Sample data — synthetic, labelled, never quoted·the Index is in development

The Jesus Index

§ Learn · the record · compiled August 2026

The long version

A coalition tried to buy a picture of youth faith.
It ended up building the measure and giving it away.

That sentence is the whole through-line, and it took about eighteen months of expensive discovery to earn. What follows is the record — including the parts where the plan failed, because the shape of the thing now only makes sense against what it stopped being.

Six eras

I The question nobody could answerII DraftingIII The wallIV The pivotV Who actually carries itVI From pitch to working platform

A coalition of thirty-plus organisations adopted one goal — everyone in the next generation with a real opportunity to follow Jesus by 2033. A goal that size needs a scoreboard. There wasn't one.

2033

the first milestone, not the finish line

  1. 01The framing

    What do young people believe about Jesus — and what does that tell us to do?

    The Research & Measurement work group set the leading question, and named two purposes it had to serve: progress (are we actually moving?) and funding (unlock resources against evidence, not anecdote).

  2. 02The model

    Three questions, and the 4+2 framework

    Do they follow Jesus? Do they participate in His mission? Does their world look different because of Him? Underneath the first sat the four beliefs — God exists, Jesus is the Son of God, forgiveness through Jesus, the Bible is God's word — and the two activities: pray weekly, read scripture weekly.

    What changedThe three questions have survived every subsequent revision, including a total change of business model.

  3. 03The constraint

    One question is best. Twelve can be done. Twenty is the maximum.

    Set early and defended since. A long instrument is an unfinished instrument — in a camp queue, on a borrowed phone, the length of the survey is the study's real sampling method.

The evidence that started it

Belief outruns practice.

The Dallas–Fort Worth pilot is the only real data the project has, and it did the job a pilot is supposed to do: it found a gap nobody could argue with. Near-universal assent to the beliefs. Barely a quarter reading scripture daily. And a third fewer people mentoring someone than being mentored.

That second gap — the mentorship deficit — is arithmetic with a horizon on it. A movement where fewer people reproduce than are being formed does not compound. It is also precisely why multiplication is a tier of its own rather than a footnote.

DFW pilot, Centiment panel, under-30s, 2025. Real data, cited — unlike every other figure on this site, which is synthetic and labelled as such.

DFW pilot · under-30s identifying as followers

Fig. 04 · real data
Dallas–Fort Worth pilot results
Affirm Jesus is the Son of God
97
Identify as followers of Jesus
93
Pray daily
64
Being mentored by someone
48
Attend church weekly
36
Mentoring someone else
34
Read the Bible daily
26

Navy is level. Vermillion marks the practices that fall away — colour only ever means something.

What it actually measures

Three questions × four tiers.

The three questions are what we measure. The four tiers are how deep it has gone. Every item in the instrument carries exactly one of each, which is what makes a single four-minute survey readable through two completely different lenses.

Read across a row and you learn how far one question has travelled. Read down a column and you learn what an entire cohort has and has not yet reached. The narrowing between columns is the diagnosis.

This grid is rendered by the same component the live dashboard uses — with plain language in the cells instead of scores. There is no second, prettier version of the model kept for marketing.

The J12 · the model

Fig. 05
The three questions by the four tiers — what we measure, and how deep it has gone
Exposureencountered?Responseresponded?Formationbeing shaped?Multiplicationdoes it spread?
FollowDo they follow Jesus?heard of Jesusbelievesbeing shapedhelps others believe
MissionDo they participate in His mission?aware of the callconvinced it's theirspractising witnessmobilising others
WorldDoes their world look different?sees faith should matterbelieves it doeschoices reshapedchanging their spheres

The nameplate

Named so it never has to be renamed.

Rebrands cost trust precisely when a longitudinal measure is accruing it. The Index begins with the next generation; it does not end there — so no generation appears in the name. Editions carry the cohort instead.

LayerNameRole
MasterbrandThe Jesus IndexThe standard itself. No generation in the name — editions carry the cohort.
TickerJXJX:NG for NextGen today; JX:DFW and JX:BA for city waves; JX:ALL after 2033.
Instrumentthe J12The twelve-item core. Twelve was already sacred arithmetic — it inherits the disciples, not a demographic.
Addressjfindx.orgReads J·F·INDX — Jesus-Following Index.
PublicationState of Jesus Following in the Next GenerationVol. I, 2028. A series template: the cohort slides, the subject never moves.

The line that governs everything

We will never claim to speak for a nation.

Crowdsourced data is only responsible if you are honest about what it is. Every score on this platform carries its sample size. No benchmark appears for a country until enough people there have completed the Index.

No organisation ever sees another organisation's results. No organisation ever sees an individual response — not even its own respondents'. There are no cross-org league tables, and there will not be.

This is also why every figure on this site is currently marked as synthetic. A demo screenshot circulating as a real finding would cost more than a slower launch does.

Still unsettled

Questions we have not answered.

Publishing these is deliberate. A measurement standard that hides its open problems is not a standard, it is a product. If you have a view on any of them, we want it.

  1. 01

    How do you measure multiplication without self-report inflation?

    People reliably over-report sharing their faith. Multiplication is the tier the whole strategy turns on, and it is the one most vulnerable to flattering answers.

  2. 02

    Where exactly should the critical-mass gate sit?

    No benchmark is published for a geography until enough people there have completed the Index. The working number is a placeholder, not a finding — and it decides when countries start seeing themselves.

  3. 03

    Do a 13-year-old and a 29-year-old belong on the same instrument?

    The platform is built to survive age-specific versions. The research has not settled whether it needs them.

  4. 04

    Should a skipped question count as zero, or as not-asked?

    Now that the survey adapts, Formation and Multiplication describe the people who reached those tiers rather than the whole sample. That makes the funnel honest per-item and harder to compare between organisations. Currently: not-asked.

  5. 05

    The Index starts at 13–30 — which cohort comes second?

    The nameplate was chosen so it never has to change. Editions carry the cohort; the subject never moves.

Clay to be moulded — not a vase to be baked.

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