| Recently launched on YouTube, with 50K views in its first 11 days, ChristianStory is the brainchild of Wycliffe ordinand Daniel Kim, whose creative gifts were always destined to form a part of his future ministry. |
Daniel Kim tells us more:
ChristianStory is for Christians who want to learn about their faith. It’s a creative educational project blending academic rigour and nuanced thinking with first-class artwork accessibly animated in short YouTube episodes that we hope you'll find really appealing to watch. People have said we’re a bit like the BibleProject for Church History and Theology. I suppose that would be the aim!
DEEPENING FAITH IN HEART AND MIND
Growing up, people at school used to ask me about the crusades, violence in the Church, and the more complicated aspects of theology - how does the Trinity work etc. Back then, I had no idea how to really address these and went on a long journey of study to educate myself on a lot of these topics. I know that no everybody has the privilege or ability to do that, and so one of my passions and vocations in my ministry has been deepening faith in Christians both in heart and mind. This is where ChristianStory fits in.
The idea came to me 6 years ago while I was working in advertising in London. I went to an Christian event where I heard Dr Sarah Williams lecture on Church History. It moved me to the point of tears. With so many of us seeking after roots, history and depth in our own lives, I realised the history of the church - our family history - can root us, edify us, and show us that we have never been alone. The Church is both spacial (spread throughout the world), and temporal (spread throughout time).
A HIGH-CALIBRE COLLABORATION
In a rush of inspiration, I wrote a project proposal at 2AM, waiting to cross paths with the perfect collaborators. It took four years to find them! They turned out to be the theologian Oliver Dϋrr and his brother Manuel Dϋrr who runs a creative studio in Bienne, Switzerland with some incredibly talented illustrators and animators. Ideas are dreams: they only become reality with the right team.
Together we set about securing initial funding and assembling a high-calibre team, many of us drawn from Oxford and the University. My wife Charlotte Kim is a script writer and the voice of the videos, and Benjamin Sharkey – probably the best historian I know – is our lead researcher. Alister McGrath (former Principal of Wycliffe Hall), Bishop Graham Tomlin, and Andrew Davison (Regius Professor of Divinity) are among the project's Theological advisers as well as scholars from the Center for Faith and Society in Switzerland.
OFF TO A FLYING START
We launched our first video on Good Friday 2025. My personal ‘pat-on-the-back’ goal was 10K views in a week with about 500 subscribers… The whole team was staggered when we met that goal in the first two days and, after 11 days saw that we’d achieved 50K views and over 3,500 people had subscribed to our channel!
TELLING THE GLOBAL HISTORY OF CHRISTIANS
Historically, we’re taking a global approach. So even in the Early Church we're exploring Christianity in the Persian (as well as Roman) empire – then later on, we'll introduce the Chinese Christians. How many are aware that in Afghanistan – aside from the past 200 years – has an unbroken Christian history of 1,800 years? We want to debunk the idea that Christianity is a ‘Western’ religion, and show that people from all cultures and times have found relevance and beauty in the Christian faith.
We’re telling “the history of Christians” which is more relatable, perhaps, than the history of The Church or of Christianity. What were Christians actually doing and how did their faith express itself? For example, when we get to the crusades we need to examine violence, empire and religious war but also to imagine what the faith of the crusader looked like - what was going on in their minds. And here we'll go the way our research leads us. Christians have always been trying to live out their faith and this has always manifested in some mistakes as well as many successes. Our job is neither to heroize nor villainize but just to tell the story.
BRIMMING WITH IDEAS
We’ve so many ideas for videos already! If we make 1 per month for 10 years that's 120 videos - we could easily make more! In practice, I'd estimate it takes 300 hours and £22,000 to create each one.
We want ChristianStory to be a free resource for everyone, in perpetuity, so we've actively turned off monetisation and paid advertising. We’re trusting word-of-mouth to bring our content to those who need it.
I'd like to warmly invite you to watch our videos, subscribe to our channel and pray for our work. We've been humbled by the really warm reception ChristianStory has received from wonderful people all around the world - and we’re so grateful for your support!
