Not money, time.
XtianNinja: How do you count members, baptism, and tithing? I'm sorry. We're going to have to count different things.
Jeff Reed: Yeah. God bless Canadians for listening, man. That's great.
XtianNinja: It's been exciting because, and kind of going back to where we did conversations a while ago, and that is it hasn't been easy to talk to local churches.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: I have been a rare bird. I've been a unicorn in the denomination. I have the degree. I have the experience. I have the title. I have been baptized as a digital minister.
XtianNinja: I have all the credentials you could ever want. I'm not some podunk off the internet who just decided to call himself pastor. I'm not just like some other whatever. I'm the guy. But every time I try to connect to region or I connect to a church or connect to a leader, the answer comes up, no.
XtianNinja: Not maybe later. It's no, we don't want to talk about that.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: We're not ready to talk about that. We don't have the money to talk about that. Nobody here knows how to do that. We're too old. Oh, yeah, we're thinking about doing that. We'll get back to you when we're ready.
Jeff Reed: Already, yeah.
XtianNinja: Nope. And so across the board, it's hard to get in. So as soon as you find somebody or a group or anybody that's willing to go, sorry, can you, can you want to talk about that more? It's, it's just gets me so excited, man. I'm just, because so, so much is just nah, nah, internet, nah.
Jeff Reed: It's literally, it's like you're my brother, man. I'm sorry. I'm literally like, where have you been all my life?
XtianNinja: We preach to the choir. Yeah.
Jeff Reed: It's just so freaking good right now.
XtianNinja: Is that me?
Jeff Reed: How... So one of the issues that, oh my gosh, so many different issues that I'm running into, but on the pastoral care, like caring for the missionaries, pastoral care, leaning into that, can you hear me? Check, check. I can hear you.
XtianNinja: Something glitched.
Jeff Reed: Can you hear me now?
XtianNinja: Okay, I'm back.
Jeff Reed: Yeah, you're here.
XtianNinja: Yeah, I can hear you now.
Jeff Reed: Okay, we're good.
XtianNinja: All right.
Jeff Reed: On the pastoral care side, on caring member care, missionary care, on caring for that side, how does this scale?
XtianNinja: Yeah, yeah.
Jeff Reed: Like, you know, individually, I can invest time, and the amount of time that I'm going to spend into an individual— now, I'm caring for a missionary, and so they're going to care for others, and so there's a little bit of scalability here— But as I look at this, I mean, I already see like dozens, if not hundreds of opportunities where care is necessary to step into. How is that, like what's Hope's plan or how are you challenging or addressing some of those issues now?
XtianNinja: So part of it, like with the taco class, that was part of it, right? Invite eight people to come in and talk directly at them for eight weeks, let them get to know each other, evaluate, train. That was the book, right? The book so other people can know, A, there's someone else out there that's thinking about this stuff, and now there's a book for them. Hooray.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: But that is the struggle, man, because within the digital missionary community, uh as we just talked about they really are struggling and there's this weird trying to mentor you know when you try to mentor somebody to get them to a place where they're healthy enough or they're they're strong enough or whatever that you can like okay now go work with messed up people who are gonna mess you up right this kind of thing the hard part is that there's like this this if you're a content creator
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: there's this drive to build your brand and build your channel. Cause that's all you're told all the time.
Jeff Reed: Right.
XtianNinja: And so when you, when you open up training for content creators or whatever, they, even if you just keep yelling, we're trying to mentor and disciple, and this isn't about growth. So many of them here networking and, and, you know, Brian Gross and nobody back and grow now.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: uh because that's what god called me to do is grow like no but and so that is a struggle but then also some of the troubles are so deep uh overwhelmingly i would say statistically most are are neurodivergent in some way adhd autism something like that so you're already working within you know that kind of difficulty and then when you add
Jeff Reed: Hmm.
XtianNinja: loneliness and and uh whatever else to the to the mix that person doesn't just need a six-week class go mentor people right they really do need a lot of care and finding mature and sensitive, called, relatively, you know, holy people who are willing to invest the time and aren't already in the ministry somewhere that understand the technology is pretty rare. I can find you those first five things everywhere. But then you try to hand them discord and... I don't know what it is, Gord. Sorry, I can't help.
XtianNinja: And that's it. Done. You got the greatest mentor ever. You can't get him involved. And the people who are technically able are very, very immature. So you have to bring them along slowly.
XtianNinja: That is a big struggle.
Jeff Reed: Yeah. I, you know, there are situations where I've tried Christ-centered recovery in digital space and gone down that road. And that was so many, you know, organizations about, you know, porting it over into digital and trying to help them. understand digital as a community, not as a communications tool.
XtianNinja: Mm hmm.
Jeff Reed: And, you know, I really face that challenge, trying to help them see and understand scalability. And, you know, I can remember talking with one Christ-centered recovery, and I'm like sharing stats with like... I think Barna came out with some stats in the season where it's like 60% of men are addicted to porn or actively looking at porn. 30% of them are doing it in secret without telling anybody. 40% of women are doing the same thing. It's an epidemic.
XtianNinja: yeah yeah yeah
Jeff Reed: That stat was out a couple years ago. I'm guesstimating on the numbers. And I was like, well, how are you as an organization? Like, how are you tackling this problem? And this one, I'm not gonna out the name of the organization, but this one organization's like, we have three appointment openings to train certified counselors. And I was like, no, no, no, no, you've got, it's a freaking epidemic.
Jeff Reed: Like, there's a massive problem. And this is not outside the church. This is inside the church. And you, as a nationally recognized Christian counseling organization, you have three slots. Like, there has to be a better option or opportunity.
XtianNinja: Mm-hmm.
Jeff Reed: And it's just been such a... I mean, just what you described, it's been such a struggle to try to find certified people that are comfortable being as counter-cultural as what you're describing. A, not even in seeing the opportunities that are necessary, but then also B, doing it in digital space. It's like... Um, we're, we're flipping the script on, on the digital growth versus, uh, discipleship because that's a thing with, with digital missionaries and content creators.
XtianNinja: Yeah.
Jeff Reed: How do you not be about the vanity metrics and the numbers? Secondly, we're also flipping the script on, on, on the Christians that are, don't abandon the gathering instead of, uh, or don't forsake the gathering of Hebrews and instead doing it.
XtianNinja: Yeah.
Jeff Reed: Hey, we're not forsaking the gathering. We are actually implementing the gathering right here in this opportunity. I have not felt this close to a 48-year-old man in months as I am right now in this conversation. It's hilarious.
XtianNinja: And think about the church, right?
Jeff Reed: Go ahead.
XtianNinja: So the church is also in crisis. Talking about Barna. You've got these churches that they're shrinking, they're closing, they're worried, they don't have enough money. And so the invitation to them is go put a bunch of energy and leadership and potentially money and your youth into this arena to people who will never come to your church.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: You'll never see a dime. You'll never see them come. They're not going to increase your numbers. You won't be able to do anything. You'll never baptize any of them because they are in different cities all around the world. And so therefore, the incentive, and it sounds horrible to say because it is, but the incentive to do that kind of ministry doesn't lead directly to local impact.
XtianNinja: And so there's a disincentive to use their own disciple makers and mature people in the digital space.
Jeff Reed: Yeah, I mean, to be honest, like if I'm psychoanalyzing myself at this moment, it's hard being so disruptive. I don't know, maybe that's not the right word. It's hard swimming upstream. I'm tired of being the salmon.
XtianNinja: You know...
Jeff Reed: You know what I'm saying?
XtianNinja: He says the hardest part is not hardening your heart against the body of Christ. To me, that's the hardest part because it is so easy to become a stem, right?
Jeff Reed: Amen.
XtianNinja: We're digital. They're traditional. Never the twain shall meet. They don't get it. We don't get it. They don't like us.
XtianNinja: We don't like them. We'll just split. And that is not how God wants this situation to work. God wants us to work together. We need the old school pastors and the old school Sunday teachers and that we need the local. We need people to care for those guys.
XtianNinja: We also, need the new thinkers and the online people people who are utilizing the new arena who are going into the the the frontier of digital ministry meeting people who no one has ever met before that's you know and that's what we're doing man like i did a little talk and did some stats like we as digital missionaries are reaching people nobody else can reach nobody else has reached why because every other ministry every other ministry is
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: come to our thing or we'll come to your thing that's the deception or third one we will convert your friend or your neighbor your mom or your dad or your brother who will then come talk to you and i'm like some people don't have any of that Right. I always think of the story in the scripture of the, you know, the great banquet where you have, you know, he sends out the invitations to the people who got invitations come on in and they all make excuses. They don't want to go. And then he says, go get more. Just go get anybody, man.
XtianNinja: And so they drag in folks from everywhere, inviting everyone they can to this banquet. And then he says. Go to the highways and byways. Go to the highways and hedges. Compel them to come in. We, as digital missionaries, are the ones who are looking behind walls, who are diving into ditches, who go the extra mile down the highway, who are looking behind walls, looking behind locked doors for people who would...
XtianNinja: didn't even know there was an invitation, who didn't know that it was a party, and the first group never even considered because they were actively hiding from the inviters. We go look for them.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: We need them. They need us, right?
Jeff Reed: Yeah. It's often, it has not been lost on me. It's funny, I'm throwing up comments here in the video as well of people that are agreeing what we're talking about. NCC Live, perhaps there can be a global local solution if digital ministry can show how digital can connect people to the local church. A, you've got to know people. B, you've got to trust the church.
Jeff Reed: It's not a bad idea. There's some challenges to that.
XtianNinja: Take a save point ministry, right?
Jeff Reed: Yeah, yeah.
XtianNinja: I don't know. Have you met Steve from save point?
Jeff Reed: Yes, yeah, we have.
XtianNinja: Right? So Steve from SavePoint, his whole ministry, his whole thing is trying to connect nerds online to local churches, right? And it is pulling out his hair hard. He's like, I do months of research. I call church after church after church. I look at website after website after website.
XtianNinja: I actively ask them, you know, do you have anybody who's a nerd? Do you understand anything? What is your welcome ball? You know, how do you do this thing? and try to find one person, one church, anywhere in that town is kind of impossible.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: Right?
Jeff Reed: Well, and nerds being what nerds is, yes.
XtianNinja: So he just celebrates if he can get anyone.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: Yeah.
Jeff Reed: That's so good. Which is funny. That's why I'm just going to back up a little bit. When you were like, man, there's pros and cons on both sides, that's exactly what I'm talking about. Because it's, I mean, I have a chip that's on my shoulder. Confession hour.
Jeff Reed: And I've talked about this before. It was so funny. One of my mentors,
Jeff Reed: This is a true story, honest to God. I put a post on Facebook, something about digital. And one of my mentors, one of the men who discipled me in college, posted a response on that. I love how God is using you in the local church. And the chip on my shoulder focused on local. And I'm like...
XtianNinja: so like you felt that was sarcasm yeah yeah yeah
Jeff Reed: Honestly, I'm not sure. I'm not sure in this moment. Ray is not watching this, and so I'm not worried. Ray, you and I will have this conversation. But my honest to God is, was that a jab with what I'm doing now? Does he not realize?
XtianNinja: Yeah, yeah.
Jeff Reed: Because I know some of the stuff that I'm doing, once again, is so countercultural. It doesn't resonate. And sometimes people think they're supportive when they're not. And sometimes I'm overly sensitive because, dude, I've been... poked and jabbed for 25 years.
XtianNinja: And you should be.
Jeff Reed: I'm tired.
XtianNinja: Look at Paul, right? So when Peter decided that he kind of backtracked on separation of Jews and... know the law keepers and whatnot and peter was a little bit nervous he didn't want to offend people and so he started pulling back paul lost his absolute mind on him he woke up to you know peter the leader of the disciples and bawled him out for saying no to the the people everybody else in the world right the gentiles you're saying no to the gentiles you're actively sitting with people and talking to people who are saying you shouldn't bring gentiles into the church they should join us they should be part of that he got actually angry right this new this new missionary to to to uh to peter see it's the same thing man right where you should be angry and it should make you infuriated that there are people out there that look at the folks that you love that you were called to that god gifted you to be able to serve that there that your heart has broken for you putting hours and hours and hours and thousands of dollars into and blood sweat and tears and they look at it and say that doesn't count quit
XtianNinja: It should crush. It should make you mad.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: That's why I said the hardest part of this is not getting better, man.
Jeff Reed: Yeah. His hardening to the Church. Yeah, I can tell you some stories that aren't... You know, it's funny, like, he's doing this example, and, you know, I know he knows, but I just want to say this publicly, that literally is happening. You know, we probably have a mutual friend, I'm not going to say his name on here, but this is a man who shared Jesus over 2,000 times in virtual reality, and his denomination told him to stop immediately or he would be excommunicated from the Church.
Jeff Reed: Do you know what I'm talking about? It's okay if not. But yeah, like that is a true story.
XtianNinja: No, I haven't heard that story.
Jeff Reed: It's a man that we used to work with, with the church digital. And Leighton's on here. Leighton knows him. And it's a true story. Dude literally shared Jesus over 2,000 times in virtual reality, evangelical church. And the denomination, the church organization said, cease immediately.
XtianNinja: So let me give you some hope.
Jeff Reed: And he did. Please.
XtianNinja: Back up 80 years, globally speaking. believe it or not, sports was what the internet and video games are now to the church.
Jeff Reed: Interesting. I'm listening.
XtianNinja: They, if there are places today that if you go and you're like play soccer on Sunday,
Jeff Reed: I hadn't heard this before.
XtianNinja: They will, you know, that's it. You're done. You're going to hell. That's it. No way. There's no sports on Sunday.
XtianNinja: Nobody's allowed to do that. You sit in your itchy pants all day long being miserable. That's how church is. 80 years ago, if you go to any place around North America, you go to any church and you start talking about how on Sunday you want to bring everybody together to have a ball game.
XtianNinja: Are you kidding? That's the Lord's Day. You can't be doing that. We're not even allowed to go to a movie. We're not allowed to mow our lawn. You're not going to be able to go out and play sports.
XtianNinja: Are you kidding me? Now, after you've had this many sports evangelists come through and show the effectiveness of what happens when you serve in the community as a coach and that you bring together people and that you connect sports to spiritual things, how effective that is after seven decades. of doing that you now if you walk into any church and you say hey i want to start a baseball ministry i think it'd be cool to get in the neighborhood and maybe bring people in and play catch on sundays every one of them would be like great idea that's the best thing i've ever heard in my life absolutely that would have been a a knockdown drag out
Jeff Reed: Yeah. Yeah.
XtianNinja: not that long ago, right? We're going faster, okay? By God's grace, it's not going to take 70 years for us to make this conversion because they can't help it. COVID made a huge push. It made everybody realize, wait a minute, the internet exists, and holy moly, that's crazy. It made everybody figure out, you know, who actually values going to church and who just wants to stay home.
XtianNinja: I think in the U.S., it was 45% didn't come back. And in Canada, I think it was 40% or 35% and 30%. Almost half didn't come back.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: So it showed where the priority was. And so we have been given gifts of pretty major crises that has forced the church to evaluate this technology. So I don't think it's going to take 70 years, but it will happen. It will happen.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: But I've said, you and me, we have... We've committed, I've committed, I'm not going to speak for you. I've committed to be the bushwhacker that is going to be, you know, going through the jungle for the first time, getting bit by the snakes, trying to trudge some kind of path, going through, you know, explaining it 500 times to people who don't listen, get to the end and pass out so that the next generation of content creators and digital missionaries will be able to go, wait a minute, we know how to do that.
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: Al did that, right?
Jeff Reed: Yeah.
XtianNinja: Okay, cool. We already know what to do with that. We fought it out with him. Your life is a little easier. I'm willing to do that. Somebody has to.
Jeff Reed: Yeah. And yeah, that's me, I would say. And every time I'm, and to be honest, every time I'm like, hey, you know what, God, I'm tired.
XtianNinja: Yeah, but you too. Absolutely.
Jeff Reed: I need a break. I'm gonna, I'm like, it was funny. Actually, I've said this publicly. Like I was fired from a church job about a month or two ago. Because I was like, hey, you know, I'll do this on the side, but I really, I need to make money. And so I'm like going to go work over here for the church.
Jeff Reed: And long story short, God was like, no, you're not going to work for that church. The church is going to let you go and you're going to die back full time into the church digital.
XtianNinja: Yeah.
Jeff Reed: So I'm like, okay, cool. Hey, we'll do that and figure it out. So God keeps reminding me to come back. I was funny. I've got this, you know, there was talking about the sports thing. Drew's he's got on here.
Jeff Reed: He's talking about a church that he was raising money for. I called him a heretic. There was there's a line. I've been trying to remember the exact quote, but it was.
Jeff Reed: Helen Keller quote, which is weird to me, I never considered Helen Keller like a theologian, but she was quoted as saying, today's heresy is tomorrow's orthodoxy? I think today's, like, what's considered a heretic today... tomorrow is going to be accepted and standardized. I don't know why Helen Keller would say that, but it's one of these quotes that I've kind of have resonated and stuck with me is going, hey, yeah, you know what?
XtianNinja: Yeah.
Jeff Reed: We're doing this today. I'll be honest. I never go on Twitch. I love the fact that guys like you and Leighton are supporting that. My digital efforts and my ministry is not in that because I...
XtianNinja: Yeah.
Jeff Reed: Listen, I said this yesterday at the Bible study. My kids beat me up when I play video games. My son's ranked number 50 in the state of Florida in something. He told me the other day, and I'm like, that means nothing to me, man. I'm sorry. Good for you.
Jeff Reed: I am excited about it.
XtianNinja: Yeah. Yeah.
Jeff Reed: You are doing a great job with your esports team and Super Mario Smash, whatever, but I haven't played that in 25 years, and I've been irrelevant in that.
XtianNinja: Yeah.
Jeff Reed: But I love the fact that he is and he's leaning into that. And that's really so much for what we're doing. And yeah, like I love what Crossing Tony, I'm guessing Crossing Tony is somewhat connected with you here. Is she with you?
XtianNinja: Remember that I was talking about the lady I was talking to that one time that said, that's her.
Jeff Reed: Yeah, this is her. Yeah, the church areas, it will continue to fail, but we should always be praying for our blind spots too, which is, once again, it's not the either or, and it's both.
XtianNinja: Yep. Yeah.
Jeff Reed: And if I'm calling myself out, yeah, there are times where I get, just in my story, I lean very heavily away from, I've got some trust issues, let's say it that way, and God's work in...
XtianNinja: Of course you do. Once burned, twice shy.
Jeff Reed: Exactly right. So, man, how do people get connected with Hope Digital Missions? What's the connection point? What's the process if people want more information?
XtianNinja: Okay, so...
Jeff Reed: Talk to me a little bit about it.
XtianNinja: Go to my website, christianninja.com or better, christian.ninja, X-T-I-A-N.ninja, which is the better URL. And you go there and you're going to see links to both, Power of Change, what I do there, and also Hope Digital Mission, what I do there. And then you'll be on their websites. Each of them has their own... major massive organization. So go in and do some research on what they're doing there.
XtianNinja: But if you want to know more about me, you know, the best thing you can do is join my sub stack and follow along with the stories and what I'm doing. Hope Digital Mission is very cool in that their majority of their ministry happens in Discord. And so if you're already on Discord, it's a matter of joining over there and they already got communities built and stuff. It's very, very easy and they try their best to keep everybody informed. Uh, power to change. That's just me, man.
XtianNinja: Uh, they, they're, they're my, I'm, I'm working with them. And so, but, but I'll try to keep everybody informed when things are going down and they're going to be like, I got, I got connected to today. Someone said, Al, we need you. We're, we're, believe it or not. We need you. We're, we're failing in this crossword puzzle.
XtianNinja: Come over. You got to help us out. And that was the person I was having a chat with about the ranting at, about digital missions, who was very excited, very interested. And she wants to continue the conversation. So, yeah, I'd say check out my website and then check out Hope.
Jeff Reed: X-T-I-A-N dot ninja.
XtianNinja: X-T-I-A-N. Because Christian's always gone.
Jeff Reed: It's... Yeah.
XtianNinja: Somebody already took it every single time. So I've had to just embrace the X. Christ.
Jeff Reed: X. But it's because X is Greek for Christ.
XtianNinja: Yeah, it's the first letter of Christ's name.
Jeff Reed: And so it was funny, my AI is like, who? Because I typed X-I-A-N, because that would be Christian, but I missed the T. And so it's like, who are you talking to?
XtianNinja: Mm-hmm. I'm aware.
Jeff Reed: And I'm like, what do you mean? Alan. And then it was so X-T-I-A-N. And so you're taking the Greek Christ and then you're putting the normal cross and then I-A-N. So it's like cross, cross times two.
XtianNinja: Definitely. That's exactly what I was doing for sure.
Jeff Reed: Yeah, it's totally intentional.
XtianNinja: Yeah, definitely. Yeah, totally.
Jeff Reed: So Christian, X-T-I-A-N.ninja, check out. I'm glad you got the website. That's important towards that.
XtianNinja: I love it.
Jeff Reed: Man, this has been really good. I literally, I've got another thing. And so it's like I'm landing the plane, but I could sit here. for another hour and just have this conversation with you. I just, I feel so much at peace right now.
XtianNinja: Yeah.
Jeff Reed: So thank you. Maybe I need to like send some money to Hope Digital Missions because you have like actually, I need to like pay for the services of this stream for myself because this has been so therapeutic in this moment. So thank you for that. But, you know, as we're landing the plane here, any closing thoughts on your side?
XtianNinja: You know what? Just simply to, if you know the church, be kind to people within the church. They're struggling, but they really do have a good heart and they really do want to reach people. They really do love folks and they're a good church. And so if you're an internet person, bring them along slowly, introduce them, have lots of patience. know because everything they've been told about anime and video games and everything else isn't just it's bad it's evil and destroying the world like that they have been misinformed they've been lied to and they have and that's what they're living at you'd say dungeons and dragons half of them still think that you're worshiping demons in a basement right so be patient listen communicate and on the other side if if you are part of the digital realm find a community, man.
XtianNinja: Find people to be with because it is so easy to become jaded. Nobody listens to me and I don't know what to do. People are taking my viewers and I don't know who to talk to and they're no other Christian. Find a community. Connect to a community. Even though instinctually your social anxiety goes out the window and you're like, man, I don't know what to do and they won't understand me and I'm different.
XtianNinja: no man we we we want to get to know you we want to love you we want to serve you we want to pastor you we want to help you and resource you their their help out there you don't have to do this alone we're there yeah
Jeff Reed: Yeah. Amen. And that's, I mean, to be honest, that's the heart behind the Church Digital as well. It's like, we don't want people to be alone.
Jeff Reed: We often, incitingly, insider language, just call ourselves the Island of Misfit Toys. from um um uh rudolph the red-nosed reindeer because it's like we're it's all all just oddballs and if it's not because we like by the way um my church told me growing up that pokemon was satanic so i once again kind of reinforcing you know peak pikachus of the devil just saying go ahead
XtianNinja: Heck yeah. I'm releasing a video. I'm releasing an hour long video soon where I go through the entire talk that some dude did about Pokemon and it is bananas. That guy's fully crazy and it's hilarious to watch.
Jeff Reed: Yeah, 100%.
XtianNinja: Stay tuned.
Jeff Reed: But the fact is, is that of all the thinking outside the box and the counter-cultural stuff, once again, from all different perspectives, even the idea that internet people are different than physical people, which what they are, but physical people do not understand that.
XtianNinja: We love you.
Jeff Reed: And so even in that grounding, if you're alone in the isolation, you're looking at two, gray-haired men on the screen right now who want to help in that. So connect with Hope Digital Mission at the Discord server with that. Come hang out with us at Church Digital. And offline, I want to talk, figure out how we can partner together better because we've tried a couple times to do some of the stuff that you're doing, and honestly, I'd rather partner with somebody than just do it. So let's continue this conversation.
XtianNinja: Let's do it, man. I'm excited. For sure.
Jeff Reed: offline and we will uh it's funny uh we're going to end on nate right here we just got to help the church uh move along and so thank thank you uh nate uh word girl uh crossing tommy as so many others been hanging out uh make fun of oh hey make fun of faith good to see you too man i didn't catch the name earlier as you've been on but uh thank you by the way mr pete has been streaming this talk into uh in the metaverse in the big screen as he typically does hey mr pete
XtianNinja: Gotta help him a lot. That's right.
Jeff Reed: uh mr pete i could book some time man actually when i have a conference you know mr pete don't you uh christian ninja of him yeah he's if you if you've ever like do anything in in christian circles mr pete's hanging around so anyway uh sir it's great to hang out with you thanks for the time and we're gonna land the plane so for uh for christian ninja this is jeff thanks for hanging out here on the church digital here with the stream and we'll see you next time y'all have a good one
XtianNinja: I know of, we've never met. Thank you.
Can there be a global/local solution, where digital ministry connects people to the local church?
Jeff Reed read this question from the chat on air and said it is not a bad idea, with challenges: first you have to know people, and then you have to trust the church. XtianNinja pointed to Steve at SavePoint, whose whole ministry is connecting nerds online to local churches; he researches and calls church after church, and finding one church in a town that understands is close to impossible, so he celebrates when he can. Hope Digital Missions works the same direction: after people from its Discord meet in person at HopeCon, the next question is whether there is a church in their area.
What is a digital missionary?
XtianNinja: anybody who is intentionally engaging in an arena online to build relationships that lead towards the gospel, or a bridge of trust. That could be Twitch or pre-recorded YouTube videos, and it could also be someone who never turns on a camera but goes into Discords or rough subreddits to be salt and light and open a few conversations.
What are digital missionaries struggling with?
XtianNinja, who is director of missionary care for Hope Digital Missions: they are hard to find; they are generally not connected to a local church, so they have no accountability and no pastors; they are generally not funded and do it all as volunteers; and things happen in their communities that they are way under-trained for, with no resources or support system. It is better than it was five years ago: networks have formed for different kinds of digital ministry, and Reach Conference brought hundreds of Christian content creators together.
How does care for digital missionaries scale?
Jeff Reed asked this directly. XtianNinja's answer: small cohorts, like inviting eight people for eight weeks to get to know each other and be trained, and a book, so others know someone else is thinking about this. The struggle is that content creators are told all the time to build their brand, and that mature, called people who are willing to invest the time and also understand the technology are rare, while the people who are technically able are often immature and need to be brought along slowly.
Why is it hard to get local churches to support digital ministry?
XtianNinja has the degree, the experience and the credentials, and he says every time he approaches a region, a church or a leader the answer is no. Churches that are shrinking are being asked to put energy, leaders and money into people who will never come to their church, give or be baptized there, so the incentive runs the other way. His hope comes from sports ministry: about 80 years ago sports on a Sunday was unthinkable in church, and now almost any church would welcome a baseball ministry. COVID pushed churches to face the technology, and by God's grace, he says, this change will not take 70 years.
How do people get connected with Hope Digital Missions?
XtianNinja: go to his website, https://xtian.ninja, which links to both Power to Change and Hope Digital Missions. Most of Hope Digital Missions' ministry happens in Discord, so if you are already on Discord it is a matter of joining. To follow his own work, join his Substack.
