The National Council of Evangelicals in France (CNEF) recently organised a gala dinner for evangelical influencers to share experiences and find ways to work together to reach more people with the gospel.

Twenty influencers on Instagram and Tiktok, who have between 40,000 and 2 million followers, attended the dinner, hosted by the president of CNEF, Erwan Cloarec, CNEF's secretary Nathan Lambert, and its communications director, Romain Choisnet, along with

The aim was “to meet, encourage and honour those who bear a public evangelical Protestant witness on social media” in France, said Choisnet on X.

Le CNEF a souhaité rencontrer, encourager et honorer ceux qui portent un témoignage protestant évangélique public sur les réseaux sociaux !
Les "influenceurs" évangéliques. pic.twitter.com/OiQHkUsjVl

— Romain CHOISNET (@comcnef) December 16, 2023

The event started with a welcome cocktail and the presentations, followed by a time of worship and prayer.

During the dinner, Nathan Lambert gave a Bible message; some of the influencers share their testimonies, and there was also time for reflection and prayer by tables.

The gala took place at the Hotel-restaurant le Shangri-Lall in Paris, thanks to several donations of sponsors who gave specifically for this meeting.

CNEF: “Social media is a mission field”

Lambert recalled that in the document about mission recently released by the CNEF, they stressed the importance of using the “new means” of technology to make the message of Jesus heard, and social media is “a mission field, a place to make disciples and not to simply bring a Christian veneer in our context”.

According to the secretary of CNEF, “the body of Christ is universal […] social media can reach people in places that local churches will find very difficult, to lead them to be connected to a local church”.

Eager to share the message of Jesus

In a written press release prior to the gala, the CNEF also interviewed some of the influencers that participated in the event, about their experiences on platforms like Instagram and Tiktok.

All of them have in common that they started in social media, as Gloria (RaïssaGloria on Youtube, with 1.7 million followers) explained, “out of love for sharing what Jesus has given me: calm, serenity, assurance and faith”.

“Everything happens very quickly on social media, and the biggest challenge is to capture people's attention. Talking about a subject that will resonate deeply in people's hearts, like the pure and simple message of the gospel, is a good way”, said Léana Payet (40,000 followers on Instagram).

Risks of social media

Asked about the risks of social media, Olivier Hayek (Zeytooun on tiktok, with over 500,000 followers), warned that “pride can get in the way, making me forget the real purpose of my mission: I'm not doing this for my glory, but for the glory of Jesus”.

“You have to be prepared for the message not to be appreciated. There is clearly Christianophobia. In France, we still still enjoy a certain freedom of expression, so we shouldn't hesitate to denounce it”, stressed Johanna (Princess of the King in tiktok, with over 440,000 followers).

Wide audience

Influencers agreed that one of the best things about social media is that a wide audience can hear about Jesus. “I don't think we even realise how much people are hungry and thirsty for joy, life and meaning”, pointed out Johanna.

For Hayek the networks are a good example of Mark 16:15, while Johanna believes that they are “the fulfilment of Habakkuk 2:14”.

Despite the benefits of social media, Léana Payet underlined that they “will never replace the Bible and time spent in prayer”.