Global Mission Trends 2008

Christian mission brings the message of salvation in Christ alone to all ethnic groups so that they have the undisputed opportunity to become new persons in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17).

“As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.”--John 20:21 (out of our comfort).

Luke 4:40-44 When the sun was setting, the people brought to Jesus all who had various kinds of sickness, and laying his hands on each one, he healed them. 41 Moreover, demons came out of many people…. 42 At daybreak Jesus went out to a solitary place. The people were looking for him and when they came to where he was, they tried to keep him from leaving them. 43 But he said, "I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent." 44 And he kept on preaching in the synagogues of Judea. (References are from the New International Version)

A Christian missionary is God’s ambassador bringing the message of salvation in Christ alone to another people, so that members will have the opportunity to be born from above.

A missionary is sent by God on a task. The word “missionary” is the Latin equivalent of the Greek “apostle,” or “sent one.”

Missionaries are distinguished by a “call” from God (Acts 13:2), although some believe Matt. 28:18-20 (“the Great Commission”) suffices for a call to everyone.

Someone who simply does the work of a deacon:

M-1 Frontier missionaries—World A

A good strategy to disciple the nations is for frontier missionaries to plant viable ethnic churches, which will rapidly multiply and continue to evangelize and disciple their own people, first.

Matthew 28:19-20 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you…."

Why Support Global Missions?

God wants no one to be lost (go to hell), but all to repent (2 Pet. 3:9). Missions is God’s work, not the responsibility of any one sending nation or people.

The “Servant of the Lord,” meaning both Jesus and Israel, was to bring God’s salvation “to the ends of the earth” (Isaiah 49:3-6; Acts 13:46-47).

In the New Testament the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost (Luke 19:10). We are now His “feet” to reach the lost, wherever they are (Rom. 10:14-15).

It grows from a mustard seed to a tree

Missions Terms

First World

World A

“A significantly large grouping of individuals who perceive themselves to have a common affinity for one another because of their shared language, religion, ethnicity, residence, occupation, class or caste, situation, etc., or combinations of these.” Lausanne Strategy Working Group, 1982

“Great Commission Christians”

Evangelicals

Definitions of Major Religions

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By mid-2005 there were 13,000 unreached unimax peoples—”having no viable church planting movement or viable, indigenous, evangelizing church.” Center for the Study of Global Christianity “All Humanity in Mission Perspective in mid-2005” © 2004 globalchristianity.org

An ethnolinguistic people is “A distinct homogeneous ethnic or racial group within a single country, speaking its own language.”

Christian Growth Rates

Independent Churches are the Fastest Growing

Independent Churches Are The Fastest Growing Churches

Spectacular Pentecostal Growth

Church attendees: 1.04% per year

Global Religion Growth Rates

Growth Rates: Africa

Major Religions as a Percent of World Population, 1900-2000

World Religions by Size and Percentage of World Population

Non-Christians (World B) in mid-2008 = 4,460,063,000

Major Religion Numerical Growth: by Birth and by Conversion

Percentages of World Population: Hindu, Muslim & Christian

Deployment of the Christian Missionary Force

Foreign Missionaries per Million in Major Cultures

Missionary Deployment 2000

Most of the 458,000* foreign missionaries go where invited, not where most needed

“In our Evangelical missionary efforts we made it our goal to proclaim the Gospel to every nation on earth. Then we made it our goal to proclaim the Gospel to every people on earth, and that is still very much a strategy in action. Let us now also consider how to bring the Gospel to every religion on earth.”

The Urban Challenge

148,000 Non-Christian urbanites are added per day

Increasing Global Urbanization

By 1950--7 of the top 25 cities were non-Christian

Global Shift: Christianity is Headed South by Southeast

2,224,800 Church members cease to practice Christianity each year in North America and Europe—7,600 per day if attenders are included

2,224,800 In 1900 94.5% of Europe was Christian, but in 2000 only 76.8% was.

“One central fact in the changing religious picture is a massive relative decline in the proportion of the world’s people who live in the traditionally advanced nations.” [Europe, North America, former Soviet Union]

1500s-Europe

In 1960 about 58% of the world’s Christians were western. In 1990, 38% were. (Guthrie, p. 134)

More missionaries are being sent from non-Western churches than from Western churches. (Ralph Winter & Bruce Koch, “Finishing the Task: The Unreached Peoples Challenge,” Perspectives, 3rd ed., p. 509)

By 2025, only 3 of the 10 nations with the largest Christian population will be advanced nations.

Due to affordable jet travel, early retirement, world exposure via TV, and mission organization facilitation, such trips have proliferated within the last 20 years.

Evangelization by the Word and Media

Approximately 66% of people globally live by orality (non print-based communication), resulting in an “oral majority who cannot or will not learn well through print-based instruction.”

Among people groups not yet reached the illiteracy rate is “significantly higher” than 66%. Many of these groups are without Bibles.

The Jesus Film phenomena- by 1/08 over 6 billion had seen it and over 218 million had professed Christ. It’s translated in almost 1,000 languages.

Languages With Scriptures Are Escalating

“The world’s dominant activity is rapidly becoming the deepening and spreading of information and knowledge.” David Barrett, George Kurian, Todd Johnson, “The Status of Christianity and Religions in the Modern World,” World Christian Encyclopedia, 2nd ed., p. 1:5; p. 2:535

56 global ministry networks have developed, with 350 million computers. (David B. Barrett & Todd M. Johnson, World Christian Trends AD30-AD 2200, p. 71)

Christian Giving

Globally Christians in 2008 gave 2.1% of income to Christian causes—of this 0.1% went to global mission. David Barrett, Todd M. Johnson & Peter Crossing, “Missiometrics 2008: Reality Checks for Christian World Communions,” Int’l Bulletin of Missionary Research, Jan. 2008, p. 30.

Very Poor: 18%--0 to $100 (per capita)

Mission Force Changes

The movement is toward specialization. Each is seeking its own niche.

95% of graduates of evangelical seminaries, Bible colleges and similar institutions stay in the US, which has 5% of the world’s population. Stan Guthrie, Mission in the 3rd Millennium, p. 22.

More local churches are bypassing traditional mission agencies, becoming direct senders. Stan Guthrie, Mission in the 3rd Millennium, p. 5

Nationals know the culture and are more efficient evangelists within their own culture. They can serve for far less money than do North American missionaries.

MISGUIDED EVANGELISM

While 72% of the world is adequately evangelized, 1,871,208,000 are left out in 2008 (28%).

“40% of the church’s global foreign mission resources are being deployed to just 10 oversaturated countries with strong citizen-run home ministries.”

The number of evangelized non-Christians increased by about 87,000 per day by mid-2008. David Barrett, Todd M. Johnson & Peter Crossing, “Missiometrics 2008: Reality Checks for Christian World Communions,” Int’l Bulletin of Missionary Research, Jan. 2008, p. 30.

“To evangelize the world by 2025 the number of unevangelized who are evangelized would have to increase from 70.7 million per year to 174.2 million per year. But these 100 million unevangelized non-Christians are far-removed from current Christian outreach.”

How important is missions, after all?

Those who do reject Jesus will not have eternal life in heaven (John 3:36; 12:48). JESUS said that none come to the Father apart from Him (John 14:6).

Pagans also violate their own moral standards– thus condemning themselves (Rom. 2:14-16).

Theological drifting, even among evangelicals, is toward believing that those who haven’t heard the Gospel will not go to hell.

“Theologian Ronald Nash, in his 1994 book Is Jesus the only savior?, estimates that more than half of the evangelical leaders in denominational or missions leadership and of missions professors at evangelical colleges and seminaries may believe that people can be saved by Christ without specifically turning to him for forgiveness of their sins.” Stan Guthrie, Mission in the 3rd Millennium, p. 39

North American agencies centered upon evangelism/discipleship received 45.1% of the North American total giving, whereas those focusing upon relief/development received 49.1% of funds in 2005.

If all are saved who don’t hear of Christ, the best strategy is to immediately withdraw all missionaries, so that all will be saved.

The world will hear. Matthew 24:14 14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. But God will use people to preach (means).