Planting churches among the most unreached

This month I will be travelling with three other Christians from Perth to India.  Why go to India, despite the recent bombings?  Because we are gripped by the need to plant churches amongst people groups who have not heard the gospel, and go to see firsthand the work of agencies dedicated to the fulfilment of Matthew 24:14, “And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.”

And of “all nations” that Matthew 24:14 speaks of, there are many still to be reached with the gospel of Jesus Christ.  Nearly 3 billion people are still unreached!  Four out of ten people in the world (not much less than half!) have yet to hear.  Today 97 percent of the world’s unreached people live in the 10/40 Window, a rectangular shaped area on the globe, extending from West Africa to East Asia, from 10 degrees north to 40 degrees north of the equator.  The Window also encompasses the majority of the world’s Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists (see joshuaproject.net).

We will have opportunity to see the work of gospel partners: Gospel for Asia (http://www.gfa.org/), Asia Evangelistic Fellowship(http://www.aefi.org.au/) and REAP  (Relief, Education/Evangelism & Aid Program http://www.reapintl.org/).

In contrast to the colonial missions, which is the picture that often pops into our minds when we hear the word “missions”, these groups have a unique approach. They aim to reach people groups who’ve never heard the gospel via missionaries who are native to their cultures.

In the eyes of the people, native missionaries do not represent a foreign country or a strange religion. They already know the language or can easily learn a local dialect. We’d celebrate if just one person from our Australian congregation went to India to be a missionary. But a Gospel For Asia missionary would be more effective in their own culture, because they don’t have to spend decades learning the language and culture Further, a native missionary can be sent out at a fraction of the cost of a Western missionary.  The average cost for a native missionary is only $1,100 to $1,800 per year, compared to over $75,000 per year for a foreigner.

Indigenous churches are able to grow and multiply more effectively if native people take ownership of the church planting – perhaps more than if they are dependent on foreign missionaries. The possibility of reaching Asia’s multitudes through native missionaries in our generation is very real, as thousands are being trained to plant churches across Asia.

We will be visiting native missionaries at Bible Colleges and Bridge of Hope Schools, but our visits to the missionaries out on the field will be more limited – it is dangerous for the native missionaries to be seen with foreigners. There has been over 30 Christians killed in Orissa in the past two months and over 50,000 homes have been destroyed there and in neighbouring states due to persecution.

We will certainly be brought to our knees in earnest prayer on our trip, and we greatly appreciate the prayers of our brothers and sisters back home.

Your brother in Christ,
Paul