EMDC Session Descriptions
The breakout sessions for 2024 are being posted as they are received. Please check back for updates and additional descriptions.
Monday 27 May: Session 1 14:00-15:00
Return to Schedule
This hands-on workshop is designed to empower participants with the tools and methodologies needed to innovate and solve mission-critical challenges. Through this guided design sprint, you’ll learn to turn ideas into actionable solutions. Whether you’re a seasoned professional or new to the field, this sprint will inspire creativity and foster impactful innovations.
Contextualized ScriptWriting 101 (Steve Baldwin)
Scripts are the foundation of any good film. In this presentation, we will explore Create International’s formula for writing indigenous scripts for a cross-cultural audience. This presentation will be especially helpful to producers, directors and scriptwriters drafting effective cross-cultural evangelistic films for unreached people groups. Topics include: partnerships, key questions for cultural advisors, researching your indigenous audience, collaborative engagement with in-country staff, script line numbering and more.
Culture Meets Scripture: Bringing God’s Power to Cultural Strongholds (Jo Shetler, Dr. Amy West)
What do believers do when cultural customs clash with their allegiance to God? How can we help them use Scripture to both evaluate their underlying beliefs and then discern what to do? When pressures from family, peers and community require participation in those practices, how can they gain needed support to make choices that align with Scripture to honor God? What if those choices entail great relational costs and powerfully entrenched cultural beliefs? These types of questions are core to this seminar. The hour introduces a process to uncover the driving forces that demand the practice be done and then uses Scripture to see how God’s Word speaks to those forces. It aims at providing a process for believers to develop culturally meaningful responses that align with Scripture.
Simply the Story: Inductive Bible Story Oral Style (Butch Vernon, Larry Dinkins)
See an oral model of how to go deep in the Bible through discussion. Learn actions and expressions that engage participant’s imaginations, while maintaining accuracy to Scripture. We will teach the importance of developing active listening skills, asking good questions, and allowing participants the joy of discovering truth for themselves. If you minister to those who may struggle to read or who prefer to learn orally, this opportunity is for you.
User Experience Workshop – Better Websites Immediately (George C)
Monday 27 May: Session 2 15:45 – 16:45
Return to Schedule
Feeding the Mobile Masses: Engaging the Digital Crowds with Your Best Media (Jim Moore & Dave Johnson)
Embracing digital strategies for Scripture engagement is crucial in today’s landscape. If you’re navigating the challenge of sharing your content on websites, apps, or social media, join us to discover how Kalaam Media collaborates with language communities globally. Our aim is to empower these teams, enabling them to develop and oversee culturally tailored websites and mobile apps. We will also look at the latest features of Wildfire, our custom website builder, and share some new innovations we are working on. We partner with language communities, church plants, and other ministries across the world, empowering them to create and manage their own digital solutions.
Digital Disciple Making (Clyde Taber, AJ, JS)
The Church has decades of history in traditional media campaigns using a broadcast approach, ‘pushing’ content out to large audiences. The game has changed with the advent of new media paradigms, especially social media. Social media is the primary way most people engage with content. It is no longer enough to tell the story you want to tell over traditional media or social media channels, and hope that you will connect with an audience. We must learn to shape our strategies and our content to ‘pull’ people into conversations. In this seminar, you will learn how to connect with audiences that filter and search for the stories they want to hear, based on their interests and desires. You will learn an approach that can foster deeper connections and make “disciples who make disciples” to saturate a culture.
Valuing Cultural Engagement for Effective Communication (R. Daniel Shaw)
In our contemporary world of missional engagement, localization, orality, and relevance are important trends. Enabling pastors, Bible translators, and others in vital relationships with people to communicate a gospel that is relevant to the lived experience will ensure greater use of scripture that not only speaks right but also acts right for those who apply it to living their lives.
It Takes a Whole Village: Part 1 (Jo Clifford, Justing Randolph, Johannes & Sharon Merz, Peter and Jennifer Brassington, SIL Global Scripture Access Services)
In the first session, we will demonstrate a way different specialists can assist language teams and communities in thinking through and planning activities to maximise the impact of translated Scriptures. This is an interactive session as participants will be asked to put into practice their learning through given scenarios.
Bringing Artists Together Through Online Training and Community (Keegan West)
Join us to discover Campfire, a platform that provides opportunities for aspiring storytellers and artists to hone their skills, connect with like-minded individuals, and collaborate on creative projects – all focused on the Unreached. Online training in animation, creating children’s books, comics and filmmaking will be demonstrated along with success stories of individuals and teams who have used the platform to create new resources to share the gospel cross-culturally. www.campfirecreatives.org
Monday 27 May: Session 3 17:00 – 18:00
Return to Schedule
Learning on Demand – AI+Education Micro Learning (SABDA)
Description Coming Soon…
Max7: Dubbing Animation (Joel Groening, Reece Terrell)
In this breakout session, you will discover that while Max7‘s animated resources are aimed at young people, all ages enjoy animation. You will learn what Max7 offers and why it is an amazing resource for you to learn about and make use of in your ministry areas. We will also discuss video dubbing in general, talk about software tools now available, and give you a taste of how a Max7 dubbing of an animated video is done in another language.
How to Transmediate “Jesus” for Visual Media (Johannes Merz, Sharon Merz)
What did Jesus look like and how should we picture him in visual media? Even though the Bible remains silent about such questions, we all know what Jesus looked like. Or do we really? In this seminar we look at the history of how Jesus has been visualized, how his image went global and what effect this has had on people. We then present what we can learn from this by using the idea of Bible transmediation, which is the adaptation of biblical texts to different media.
OneStory: The Benefits of an Oral Bible Story Project that Uses Sound Translation Principles (Kathy Law)
Most of the world prefers oral communication over written communication. How then can we share God’s Word with them in ways that they will find appealing? What if the Bible does not exist in the language of the people I work among? Can oral Bible stories be produced in a way that is faithful to the original and uses sound principles of Bible translation? How can a set of oral Bible stories complement a traditional bible translation project? This session will look at the benefits of an oral Bible story project as well as presenting the distinctives of OneStory projects.
Media – a Tool to Tell His story; His work. (Joshua Chew)
Media plays a vital role in various aspects of our lives, such as work, education, marketing, entertainment and news. How can we leverage media in all areas of our ministry work? How can we avoid treating media as an isolated or separate “media ministry”? In this session, we will explore how we can leverage media to accelerate ministry progress and even increase effectiveness in our work and as an organization.
Tuesday 28 May: Session 4 11:15 – 12:15
Return to Schedule
Mobilize the Next Gen Through Digital Cohorts (Nick Wu, and Kyle Le)
Dive into the future of digital engagement in this workshop! We will equip leaders and innovators with cutting-edge strategies for engaging the Next Generation to join in missions. Attendees will explore the power of digital cohorts in fostering meaningful connections, driving Kingdom impact, and enhancing their skills and personal faith journey. We will share our process in bringing together students, mentors, and partnering organizations with challenges for cohorts to solve together.
Indigenous Media and Arts: Transforming All Nations with the Gospel (Calvin and Carol Conkey with Create International staff, and other guest presenters.)
Witness how faithful adherence to Scripture and cultural relevance is yielding remarkable responses. Explore new films, animations, art, and other indigenous media forms that are spreading the gospel message with incredible global impact. Experience animated testimonies, audio-visual Bible stories, digital art, and mixed media resources, alongside creative materials for the whole family. Unveil new websites and apps where you can download these presentations and access other free media resources in hundreds of languages. Gain insights into beneficial online or on-field training in media, arts, and animation. Discuss effective integration of contextual visual storytelling for maximum impact. www.Create international.com, www.indigitube.tv
Culture Meets Scripture – Community of Practice (Amy West and Jo Shetler)
Whether you have used Culture meets Scripture (CmS) or are simply curious about it, come join us for this first ever CmS Community of Practice. Believers of every generation and in every culture face questionable cultural practices and wonder what to do about them. Together, let’s consider ways God has used CmS principles to help believers discern godly responses, and in that process transforms lives, strengthens churches and impacts communities. We invite the curious to come and the doers to share.
Taste of Weavers (Bibidh and Jessie Baral)
This brief seminar introduces what it is to weave personal and Biblical stories into our everyday conversations, connecting with the life-situation of the person with whom we’re conversing. This Scripture engagement strategy is by nature flexible, personal, interactive, sustainable with minimal resources, and can be adapted to various situations and conversations in the long- or short-term.
Alpha Tiles: Create a Literacy Games App for Android (Aaron Hemphill)
Would you like to create a literacy games app for Android for a minority language? The Alpha Tiles app has been localized into 88 languages in 31 countries. To create the app, most teams work at their own pace in a Google Sheets template. Once all data fields are completed and the corresponding audio and images for each word are uploaded, the Alpha Tiles team builds the app and shares it with you. Please come join us to learn more about Alpha Tiles! Any questions, please email aaron_hemphill@sil.org.
Tuesday 28 May: Session 5 14:00 – 15:00
Return to Schedule
Putting the Word in WordPress (AJ)
Light their path by placing a simple Bible reader in your WordPress based evangelistic or ministry website. The Bible Plugin is a free to use, open source, mobile first, WordPress plugin Bible reader drawn from the Bible Brain DBP4 API. During this breakout session we will give an overview of the rationale for The Bible Plugin, explore its features, and walk you through the basic, non-technical steps for implementing this tool on your own WordPress site. Visit https://thebibleplugin.com/emdc2024 for more. First come first served – email aj@missionmediau.org if you have an existing WordPress site and we will install The Bible Plugin on your site live during the breakout session (limited slots available).
Casting Actors…for Your Movies and Short Videos (Steve Baldwin)
Making movies requires amazing actors in front of the camera. In this workshop you will hear practical tips for securing actors for your movie. Special emphasis will be given to the process of casting indigenous actors for culturally-relevant gospel movie productions. We will enjoy a mock casting session that will give you a front row seat at the casting director’s table. Actor volunteers will be needed for the casting session. (Steve Baldwin)
Redeeming the Downside of Digital Bibles (Dr. Rich Ernst)
Research into the use of phones and digital Bible reading is revealing some surprising observations. People may remember what they read on a paper page better than a screen. Excessive Phone/screen time is also affecting how people live, their health and parenting. Learn more about the risks of digital engagement and how you can plan digital Scripture engagement in ways that will be of the most benefit to everyone.
Emic Genre Studies and Effective Scripture Engagement (James E. Morrison)
This session will explore How an emic understanding of target language (TL) genre classifications can impact the quality of Bible translation and scripture engagement (SE). More specifically, this session will demonstrate how an emic understanding of genre types within the vast corpus of Tibetan writings has impacted the quality of a Tibetan language translation, and in particular the development and effectiveness of SE materials. This session will include practical examples of the application of specific genre types in developing SE materials, including application to digital media. This presentation may be of particular interest for those working in a Buddhist context. Time will also be given for discussion about other genre types that may lend themselves to an SE application.
Telos Media (Said Akhmedbayev)
Join us for an engaging breakout session introducing Telos Media (TelosMedia.org), a dynamic platform merging Christian blogging and Scripture distribution. In this hands-on workshop, you’ll discover how to effortlessly create your own blog or Scripture distribution project. Learn firsthand how Telos Media simplifies the process of running a powerful blog or Christian media distribution initiative, all centered around your preferred version of the Scripture. Don’t miss this opportunity to explore the possibilities of impactful digital engagement with Telos Media!
Tuesday 28 May: Session 6 15:45 – 16:45
Return to Schedule
Hands On Bible Transformers Workshop – Illustrate Mark’s Gospel for Your Context Using Generative AI” (Neil “Studge” Rees)
In this session Neil Rees from BFBS will briefly overview the Bible Transformers digital mission event based approach for small group leaders to reach digital nations and tribes. Then we’ll run an example hands on session as we explore using AI prompts to illustrate Mark’s gospel for our own language and cultural context. To be an active participant, please bring your laptop and you will also need your own Microsoft account https://account.microsoft.com/account. At the end of the session participants will have their own illustrated copy of Mark chapter 1!
Exploring Immersive Digital Culture (Mike Mirabella)
With 3.3 billion gamers in the world and gaming influencing social media, business, virtual reality, education, and the metaverse, the Church has amazing new opportunities to be present where millions of people live and search for hope. In this session, we’ll explore the developing immersive digital culture and its impact on the future of digital engagement. We’ll preview a specific game that will launch later in 2024.
Extraordinary prayer? Extraordinarily simple?! (JS)
Research indicates there has never been a disciple making movement apart from extraordinary prayer. Come build a strategy that leverages free tech tools (Pray4Movement.org’s 24/7 campaigns, and Prayer.Global) to help multitudes pray Biblically and strategically.
It Takes a Whole Village, Part 2 (J Clifford, J Randolph, J & S Merz, J & P Brassington, SIL Global Scripture Access Services)
In this second session, using a couple of real-life scenarios from participants, we will talk through the scenarios and as a team of specialists give possible suggestions. In addition, participants will be able to talk through their own situations with the various specialist consultants, one-on-one.
Storytelling Ethics in Photography and Video (Clive Thomas)
Never before has it been more important to understand the issue of ethics in the production of photographs and video. In a world where truth is relative and ‘image’ is everything, how do we make better ethical decisions when creating images for storytelling? We’ll discuss and unpack areas such as dignity, consent, ownership and participation as we journey to become more ethical storytellers. Come and learn more about this critical area of media creation.
Tuesday 28 May: Session 7 17:00 – 18:00
Return to Schedule
New Gadgets and Technology in Scripture Engagement (Richard Margetts & Joshy Kurian)
Want to find out about some new and cool technologies that you can harness for ministry purposes? Join us to hear from a variety of presenters as they share about these gadgets and tools, as well as their potential applications in ministry contexts. Do you have something you want to share? We may be full already, but please send that information to newgadgets@emdc.info and we will let you know if it fits, and how much time you get to present it during the workshop. You may visit https://emdcon.org/emdc-2024-session-descriptions/newgadgets later to find more info about the session.
From the Harvest to the Harvest: Media that Multiplies Disciples (Calvin and Carol Conkey and M4M team)
Explore innovative methods to bolster thousands of Disciple-Making Movements among the Unreached, utilizing suitable media, technology, and indigenous arts. National believers and field workers are in need of simple, affordable, reproducible, and multilingual media resources. Explore compelling case studies showcasing innovative training and strategies leveraging smartphones, Bluetooth speakers, audio Bible players, AI, ethnic arts, and other tools to effectively engage communities across Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. Access free resources to enhance your evangelism, discipleship, and church planting ministries. globalmedia4movements.com
Classic Trauma Healing (Michael Wan)
This proven model of the Trauma Healing Institute uses applied Scripture and mental health principles to address spiritual and emotional wounds caused by trauma whether from war, violence, natural disasters, or abuse. The book Healing the Wounds of Trauma: How the Church Can Help has been translated and taught in 130 countries with more than 200 language groups around the world.
The Art of Digital Storytelling for Missions (Naveed Hameed)
Embark on an exhilarating journey into “The Art of Digital Storytelling for Missions.” Discover why storytelling is essential for missions and learn to craft compelling narratives for the digital age. Gain insight into the digital landscape of young generations and masses to explore an overview of platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, and more. Discover how to effectively share testimonies, and learn to use digital tools to enhance storytelling. Also, receive essential education about online safety. Join us as we unlock the secrets to spreading your message effectively in the digital world.
Wednesday 29 May: Session 8 11:15 – 12:15
Return to Schedule
Pattern Platform: Making Disciples and Inspiring Church-Planting Movements Through Secure and Simply Created Apps. (Nolan Sanders)
The Pattern team saw a need to help create apps super-focused on providing discipleship content and disciple-making training materials. Further, we wanted the creation of these apps to be possible for even the least technical (easier than using Microsoft Word). The end result was the Pattern Platform. Pattern overcomes the complexity of creating stand-alone, customizable, no-code discipleship apps. Anyone can create and manage an app with Pattern Platform!
Using the platform you can create a website, Apple App Store app, and Google Play app. HOWEVER, the secure, offline Android version for sensitive countries is very important to us. Apps feature audio accessibility, scripture inclusion, simple navigation, and multiple ways to share the material or app. Pattern apps are ready to assist in any place, any language, and on any device.
This workshop will give a demo of the end-user app features, show the simplicity of designing an app in the Launch Center, and introduce the powerful Content Creator where all material is created and easily managed for global distribution. Pattern makes app creation simple for any team regardless of their technical skills. Design. Fill. Launch. Make Disciples.
Mobilizing through Media (Joshua Chew)
Many people have not yet heard the gospel, and the workers are few. How can we motivate this generation to obey His Mandate and participate in His mission? How can we use media effectively to inspire and move the church in this generation to finish the Great Commission?
This session will explore media strategies to awaken and move believers to action for the sake of those who lack the gospel.
Immigration Issues in the Book of Ruth (Sunny Hong)
This session looks at immigration issues in the book of Ruth to understand them: causes of immigration, identity issues, economic issues, cultural issues, host and guest relationships, potential mistreatment, and God factor in immigration. Then compare those issues with the 21st-century realities. This workshop is interactive, looking at the Bible verses together to learn from each other.
ClearDashboard (Milt Jones)
The Clear Dashboard is a new Quality Assurance tool from Biblica and Seed Company that works in collaboration with your Paratext projects. It enhances interlinear functions, adds richer note taking, and provides a space where CiTs can learn and practice without disrupting the translation team. Furthermore, it allows for integration with evolving technologies such as AQuA and ScriptureForge/Serval. For more information on the Dashboard, check out cleardashboard.org
Friendship with Jesus (Clyde Taber)
Description Coming Soon…
Wednesday 29 May: Session 9 14:00 – 15:00
Return to Schedule
Digitizing Historical Texts for Mission (Neil “Studge” Rees)
Description Coming Soon…
Give them The Savior (AJ)
The Savior is a full length (2 hours) feature film of the life of Jesus Christ, produced with an intentional focus on presenting the story in a way that would be more accepted (visually and culturally) for those coming from a Muslim worldview. The Savior has been dubbed in over 40 languages and has had more than 1 billion views. During this breakout session we will review the available content and look at specific examples of using this content in the Jesus Film’s Next Steps platform for organic sharing or broad scale advertising.
Story-based Trauma Healing (Amy Fields)
“Healing the Wounds of Trauma” is a proven program that applies Scripture and mental health principles to address spiritual and emotional wounds caused by trauma of war, violence, natural disasters, and abuse. Story-based Trauma Healing adapts “Healing the Wounds of Trauma” for people with low literacy and/or people who prefer learning and communicating orally.
Reaching Oral Learners Through Ministry Collaboration (Mark Perkins – Davar)
During this session, we will explore the ongoing need for audio scripture access by oral learners throughout the world. In this context of orality, we will also explore the biblical principles of ministry cooperation, along with practical examples of ministry collaboration in order to accomplish more for the kingdom by working together.
“Jesus” Animated Film from JFP (Prince Rana)
Come join us for a time to connect more around the new animated feature film, Jesus, being produced by the Jesus Film. We would love to share more about this tool, how we are working on it, and hear your feedback and input!
Wednesday 29 May: Session 10 15:45 – 16:45
Return to Schedule
Filling the Aquifer: Unlocking Biblical Resources for the Global Church (Ben Amundgaard)
This presentation will introduce the Aquifer platform–an ambitious initiative to provide openly licensed, high-quality biblical content suitable for both study and translation help, in 25 gateway languages to Christians worldwide. The speaker will outline the urgent need for such a resource, especially in underserved language communities. Gain insights into the cutting-edge processes and tools powering this effort to translate over 1 billion words of trusted materials in just 5 years. The talk will also feature demos showcasing the Bible Well app, the Aquifer API, and the Aquifer TMS. There will also be time set aside for discussion to explore the effectiveness of the Aquifer in addressing these issues and delve into the potentials and limitations of machine translation and AI-driven audio solutions.
The Role of Audio Story Recordings in Disciple Making (Tim Strauss)
Oral Bible storying has proven its value in disciple making, but what are the advantages and disadvantages of using recordings to deliver these stories? This workshop is an interactive discussion regarding things to consider like content, presentation, and devices that stimulate active listening that is culturally appropriate. Is it possible to build relationships using audio recordings? Global recordings network, with materials in over 6500 languages and dialects, will lead the discussion, and include lessons learned from our recent experience providing material for deaf communities as well as other field experiences with the intent of stimulating thoughts and ideas from those participating in the workshop.
Digital Quotient/AI Quotient (SABDA Yulia)
Description Coming Soon…
Discover Jesus Initiative (Kavanah – AJ)
Prayer. Partnership. Proclamation. Purpose. Power. With these core values, our vision is to see the top 50 unreached nations in the world transformed as partnerships of believers, churches and organizations use digital tools to reach people with the Gospel, lead them to Christ and disciple them. Come and hear what we are learning and how you can be a part of this initiative. DJI is a Kavanah Media initiative. For more information, see our website at https://
Connecting Content with Your Audience (Bob Bartz)
In today’s saturated media environments, how will your audience appreciate and value the content you offer them? This interactive session will explore The Gray Matrix, a tool for discovering content that will amplify your message and expand meaningful engagement for greater ministry impact with your intended audience.
Wednesday 29 May: Session 11 17:00 – 18:00
Return to Schedule
Scripture App Builder: Adding New Engagement Features to your Apps (Richard Margetts)
Scripture App Builder is being used by ministries around the world to create contextualized smartphone apps for translated Scriptures, Bible stories and discipleship materials. Over two thousand different apps are being distributed online and offline, with text, audio and video content.
How can we encourage users to engage with God’s Word? We will explore some of the latest features in the software, such as:
- A new AI assistant designed to provide insights on selected passages.
- Customizable Bible reading plans to promote daily engagement.
- Configurable navigation settings to assist and improve user experience.
- Interactive quizzes to reinforce understanding and retention.
We will also take a look at examples of innovative apps that have been created recently to show you the kinds of ideas that are being tried out to encourage engagement, as well as how to make apps for multiple platforms.
Scripture App Builder was first demonstrated at EMDC in 2014. Over the past ten years, we have continued to develop the software with suggestions from people we meet at EMDC. We are eager to learn from your experiences and discuss your suggestions for further enhancements.
For more information, documentation and downloads, please visit https://software.sil.org/scriptureappbuilder/
Digital Movement Innovation in the JFP (Ashley Bristol)
The Digital Movement Innovation team is a field team of specialized practitioners that sits within the Jesus Film Project. Our heart is moving beyond digital gospel exposure to on-the-ground churches planted in the most unreached places left on earth. We currently specialize in engaging Persian and Arab audiences in the Middle East and West Asia who desire to take the step to start following Jesus as Savior today!. We are passionate about using media, tools, and products together as part of an integrated digital strategy.
Over the past 16 months alone as a team of 3-5 people, we’ve seen over 800 young women and men accept Christ with us in live messaging. Over 400 have continued in digital discipleship. Over 100 have believed THROUGH these new believers. We desire at EMDC to connect with others who have a vision in Muslim contexts to innovatively go after seeing spiritual movement through a digital strategy that facilitates churches planted on the ground.
Cross-cultural Mentoring (Sunny Hong)
This session describes how individualistic and collectivist cultures understand key mentoring concepts differently. Then it goes through the stage of mentoring to understand how different cultures practice mentoring differently. By explaining different practices, the participant will have an understanding of why different cultures behave a certain way. From that understanding, this session could help the participant to think about how to use the strengths of different cultures so that cross-cultural mentoring can be even more fruitful than mono-cultural mentoring.
Engaging with Oral Bible Translation (OBT) (Durk Meijer)
This session is specifically for OBT practitioners and those interested in OBT.
With the help of a facilitator, we will look into best practices and lessons learned from the participants. The goal will be to learn from each other, so we can keep growing together in serving oral-preference people groups as they embrace OBT in the best way possible. The underlying goal is that we serve to empower these communities to use high-quality, relevant, and helpful approaches that fit their context.
Leverage Your Online Leads to Fill Your Ministry Net (Charlie Ritchie)
Pathfinders’ GOSPEL ON WEB (GOW) has grown over the last ten years to now include 80 main languages, distributing Gospel messages across 100 websites, fueled by Google Ad Grants with up to 300 Ads per site bringing visitors from every corner of the planet. This involves millions of clicks/visits/downloads annually. Visitors from your people group are coming to one of our websites.
We seek partners who can follow up with these leads in any of the language groups we target. We can configure our sites to display banners that these seekers/explorers click bringing them to your online course, resource or text chat.
Our ultimate goal is to see explorers cultivated toward online connection and community where they can discover Christ and be discipled through online, and where possible, local fellowship.
Our pre-qualified leads may be an excellent match for your follow-up resources! Come learn more about this and how we could launch a test pilot this summer.
Thursday 30 May: Session 12 11:15 – 12:15
Return to Schedule
Acts2: AI Translation and Text-to-Speech in 1,000+ Languages (Mark Woodward)
Can AI translate into my language? As AI technology develops at a rapid pace, many Christians around the world are asking themselves what role it might have in God’s mission. SIL’s Acts2 initiative aims to harness AI for translation and text-to-speech in languages often ignored by major AI players, using models trained on Bible data. This talk will cover the creation of these models and their capacity to produce text and audio resources in local languages, assessing both the opportunities and challenges these technological advancements bring to local communities and their mission partners.
Using Bible Narratives to produce Contextualized Life Application Radio/Audio Dramas (Ken Brown)
How to produce multiple culture specific radio dramas based on Bible Stories using a simple recorded dialogue as a template. If you are looking for ways to take a Bible story set and use it to contextualise the gospel for a specific people group, I will explain how we did this for an African Muslim people group using life application radio programs. I will describe how we took a recorded Bible story set and linked each story with a culture specific life application question and answer, and then edited them into a recorded dialogue template using sound editing software.
Millions of Jesus’ New Disciples Want Better Bible Access (Grace P with others)
Millions of new Jesus followers from Muslim, Hindu, and Buddhist families want our help to do their own Bible translations and increase Scripture engagement in their heart languages. Some only have access to the Bible in trade languages; others have Scripture portions, or no Bible translation at all, which severely limits their ability to mature in Christ and persevere victoriously through persecution. Discover ways we’re using media, technology, and the ethnoarts to give them better Bible access. Your skills may be just what they need!
www.globalmedia4movements.com, https://2414now.net, https://beyond.org.
SE Guide / SE Tools / MAT (Peter & Jennifer Brassington)
The session will focus primarily on the use of relaunched Scripture Engagement Guide https://EMDC.guide (now available in app form and for wider translation), also introducing https://EMDC.tools and the increasingly important Multilingual Assessment Tool.
Language can clearly be a huge barrier to effective discipleship, but translation and distribution of the Bible and other resources are not enough. Experience over many years in translations in many hundreds of languages has shown that there is a lot more to think about both coming from the perspective of Bible Translation organizations and of the church. The videos and questions in the Scripture Engagement Guide and app provide a starting place for discussions to explore many of the factors that need to be in place for effective use of the Bible.
Digital Evangelism (Naveed Hameed)
Discover the power of digital evangelism. The workshop will explore reaching out to a broader audience through digital means, building an online community, and employing dynamic strategies for sharing the Gospel effectively online. Get ready to learn how to handle feedback and engage with online inquiries, maximize donations through compelling storytelling, and utilize AI to create captivating content to share the gospel on various social media platforms. Join us to unlock the tools and strategies needed to spread the message of the church in the exhilarating digital age.
Thursday 30 May: Session 13 14:00- 15:00
Return to Schedule
Biblical Computing (SABDA)
Description Coming Soon…
Reaching the World With Your Oral Bible Using Audio Project Manager (APM) and the Akuo Mobile App (Maggie Campo / Sara Hentzel)
Deliver your oral Bible to smart phones seamlessly and in real time, with the new combination of APM and Akuo. Audio Project Manager (APM) is a web or desktop application that simplifies the development and management of Scripture audio files. It provides solutions for oral Bible translation, oral drafting, storying and general transcription projects. You can also produce audio footnotes and other supporting content that resembles traditional study Bibles. The Akuo mobile app delivers your published content to smart phones in a visually appealing design that does not require user literacy. Images and audio titles guide the user through every screen and users can download content to listen offline. No need to wait for a complete Bible, Testament or even one book of the Bible to be complete – translators may publish individual passages from APM as soon as they are ready and Akuo listeners will be instantly notified of new content. Join Sara Hentzel from SIL and Maggie Campo from The Seed Company for a demonstration of the two apps and learn how easy it is to add your oral projects to our tools.
Leaders – Participating in the SE Movement (Karsten van Reizen)
If you are in a leadership role in your organisation or church, you might wonder how EMDC can be of help to you. During this workshop we will look at the bigger picture of the Scripture engagement movement, the role our organisations have in it and how we can connect our teams and partners on the ground with the good resources presented at EMDC. The workshop would be practical in nature, we will have a look at the EMDC.guide and will have time to learn from each other.
NextSteps Workshop: Moving from Views and Exposures to Connections and Conversions (Sway Ciaramello and Aaron Thomson)
Desire to see God 10X the fruit of your digital efforts? “Come and see” how NextSteps can deliver. Creating and posting content online is… lots of work! Yet 99% of views do not result in conversations. If your goal is actual connections and conversations, your efforts are only 1% successful. NextSteps can increase your success exponentially by patching the gaping holes in your fishing net.
NextSteps ‘journeys’ transform your content into interactive experiences providing a pleasant departure from content consumption to personal exploration and engagement, ultimately inviting someone to chat in real time with a Christian who cares.
We’ve seen God lovingly weave journeys into someone’s personal story so He can reveal how their story weaves into His story – for them to know and follow Him.
By the end of the hour you will create and launch your first journey!
Disciple Tools (Chris Chasm and Disciple Tools Team)
Can Disciple.Tools Help Your Ministry Go Next Level?
Have you played around with a Disciple.Tools demo? (https://disciple.tools/launch-demo/) Are you wondering whether it could help your ministry? Come hear 5 quick case studies about the free “million dollar,” 50+ language, open source, customer relationship management (CRM) software that serves far more than media-to-movement teams. Better yet, brainstorm whether it might help your ministry.
Thursday 30 May: Session 14 15:45 – 16:45
Return to Schedule
Digital Bible Library (Lois Gourley & Neil “Studge” Rees)
The Digital Bible Library…Have you heard about it in passing, but really don’t know what it has to offer? Do you wonder if you can get a library card? Is your language community represented? Did you know that the DBL is for texts and/or audio and/or video, and may be the largest collection of digital Scriptures in the world with more than 3,400 texts and 1600 audios in at least 1962 languages!
Come to this session to get the answers to all your questions! We will give you a brief history of how the DBL came to be, discuss the impact that the DBL has had worldwide, let you know who our major partners are, help you understand how to become a partner, and answer your questions. If you represent an organization that produces Scripture or uses Scripture on an app or website, you don’t want to miss this session!
Touching Hearts Through the Arts (Paul Stock)
In this workshop we will focus on creative, culturally sensitive ways of sharing Christ. We will tell our story and demonstrate some of the ways we have been reaching tribal peoples in Sindh through music, dance and video. Hopefully this will spark new ideas and be an encouragement for those who attend. Come prepared to do some singing and dancing!
How to work with people from the honor & shame cultures
Most of the refugees come from places where honor-shame dynamics are practiced in their daily interactions. One of their strongest values is “saving face” (keeping and preserving the reputation) of those they esteem and for those to whom they belong. There are significant differences in understanding honor and shame between people from an individualistic culture and people from an honor-shame culture. This session explains those differences, how honor and shame is applied to women differently than men, and how you can relate more meaningfully with people from an honor-shame culture.
Christian Health Evangelism (Richard Holt)
Description Coming Soon…
Smart Speakers and AI in Audioi (Joost Bastiaans)
Step into the world of sound and technology! Discover the power of Audio & AI: A Workshop for the Future. Learn how AI is shaping the future of sound and experiment with cutting-edge technologies. Put this breakout session in your calendar and don’t forget to come!