by Eddryll Teo
In 2019, I had concluded that social media was a toxic place. I was spending too much time on it, keyboard warriors were commenting everywhere without context, and I could not distinguish truth from falsehood online. It was like a digital sandstorm. I deleted Facebook and deactivated Instagram. However, the Holy Spirit prompted me to see that a generation that needed to be reached was in the digital space. In December 2019, I decided to create Malaysian Christian Memes (MCM) on Instagram, which has since grown into a team of six people. This article highlights the urgency to see the digital world as a mission field that the church should not overlook. I will cover key issues shaping Gen Z (and increasingly Gen Alpha), and how, in the attempt to address these issues, Malaysian Christian Memes emerged as one of the responses.
The issue
I agree with what Brett McCracken suggests in The Wisdom Pyramid that our society lacks wisdom. This lack of wisdom has left us digitally sick. In the digital world, we are fed information that is too much, too fast, and too focused on “me.”1 This has led to at least three outcomes:
- Information comes in excess: We are exposed to such large amounts of content that it creates an overwhelming kind of indigestion for the brain. We feed ourselves with all kinds of information so that we lose focus on what we need to be learning. We do not digest our learning properly.
- Information comes too quickly: Content moves too fast, leaving little room for reflection. We end up doom scrolling instead of sitting with the information and taking the time to understand it fully.
- Information is too individualised: What we see is shaped by our desires rather than by what we need. As we engage with content, we train algorithms to create a digital feed that increasingly fits our personal preferences. Ironically it creates, as this Malay proverb would say, “A frog underneath a coconut husk.”
In the end, we are left with a generation that moves quickly from one piece of content to the next, constantly scrolling and reacting to whatever appears before them. They are highly connected, with amazing access to the internet, yet very disconnected with the world around them. Their attention is fragmented, and they live within an algorithm-driven echo chamber. This digital world shapes what they love, trains their attention, and disciples their desires. Whether you like it or not, they are being discipled. But whose disciples are they becoming?
From our interactions with followers on MCM, we realised followers consisted of two groups: those who are actively engaged in church life, and those whom David Kinnaman calls nomads, prodigals, and exiles.2 Although his research was conducted with Americans, the patterns observed amongst digital Southeast Asians suggest that the trend could be global. Nomads are those who walk away from church engagement, but still consider themselves Christians. Prodigals are those who report losing their faith and do not identify as Christians. Exiles are those who are still invested in their faith but feel stuck or lost jumping from church to church.
The mission
MCM was created to attempt to slow people down, so that in the digital world, they are not “tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes” (Eph. 4:14). How do we do this? We try to create memes with short, original biblical reflections (what we call sermonettes) as a channel of the gospel to be shared on Instagram. Every Saturday, we have a question-and-response session through our stories to engage the community. We lovingly respond to each question, hoping to point people back to Jesus. We engage individuals through direct messages if they inquire about further help.
On MCM, our aim is to disciple people online. The memes capture their attention. As the account grows (3758 followers currently), we echo the words of John the Baptist, “I am not the Christ…He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:28; 30). In a sea of information glut, we hope to be a small voice of truth, like the finger of John the Baptist, pointing beyond ourselves. Our aim is to help people see their identity in the image of God, rather than in the image they curate online. We want them to understand that true knowledge begins with knowing who Jesus is, and to see that life is not all about “me” but something greater. But how does discipleship work online?
Discipleship still needs a physical aspect. We use a framework to do digital discipleship. We mimic Jesus’ interaction with the Samaritan woman in John 4. Jesus enters what she thought was her “safe space,” the well at noon, likely when other women would not be there potentially because of the social complications of having five husbands.3 Yet the heat and isolation made it anything but safe. Jesus crosses the cultural and social barriers to expose her spiritual thirst beyond the physical. Jesus makes the space redemptive, and leads her to encounter him. She leaves open to the possibility that he is the Messiah and tells others, who come to believe because of her testimony (John 4:39).
Likewise, MCM seeks to enter these digital spaces, expose the lies within them, and makes the space redemptive where some people can share their deepest longings and be pointed back to Jesus who offers living water. While some observe that anonymity prevents deep interaction, we have experienced the opposite. Since followers can engage without revealing their full identity, they often share struggles they feel uncomfortable disclosing to a church leader in person. The anonymity lowers shame’s grip, not the depth of the longing. But ultimately, MCM will intentionally encourage them to be connected back to the local church as MCM functions merely as a conduit. In short, digital discipleship—creating redemptive spaces online, is merely a starting point of discipleship and is evangelistic in nature. The church continues to be God’s main engine to disciple the nations to know Jesus and believers to Christlikeness.
The charge to churches
The digital world is a mission field that the church should not overlook. TikTok, for example, promises endless novelty and entertainment, but fails to deliver the life only Jesus can give. However, the church should not dismiss it as a lost cause. Even now, there are Christians on the app using that space to invite people to know Jesus. The platform itself may fail, but faithful Christians can still use it. A 2025 Bible Society report on digital nations estimates that about 5.5 billion people spend more than six hours a day online.4 According to The Sun, Malaysians spend an average of 8 hours and 17 minutes per day on their digital screens.5 To be fair, not all of that time is on addictive social media apps, but the time factors in apps like Spotify for music and Google Maps for navigation. The core issue still remains, and the church should urgently take notice. Billions are having their attention shaped by what algorithms feed them, often without realising it. The church is no stranger to this mission field, but we urgently need more intentional efforts, including digital forms of discipleship, to help people see that they need to follow Jesus. Only then can they experience life to the full.
Jesus did not come in a pixelated photo or send a YouTube video to show how we can be saved. The Word became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14). He “emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross” for our sins to redeem us (Phil. 2:7-8). This incarnational act of love serves as an example for us to follow. That we too can learn to enter the digital world to create redemptive spaces that help people see that Jesus Christ is Lord.
1. Brett McCracken, The Wisdom Pyramid: Feeding Your Soul in a Post-Truth World (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2021), 17-22. The following points come from McCracken's book.↑
2. David Kinnaman, Mark Matlock, and Aly Hawkins, Faith for Exiles: 5 Ways for a New Generation to Follow Jesus in Digital Babylon (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books, 2019).↑
3. Peter Rule, “Jesus talks to the Samaritan woman: A dialogic analysis,” Acta Theologica, 44, no. 2 (2024): 255–274, https://doi.org/10.38140/at.v44i2.8344.↑
4. Bible Society, “Digital Nations Report: Mapping the Church’s Online Opportunities,” accessed February 27, 2026, https://www.biblesociety.org.uk/research/digital-nations.↑
5. The Sun, "Malaysians clock in high screen time, ranking second in Asia," accessed May 4th 2026, https://thesun.my/going-viral/malaysians-clock-in-high-screen-time-ranking-second-in-asia-jg12365590/.↑
Author
Eddryll Teo (@eddryllteo on Instagram) holds degrees in Psychology, Theology, and Divinity. A former lecturer at Methodist College Kuala Lumpur (MCKL), he now serves with Fellowship of Evangelical Students (FES) Malaysia, discipling university students to see their campuses as mission fields. Passionate about forming biblically grounded, spiritually mature believers, he explores how discipleship can engage the digital world without compromising truth. He co-hosts the podcast Teo-Logy and serves on the team behind Malaysian Christian Memes. He is married to Yen Ping.
