Listen Now on Spotify or Apple Podcasts (To skip ahead to Jamie’s interview, you can begin at 5:25.)
Chief Growth Officer Jamie Radtke discusses GMO’s beginnings with REimagine podcast host Cool Spring Baptist Church and how digital technology is changing the way we think of missions today.
Global Media Outreach (GMO) shares the Gospel 600,000 times every twenty-four hours. Out of those 600,000 presentations, over 60,000 people indicate a decision for Jesus daily.
Jamie Radtke, GMO’s Chief Growth Officer, explains that when she first heard of GMO, she was leading Explore God, a ministry founded to share the Gospel with younger generations in the United States. Explore God was having a great impact on the Internet and doing city-wide movements. But they were looking at how to leverage and scale, and GMO was “doing it on steroids,” stated Jamie.
By leveraging technology, GMO invites the whole world to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Through Google and Meta platforms, the love of Jesus is shared about six times every second in 13 different languages worldwide.
But what is most unique about GMO is the volunteer Online Missionary (OM) team that connect with each contact who indicates they want more information or discipleship. GMO’s missionaries are changing the way missions are done. For example, a contact sees an ad, clicks to the next step, and then, from there, can connect to an OM. The OM can then share discipleship resources, biblical wisdom, and even prayers.
GMO’s ad strategy targets each contact by language, not by geography. For example, reaching people by language allows the ministry to reach all Russian speakers anywhere in the world, not just in their country. Currently, GMO advertises in 13 languages. Even though GMO’s volunteer Online Missionary team is growing, the number of contacts coming in each day is increasing also, which is creating an even bigger need for more volunteers. That’s why GMO wants to encourage the Church to look at missions a bit differently.
GMO shares the Gospel for 10 cents per person. So, if a church views missions differently, it can have hundreds of missionaries from one congregation, who can share the Gospel not just with someone six blocks up the road but with someone in India, Puerto Rico, or anywhere else.
By using digital technology, churchgoers who either lack the funds to travel or have a health condition preventing them from traveling can fulfill the Great Commission from their homes.
In the past, people would go door to door with their tracks and engage people in the Gospel; maybe two out of ten people would show interest. It isn’t any different from the Internet. It’s just that the Internet does all the filtering, and in return, someone who genuinely wants to engage in a spiritual conversation is connected with one of GMO’s Online Missionaries.
