State of the Nerd Address 2019

It was two years ago today that Nerd in the Word launched its first article. With today being our second anniversary, I would like to take some time to reflect on how Nerd in the Word has grown over the last year, and how we plan to expand in the coming year. First, let’s look at some statistics for 2018-2019.

From June 2018 to June 2019, we have had 4,826 views on the Nerd in the Word site, which is a substantial increase from the mere 1,003 views we had in the first year. That’s over four times the growth of our first year!

For the entire year of 2018, we had 2,482 views, which we quickly surpassed in March 2019. The current 2019 view count stands at 2,921 views which, considering we are only half way through 2019, is extremely likely to increase to beyond 4,000 before the end of the year.

Nerd in the Word Global

A year ago from today, I announced that one of my goals for the second year was to launch Nerd in the Word in a foreign language. Although the original translators I had lined up fell through, I have since located a new translator, a native Spanish-speaking Christian in Venezuela who specializes in freelance ministry translation. He has since translated “The Gospel’s Five Words” series into Spanish and will soon begin translating new material. (The Gospel’s Five Words is currently available on the site if you use a browser with Spanish selected as the default language, or use the language switcher on the top right of the page)

In addition to Spanish translation, we are also attempting to reach those around the world who speak English as a first or second language. Here are some stats on the 82 countries represented in our World-Wide outreach for 2018-2019.

And the countries represented with less than ten: Ethiopia, Jamaica Venezuela, Myanmar, Austria, Uganda, Malaysia, Brazil, Italy, Liberia, Bangladesh, New Zealand, Zimbabwe, Norway, Indonesia, Benin, United Arab Emirates, American Samoa, Singapore, Papua New Guinea, Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Nepal, Switzerland, Angola, Egypt, Russia, Bhutan, Rwanda, Algeria, Vanuatu, Honduras, Laos, Lebanon, Vietnam, South Sudan, Seychelles, Costa Rica, Namibia, Libya, Kuwait, European Union, Madagascar, Finland, Guyana, Argentina, Columbia, Kazakhstan, Turkey, Nicaragua, St. Lucia, Albania, Romania, Slovakia, Fiji, Dominican Republic, and Paraguay.

These are all real people, and it brings me joy to know that there are individuals all across the globe that we have been able to reach with good biblical teaching. I may never meet these people or talk with them one on one, but through Nerd in the Word, I’m able to reach out and touch their lives, even if it is just for only a passing moment. I consider the push for Nerd in the Word Global in the last year a success and am looking forward to expanding our outreach to even broader coasts in the future.

Nerd in the Wordcast

Due to Nerd in the Word receiving funding through a generous patron. (You can support us here) We have been able to purchase equipment for audio recording. With this new equipment, we plan on creating audio versions of all our articles. We realize that many people are busy and don’t have time to sit down and read a full article. So to remedy this situation, we plan to make audio recordings of all of our articles available in a podcast-like format. With this available, people will be able to listen on the road, during a lunch break, or whenever they want. A specific publishing platform has yet to be decided, but we are making progress and hope to make them available in due time. If you have a specific web service you use for your podcasts or ministry recordings and think it would be the right choice for us, please let us know by emailing us at ideas@nerdintheword.com.

Nerd in the Word Publishing

Another thing we can do thanks to those who donate is get into publishing. There is currently a book project I have been working on that I hope to release within 2019-2020. But these are the early days of the project, and there isn’t much to say about at the moment.

Hymation by Nerd in the Word

Soon we will be launching "hymation" a Nerd in the Word Christian clothing brand. (Hymation is a respelling of the Greek word, himation, meaning a garment or piece of clothing.) The focus of this brand is to make Christian T-shirts which I like to call Tract-Shirts, T-Shirts for short. (See what I did there?) These shirts are designed to be conversation starters. They are designed in such a way that someone might ask you what your shirt is supposed to mean and in turn give you an opportunity to talk about God. We have seven or eight shirt designs that will be launching in the following month or so as well as two designs based around the Nerd in the Word logo. Hope you all will enjoy them and that they will be a tool you can use to share the Gospel with other people.

Update: Available now at hymation.co

Nerd in the Word Funding

Thanks to donations, we’ve been able to pour more money into our ministry, specifically into reaching more people through advertising and making our material more accessible through Spanish translation and soon-to-be audio-recordings for those who are blind, busy, or just prefer to listen. We are still looking for more people who are interested in investing in our ministry so that we can continue to grow and reach new audiences for the cause of Christ. If you are interested in being a part of our ministry, please consider being a monthly supporter. If you are interested, you can sign up at https://www.patreon.com/nerdintheword”>https://www.patreon.com/nerdintheword

And Jabez Nerd in the Word called on the God of Israel, saying, Oh that thou wouldest bless me indeed, and enlarge my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that thou wouldest keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me! And God granted him that which he requested.
1 Chronicles 4:10
-Nerd in the Word, 2019

I’m looking forward to the year ahead, thanks for reading and being a part of this journey!