While pastor Craig Groeschel started Life.Church modestly in 1996 in a two-car garage in Oklahoma City, that small congregation has grown into one of the largest multi-campus churches in America and serves hundreds of millions through it’s digital outreach.
The church’s website says that Life.Church’s mission is “to lead people to become fully devoted followers of Christ,” and that their mission is “the driving force behind everything we do.” Over the past 25 years, probably no church has more extensively leveraged digital technology to increase the reach and richness of its ministries, all driven by that mission.
Bobby Gruenewald, a two-time web entrepreneur joined the Life.Church staff in 2001. He began exploring ways to leverage technology to help people build online relationships with Christ at the center. Five years ago I interviewed Gruenewald when Life.Church’s YouVersion Bible App downloads had reached 200 million, which was amazing — that number represented 60% of the U.S. population.
This past week, YouVersion marked the download and install of its Bible App on the 500 millionth unique device.
Now, we can no longer use our national population as the measuring stick. Life.Church is clearly thinking and acting on a global scale. I look forward to seeing how God will use Life.Church’s digital ministry over the next five years and beyond!