Jeanne DamasioAug 6, 2026, 10:26 PM
Hope Channel South Sudan has launched its first online evangelistic campaign, drawing a Facebook reach of 8,508 during its first three days as it streams a message of hope to a nation strained by conflict and economic collapse.
In January 2025, South Sudan's government blocked social media nationwide, mainly Facebook and TikTok, for about five days. A year and a half later, a small team of volunteers is using those same platforms, and just two cameras, to carry the gospel of Jesus to thousands.
The campaign grew out of hard limits. Arop Daniel Otto Aligo, manager at Hope Channel South Sudan, says roughly 60 percent of the country's infrastructure is broken and many roads are unsafe because of insecurity and robbery, so reaching people in person can mean boarding a small plane and hoping the flight proceeds safely. What the team did have was an audience online, so they went where the people already were. “These people need more than physical needs. They need peace, they need hope,” Aligo said. “In the face of all these political turmoils and the economic crisis biting people, when there is hope, they can still keep moving.” The team believes it is the first campaign of its kind in the country.
South Sudan is the world's youngest country, independent only since 2011, and has spent much of its short time at war. A 2018 peace deal brought a fragile calm, but in March 2025 the house arrest of First Vice President Riek Machar unraveled the power-sharing government and reignited fighting, leaving the nation, in 2026, at its highest risk of renewed civil war since the agreement was signed. The economy is buckling under the tension. Aligo puts it plainly: the U.S. dollar rose by about 20 percent in three weeks, while the South Sudanese pound keeps sliding and families feel the crisis “biting” them. The World Bank puts food inflation at 234 percent in the past fiscal year, and the United Nations reports roughly 10 million people, two-thirds of the population, need humanitarian aid this year.
Faith in South Sudan can carry a cost. About 60 percent of the population is Christian, and while the constitution promises equal treatment, believers still face pressure on the ground. Aligo says the church can preach freely across much of the country, yet in some states that freedom is limited. He describes churches that were burned and pastors who were arrested and told they would go free only if they renounced their faith. “But they remained standing,” he said. His account fits a documented pattern: religious-freedom monitors recorded the 2020 detention of about 150 Seventh-day Adventist members in Tonj State, held and mistreated for days after local leaders complained about the church's influence.
Hope Channel South Sudan began in September 2020 with a handful of volunteer journalists and a single camera. Today it has two. The team streams a 90-minute live program each evening throughout the campaign's eight days, moving between family-life talks, health segments, and a nightly sermon, with local choirs leading the music. They go live on Facebook, YouTube, and TikTok, having studied where the country's youth actually spend their time. Facebook analytics show a steady effort: posts drew a reach of 3,187 on the first day, 2,851 on the second, and 2,470 on the third, for a combined 8,508 during the first three days, with a few hundred watching each broadcast live and viewers joining from Morocco, Ethiopia, Uganda, and Sudan. Presenters record a segment on the Hope Channel South Sudan set, which moves between family-life talks, health, and a nightly sermon.
Language is its own mission field. South Sudan is home to 64 ethnic groups and dozens of languages, and while the sermons are preached in English, many viewers need more. So the team arranged for churches across the country to set up screens and projectors, where those without phones or internet access can gather to watch as someone translates on the spot into the local tongue. “The goal is not just to watch someone preaching, but to let them understand the message, because the message carries hope in itself,” Aligo said. For those beyond any screen, two Adventist radio stations, one in the capital, Juba, and another in a state near the Ethiopian border, carry the same sermon live on air. A local choir leads the music during the program.
What surprised the team was that it worked. “Some felt discouraged, saying we don't have equipment, we don't have manpower, how can we do this? We only have two cameras,” Aligo said. “But it is a very big miracle. It is God who is doing the work. Our part is to give ourselves as vessels, and God keeps pushing us forward.” Part of the live audience follows the broadcast at the venue.
The campaign is a small piece of a much larger ambition. Hope Channel South Sudan belongs to a global network of 90 media entities working toward one goal: to reach one billion people with the message of hope by 2030. It also comes as the worldwide Adventist Church rallies behind OneVoice27, a churchwide digital evangelism initiative leading up to September 2027. In South Sudan, where distance, cost, and insecurity keep traditional evangelism at bay, a screen and a signal can go where a preacher cannot.
“South Sudan is the last place most people would expect a media ministry to thrive, a country facing conflict, hunger, and a government that once shut off social media. Yet a small team with two cameras refused to wait for better conditions, and they are carrying the gospel of Jesus to thousands. That is the heart of Hope Channel. We do not wait for the world to become easy before we bring it hope,” said Vyacheslav Demyan, president of Hope Channel International. Viewers pray during an evening broadcast.
Aligo expects the campaign's reach to climb to between 15,000 and 20,000 by the time it closes on Aug. 8, both within South Sudan and beyond. For him, the name of the event is the point. “Hope for the Final Generation is not simply about conducting an event. It is about reaching a generation that needs hope in South Sudan and across South Sudan,” he said. “We believe South Sudan has a future, and through Hope Channel South Sudan we want to use every available platform to point people to Jesus Christ.” Each broadcast ends with the verse the team built the campaign around, Romans 15:13: “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”
Editor's note: This is a developing story. The campaign runs Aug. 1-8, 2026; the figures here reflect its first three days, and the article will be updated with final numbers at its close.