Missions in your Churches

Missions – Becoming a Dinosaur in our Faith?

2Co 10:16 To preach the gospel in the regions beyond you, and not to boast in another man's line of things made ready to our hand.

Friends – I’m venting right now, but yet consider the words below.

Missions are becoming more and more of a dinosaur in the Baptist walk of life.

Many Baptist churches today have never even seen a missionary, must less spoken to one.

When we mention the 10-40 Window, people are clueless.

When the Baptists are told that the 10-40 Window is now open, we marvel?

When the Baptists are told that the cults are pouring in, we shudder.

When the Baptists are told of the struggles of the Christians in the 10-40 Window, they pity them.

When we talk about missions and the millions who have never heard, we might even shed a tear.

When Baptists talk of missions, we talk of the past heroes of the faith. Why always the past? Why no talk of the present?

Missions in the Baptist faith are fast becoming archaic. Its something that our forefathers did but isn’t something that my children should consider.

Missions have become something that only young people do for a summer while they are in college or something that retired people do for a holiday when they take a summer trip.

What does the Baptist talk about?

We spend countless hours arguing scriptures instead of carrying the “good news” to others. Maybe if we were busy getting the “good news” out, we would have less time to argue.

We spend countless hours debating if the Bible is inspired or preserved. If it isn’t, than why preach or believe?

We spend countless hours discussing salary packages and retirements – shame on you!

We spend countless hours doing everything, but praying that God’s people will carry out the Great Commission. Even when we do pray, we do not pray what we can do. We just pray for that poor unfortunate soul who has no chance to hear the gospel. We pray with an unbelieving heart to reach, to go, to help, but we do pray.

I wonder what God thinks of our prayers? What does he think when we pray with no feet to our prayers or no efforts to carry out the great commission?

Rom 10:15 - And how shall they preach, except they be sent? as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!

Pastors, Preachers, Sunday School teachers, Christians, please tell your people that missions is real, missions is for today as it was for yesterday.

Missionaries are not super saints. We are just common fishermen, carpenters, tax collectors, and doctors.

Tell them of the millions that died today without a chance to hear, BECAUSE we didn’t tell them. Tell them of those who are searching for hope and peace, but never find it because no one is here to tell them. Tell them that the Devil is happy and excited that the Baptists are not as active as in years past. Tell them that while we wait, talk and tell stories of missions, the cults are pouring in.

Its time we understood it’s a shame that the Mormons, Jehovah’s Witness and Seven Day Adventist are pouring in and there is not a Baptist to be found?

It still begins with a simple – “Here am I; send me”. Why are we afraid to say “here am I; send me”. Why has it become “there they are, let’s hope that some else tells them”,

Isa 6:8 Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me.

Has your church ever had the privilege to send a person to the missions’ field? If your church has never commissioned a person to the field is that not something we should consider.

What is your church doing to get the Gospel to the regions beyond? I realize what we are doing in the “apple orchards” around our churches.

Psa 126:5 They that sow in tears shall reap in joy.

Let’s learn to sow in tears and not to shed tears over lost opportunities since we were too busy to labor in HIS Fields.

Pray for us as we work here in China. It’s heart breaking to watch so many talented and loving Chinese teachers and students fall into hell because no one wants to join the harvest.

 

What is the 10/40 Window?


World evangelism statistics: Of the 55 least evangelized countries, 97% of their population lives within the 10/40 Window.

Unless something changes soon, most of these unreached people will never hear the Gospel. Why? Well, Bryant Myers of World Vision has estimated that only about one and a quarter percent ( 1.25% )of Christian mission giving is going to missions work in the 10/40 Window. Open evangelism is difficult and even impossible in many 10/40 Window countries. Those are creative access areas.

What will you do in the next five days that will move the Church toward reaching people in the 10/40 window with the gospel?

The vision of a dying world: The people in the mission fields

Working on a school report about missions? Here are some facts to use.

Missions statistics from the places of the 10/40 Window:

Center of population:Two-thirds of the world's population -- more than 3.2 billion people -- live in the 10/40 Window.

Unreached and unevangelized: 95% of the people living in the 10/40 Window are unevangelized. Many have never heard the Gospel message even once. There are either no Christians or not enough of a Christian movement in many cultures of the 10/40 Window to carry out vibrant near-neighbor evangelism. If those groups are to be evangelized, believers will need to leave their own culture to enter another where they will seek to plant the gospel.

Such cross-cultural evangelism is required because there are people groups with no church movements that are understandable or relevant to them.

Good news: There's a difference between unreached and unreachable. In 1989 there were only four known Christians living in Mongolia. That country now has an estimated 10,000 indigenous believers. Also, Christian television programming can now be received in many closed 10/40 Window nations.
Poverty: Eighty-five percent of those living in the 10/40 window are the poorest of the world's poor.

Good news: Christians delivered more than $1 million worth of food to just one 10/40 Window refugee camp in a recent year. In one North African country that is hostile to the Gospel, abundant rain fell after an Easter service. A local news channel reported, "Christians have brought rain to the desert."

World religions: Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism are centered within the 10/40 Window.
Least evangelized cities: Half of the world's least evangelized cities are in this window.
Statistical data on unreached people groups:
The statistics of the numbers of non-Christians can be staggering.

865 million unreached Muslims or Islamic followers in 3330 cultural sub-groupings
550 million unreached Hindus in 1660 cultural sub-groups
150 million unreached Chinese in 830 groups
275 million unreached Buddhists in 900 groups
2550 unreached tribal groups (which are mainly animistic) with a total population of 140 million
Forming a smaller -- though important -- unreached group are the 17 million Jews scattered across 134 countries

Good news: Missions researcher David Barrett says the country with the most rapid Christian expansion ever is China where there are 10,000 new Christian converts every day.
Bible translation availability
At least some part of Scripture has been translated into 2,212 of the world's 6,500 languages
366 languages have the entire Bible
928 other languages have the New Testament
Individual books (such as the Gospel of John) are available in 918 additional languages
80 percent of the world's people have access to at least some portion of the Bible in a language they can understand.

 

The Chinese People

Population Summary:
Mainland China: 1.3 billion (5 times the population of America)
Taiwan: 21 million
Hong Kong: 6.4 million
Macao: 400,000
Language: Mandarin (70%), Cantonese, five other major dialects

Fast Facts:
· Urban Population: 35%

· There are four times (4x) as many people without Christ in China as there are people in the United States.

· Every Day in China:
54,477 people are born
21,403 people die

· Every 3 days in China:
164,431 people are born
64,209 die; more people than the capital of West Virginia

· China has an estimated 1,200,000,000 people without Christ! (Thats 95% of the population.)

· 892 people die every hour in China

· 93% of China's population is ethnically Han (what most people think of when they picture Chinese people); however, about 7% of the population is made up of minority or tribal groups.

 

TOM & CCROBINSON -- THANKS FOR THE ENCOURAGEMENT!

I do realize there are some churches who are faithful to hold the ropes, send, and love. However, churches like yours are NOW the minority and no longer the majority.

In years pass, the Baptist were always on the front line of any movement to get the gospel out. Now we take back seat to the cults in sending young people, couples and even the middle age leaders.

I've been on an airplane coming to CHina and over half the plane was filled with college students from a Church of Christ college in TN. THey are baptising "supposedly" converts by the hundreds.

It saddens me that we (Baptist as a whole) no longer have vision, no longer have desire as a whole to go to the regions beyond.

Everytime I meet a group of students from the USA, they are either from BYU - Mormon, Church of Christ, Jehovah's Witness and now even the Seven Day Adventist. This is why I've posted the above article. We Baptist (as a whole) have fallen in the ranks.

There are several churches in many areas that are doing more than just the fair share of sending and supporting, but on the whole, many Baptist churches have still yet to even see a missionary and sad to say, never even given to a mission program.

Many Baptist Churches still have Pastors and he himself has never been to a mission field to visit and see the needs. Missions has become a far away problem that many pastors don't want to see since they are bogged down with many local problems.

In recent years, there has been a mind shift and its different from where Baptist stood historically. Why? I don't have the answer, but I do realize the Baptist World is missing a blessing and letting the cults get a stronghold in these countries in the 10-40 window.

Thanks for being faithful there and continue to hold the ropes.

 

Mr. Coon, Pastor Bob -- Amen! As I mentioned before, there are still some who know and understand. I just wish others would join in and realize the blessing of sending and working in these harvest fields.

We are THANKFUL for Churches like yours and we hope you can be an example for others to emulate.

 

John -- 25 years -- AMEN! IFB -- AMEN! Praise the Lord for all of you!

Now lets also pray that others will enter into his harvest fields (every tribe, tongue and nation) and that we will catch up from the lost grounds that's been given over to the cults here in the 10-40.

 

Br. Barner -- each church has a different way of handling funds for mssns. Some churches will raise the mssns dollars per missionary after one year. The next year they add missionaries. There has to be a balance year after year, but thats where each church differs in grace.

If you are having steady grow in your church and missions giving, you will have more options, but if you are breaking even each year, you will have to prayerfully decide to add new missionaries or just up their monthly support.

When was the last time you added missionaries compared to the last time you raised the support?

If its been several years since you've added a missionary, it might be time to add one. However, if you've just added some, maybe time to raise the support.

In some ways, you can't go wrong either way, as long as your program is moving and by the way you speak, it is MOVING!

Just keep it active and maybe use some of the surplus to visit the field.