International (MNN) – Jesus Film Project has a new strategy to help share the Gospel— gift cards! While there are many ways to share the JESUS Film, a whole new door has opened for it.
JESUS Film Gift Cards
“The gift card allows you to give this to someone. One of my favorite ways of doing that is somebody who’s helped me, an attendant at a gas station, a waitress, a waiter, somebody who’s given me some service,” Jesus Film Project’s Ray Rohland shares.
(Photo Courtesy of Jesus Film Project)
“I say, ‘You were very kind to me, can I give you a gift?’ And, 99.9% of the time they’ll say yes. When they get the card, the card has a QR code on it or a URL, and they can follow those links, put in a promotion code, and they’re left on a page that says to them, ‘What language do you speak?’”
From here, individuals have to opportunity to download or stream the JESUS Film in their heart language. The JESUS Film (classic version) is currently in 1,542 languages. The JESUS Film gift cards are meant to help reach the non-English speakers living in the United States and Canada.
Normally, for a promotion card, Rohland says you can expect about one percent of the people to respond to it. However, with the JESUS Film gift cards, the ministry has had about a 10 percent response rate.
Advantage of the Film
While many people involved in missions use the JESUS Film abroad, it hasn’t been a tool heavily utilized in the US.
“It’s an interesting thing. The film was originally developed in 1979. The nice thing about it being that old is that it’s been having time now to be translated into nearly 1,600 languages,” Rohland shares.
“So, you get the trade-off. An older film but translated into all these languages, and these languages now are becoming more and more prevalent in our American society. So, when we want to reach out to people from another country, their language exists in that base language because it’s already been translated for use overseas.”
For a lot of people, these JESUS Film gift cards are helping connect the dots to why the JESUS Film is effective both overseas and domestically. Sharing the Gospel in heart languages is key. In fact, Rohland knows how first hand.
Real Life Impacts
Not too long ago, Rohland was walking through a local mall to a Sear’s store when he noticed a woman. The woman, who was wearing a Burka, was talking with her daughter in a foreign language.
(Photo Courtesy JESUS Film Project)
“And I said, ‘That is a beautiful language you are speaking, would you mind telling me what that language is?’ And she said, ‘I don’t mind, I’m speaking Dari.’
“And I said, ‘That’s just beautiful…Would you mind if I gave you a gift because I have a film that’s in your language.’ And she immediately said, ‘No one has film that’s in Dari.’”
To her surprise, Rohland was able to give her the film through the gift card right there.
“She began to cry. I thought, whoops, did I do something wrong? So, I asked her, I said, ‘Ma’am, did I offend you in some way or do something wrong?’
“And she said, ‘No, no, no, you don’t understand … ‘I’ve lived here with my husband, who works at a regional medical center nearby for nine years, and you’re the first American who’s ever spoken to me in public.’ And so, just thinking about that, how wonderful it is that the very first opportunity that she had to have a person from our country talk to her was about Jesus.”
How to Get Involved
You can have the same impact on the lives of people in your community by sharing the JESUS Film. JESUS Film gift cards can easily be given to someone who helps you in public. Or, with Christmas on the way, it would make a great holiday gift.
Want to share the JESUS Film? Then download the JESUS Film app on your smartphone and find the languages of people in your neighborhood.
“Start going up with a bag of cookies and [saying], ‘I have a short film clip I’d like to show you in your language,’” Rohland says. A traditional way to access the JESUS Film is by purchasing the DVDs to give away.
To purchase these gift cards, click here!
