About Us

The History of Kingstone and the Comic Bible Society

Kingstone was formed in 2004 while Art Ayris was producing his first movie “The Touch.” Having worked as a youth pastor with a large outreach to unchurched teens, he struggled to find appropriate materials for the Biblically illiterate youth he encountered. While out in the community, he saw teens sprawled in bookstores reading manga and comics, and he began to envision the opportunity to create a viable spiritual option to Marvel and DC.

After creating a few comics to serve as prototypes, Ayris began raising capital and recruiting artists with Marvel and DC backgrounds. In 2012, Kingstone began the production of the most complete graphic adaptation of Scripture ever attempted. By 2017, the Kingstone Bible trilogy was a finalist for Christian Book of the Year in the Children’s Category.

Even before the volumes were finalized, numerous Bible translators and missionaries began approaching Ayris saying, “We need this in our language.” Simultaneously, requests from prisoners began pouring into the Kingstone offices. In response to this, in 2019 the non-profit Comic Bible Society was formed to provide royalty-free licenses to language partners as well as to provide a conduit to deliver comic Bibles and Christian comic books to prisoners.

In 2020, Brandon B. joined the board as Vice-President of Strategic Partnerships and began a strategic outreach into Swahili, the predominant language of Africa. Brandon earned a Master's Degree in Cross-Cultural Ministries from Dallas Theological Seminary and spent over a decade developing Christian training materials while serving the church globally in over 20 countries. In 2023, Brandon moved into the role of President of the Comic Bible Society.

The Comic Bible Society currently partners with SIL and Wycliffe translators, Ethnos 360, Voice of the Martyrs, Reach Beyond, and numerous Bible societies worldwide to deliver a Bible to people in a medium they can understand.

In 2022, the first motion picture from Kingstone based on the true story of a church helping the addicted and homeless opened in 608 theaters, and in 2023 released on major streaming platforms worldwide. This feature film, No Vacancy, is now being licensed via the Comic Bible Society to broadcast in other languages.

In 2023, Kingstone formed a new company, Kingstone Animation, to create high-quality 2D animation of products from their Kingstone Comics and U.S. Comics imprints. It is anticipated that a number of these Bible animations will be translated into other languages in partnership with the Comic Bible Society.

Our Beliefs

The following core beliefs guide the content which is promoted by the Comic Bible Society.

• That the Bible is the literal, divinely inspired, and complete Word of God.
•  In one God, creator of all things, eternally existing in three Persons.
•  That Jesus Christ was and is true God and true man.
•  That man was created in the image of God, but fell into sin, and requires a redeemer.
•  That the shed blood of Jesus Christ provides the only means of salvation and is offered freely to all who accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. There is no salvation apart from personal faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.
•  In the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ and the bodily resurrection of those who die in Him.
•  That the true church is comprised of all such persons who have been regenerated (born again) through personal faith in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.
•  That God, through the ministry of the Holy Spirit, is active in the world today, convicting and regenerating man, to the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ.
•  In the personal, imminent, coming of Christ and His physical return to rule and reign the world.
•  The eternal destination of heaven for those who have trusted Christ for salvation and eternal condemnation for the unbelieving.