From Social Media to Social Ministry

Description

This book outlines digital discipleship principles for building an online community and provides practical instruction for how to do it no matter how big or small a local church may be.

There are more than 2.3 billion professing Christians in the world and more and more new churches launching globally, yet statistics show that in-person church attendance is declining or plateauing in every nation. Although social technology has been around for more than two decades, church leaders have long bristled at the idea of church online, ranking it as the last concern on their minds in Barna's 2020 state of the church report published February 3, 2020. And then, three weeks later, COVID-19 closed the doors of every church on earth and suddenly forced them entirely online.

Nona Jones, a globally acclaimed thought leader on leveraging technology for ministry, had been leading a movement and sounding the alarm for several years to make digital discipleship a central part of every church’s ministry approach. In From Social Media to Social Ministry, she outlines her digital discipleship principles and provides practical instruction for how to do it no matter how big or small a local church may be. There are plenty of books to help churches build a social media strategy, but this is the first book of its kind that goes beyond digital marketing to digital ministry.

Readers will leave this book with:

• Clarity on what discipleship truly is
• The data that underscores the urgency for digital discipleship
• Understanding of the resources required to do it well
• A step-by-step guide on how to implement digital discipleship into ministry plans
• Knowledge of the differences among and purposes of the most popular social platforms, as well as the tools best positioned for digital ministry

About the Author

Nona Jones is a rare combination of tech executive, author, speaker, and preacher. Her professional experience includes serving as Chief Content and Partnerships Officer at YouVersion, Head of Global Faith Partnerships at Meta, and Chief External Affairs Officer at PACE Centers for Girls, Inc. She is the author of Success from the Inside Out, From Social Media to Social Ministry, Killing Comparison, and The Gift of Rejection.

Nona travels the world speaking at the intersection of faith, business, and leadership and has been profiled by ESSENCE magazineas an “Under 40 Woman to Watch,” Florida Trend magazine as one of Florida’s “30-Something All Stars,” and Business in the Heart of Florida magazine as a “40 Under 40 Community Leader.” She is an alumna of the Presidential Leadership Scholars Program, a national leadership development initiative jointly led by former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.

Nona earned her Bachelor and Master of Business Administration from the University of Florida, where she has been recognized as an Outstanding Young Alumnus. She has completed postgraduate studies in the Harvard Law School Program on Negotiation. She is an avid runner and fitness enthusiast, as well as a Billboard-charting songwriter. She serves alongside her husband, Pastor Timothy L. Jones, Sr., in leading Open Door Church in Gainesville, Florida. She counts her two sons, Timothy Jr. and Isaac, as her greatest gifts in life.