In Part Four of a series from contributing writer Russ McGuire on the Digital Christian Revolution, Russ tells the story of the digital caring revolution.
For over 50 years, Samaritan’s Purse has helped meet the needs of people who are victims of war, poverty, natural disasters, disease, and famine with the purpose of sharing God’s love through His Son, Jesus Christ. Their growth tells the story of the Digital Caring Revolution.
Founded in 1970 by Bob Pierce after he visited suffering children on a Korean island. He wasn’t motivated by any vision of the coming digital revolution, or how western technology could save people in struggling economies. He was a man with a heart broken “by the things that break God’s heart” and convicted by Jesus’ words at the end of the parable of the Good Samaritan: “Go and do likewise.”
The Digital Caring Revolution
In 1970, the very first personal computers were just being envisioned, so Samaritan’s Purse started like most organizations of its time, with paper records, face-to-face commitments, lots of hard work, but most importantly the love of Christ. Over the intervening decades, most of the records and transactions have been digitized, but the commitments, hard work, and love remain.
Technology has increased the richness of the ministry’s interactions with donors, friends, and partners, and accelerated the reach into every corner of the world, but at the end of the day, Samaritan’s Purse is about people serving people. It is caring hands and loving hearts coming alongside hurting people with food, medicine, and other assistance. As their website says “This, in turn, earns us a hearing for the Gospel, the Good News of eternal life through Jesus Christ.”
So, how has the digital caring revolution played a part in how God is increasing the impact of Samaritan’s Purse, and how do the ministry’s leaders approach capturing the power and managing the danger of new technologies? I asked Ross Stonecipher, senior director of IT for the ministry to walk me through the four waves of the digital revolution at Samaritan’s Purse.
Wave 1: The PC Revolution
Personal computers may not have been part of Samaritan’s Purse in 1970, but, like most organizations, the ministry has been happy to adopt technology to improve efficiency. While technology hasn’t changed the mission of the ministry or the vision of who to serve and how to serve them, those efficiencies have helped the organization to serve more people.
Wave 2: The Internet Revolution
The Internet has increased the richness of Samaritan Purse’s interactions with donors, friends, and partners. As Stonecipher put it “Individuals now have the capacity to align and build relationships with specific programs, causes and shared beliefs.” The ministry has been able to leverage the Internet to host virtual special events to connect and align with volunteers across the country, to provide training to staff based in remote areas of the world, to easily and vividly share the work that God is doing all over the world through Samaritan’s Purse, and to more easily bring others into the sphere of that work.
Wave 3: The Mobile/Social Revolution
While the Internet, generally speaking, made it easier for Samaritan’s Purse to communicate with volunteers, donors, and others supportive of the ministry, and to do that in ways that leverage video, audio, and interaction, social media provides a more immediate and action-oriented way to directly engage with the community so they can make a direct impact in rapidly-developing crises around the world. As Stonecipher explained, “This enables us to be nimble in our responses to God’s call to serve those in need while allowing shorter timeframes required to mobilize volunteers and implement projects.”
But beyond the urgent need to respond to a crisis, social media also provides what he describes as a “more frequent cadence” of sharing the work of the ministry. Rather than waiting for a quarterly or monthly newsletter to arrive via e-mail, those supportive of the ministry can receive a regular on-going feed of updates, showing a deeper and broader view of Samaritan Purse’s work.
Wave 4: The Connected Intelligence Revolution
The Connected Intelligence Revolution introduces new levels of complexity in how technology can increase the effectiveness, richness and reach of ministries like Samaritan’s Purse. Technologies like the Internet of Things, big data analytics, machine learning, natural language processing, and human-like interfaces like Siri and Alexa open up new possibilities for extending the love of Christ throughout the world. But they also represent significant potential dangers, especially in a ministry’s witness for Christ.
So far, Samaritan’s Purse is watching and waiting, not yet planning to leverage connected intelligence to augment the very personal delivery, preparation, or management of how they interact with their community.
The Digital Caring Revolution – Managing the Dangers
That same watchfulness has played out through each wave of the digital revolution. Ross Stonecipher: “We are continually discussing the power of new technologies and the risks associated with them. Our challenge is to define the acceptable level of risk in the utilization of any technology.”
Continuously learning and adopting the latest best practices in cybersecurity and other risk management fields goes a long way in managing the dangers of new technologies. However, for Christian ministries, it’s about more than just the technology itself. Building and maintaining healthy relationships and always vigilantly considering their witness for Christ is essential in the often divisive online world, especially social media. As Stonecipher explains “Samaritan’s Purse strives to speak the truth, tell the story of what God is doing around the world through the ministry, and share the hope and love of Christ through all that we communicate online and elsewhere.”
Capturing the Power of the Digital Caring Revolution
I think it’s safe to say that technology has been an important part of how God is using Samaritan’s Purse to love and serve many around the world. In addition to it’s U.S. headquarters, the ministry has affiliate offices in Canada, Australia, the U.K., Germany and South Korea, field offices in 19 countries, and works in more than 100 countries to provide aid to victims of war, disease, disaster, poverty, famine and persecution.
Since 1998, more than 53,000 American families impacted by natural disasters have been helped by Samaritan’s Purse staff and volunteers. In 2020, the ministry responded to the COVID-19 pandemic in 30 countries, provided emergency field hospitals in Italy, the Bahamas, and New York City, and airlifted more than 220 tons of critical relief supplies on 12 missions around the world. Since 1993, the ministry’s Operation Christmas Child has delivered more than 188 million shoebox gifts to children in need in more than 170 countries and territories. It is hard to imagine Samaritan’s Purse being able to operate at that scale without the technologies that have become core to the ministry’s operations.
I’ll let Ross Stonecipher have the last word: “Technology is an integral piece of reaching people around the world. Because of technology, we are able to work together, share resources, and communicate regularly. We want to be wise stewards of the resources that we have access to. We are always learning and striving to implement new changes to further our work to meet people’s physical and spiritual needs around the world.”
This article on the Digital Caring Revolution originally appeared here, and is used by permission.
