Explore God's Heart For World Missionsنموونە

In day 1 of this devotional, we examined the true span of God’s Great Commission, and that it goes much further than many believers recognize. We see its origin in God’s promise to Abraham and its complete fulfillment in Revelation. So what’s our next step in growing in our understanding of this integral piece to our faith? Knowing who to bring this message of Good News to! 

We start by learning the difference between Reached Peoples and Unreached Peoples. “Reached peoples” are people groups with a population of more than 2% indigenous (local) evangelical believers to evangelize and disciple the remaining non-believers. “Unreached peoples” are found where there is no indigenous community of Christians with adequate numbers and resources to evangelize their own people (less than 2% evangelical).

Knowing these two terms is critical in understanding the bigger picture and why it’s imperative that we respond to Christ’s call in Matthew 28. This simple understanding allows our efforts in completing the task of the Great Commission to not just be busy, but productive. So where must we go with this Good News? To the “10/40 Window”. The “10/40 Window” is a term used to describe a region of the world within 10 and 40 degrees latitude from Western Africa to Eastern Asia. Of the more than 3.1 billion unreached people in the world today, about 97% live in the 10/40 Window. Compare this to the less than 1% who live in North and South America combined.

While this is a helpful way of remembering where a majority of the world’s unreached people groups live, it’s important to remember that being unreached is less about their location and more about their lack of access to the gospel. This doesn’t make these people more lost than your neighbor or your relative, but is directly affected by the utter lack of access to the message of Christ and the Bible. For these people, there are no churches on the corner, Bibles in the bookstores, or relatives who have professed faith in the God of the Bible. In fact, most will live and die and never meet a Christian.  Let that sink in for a minute.  Can you even imagine going a week, or a month, let alone your entire life without meeting a Christian?  This is the stark reality for many of the unreached.

While there are a large number of different religions making up this group of Unreached Peoples, there are five major blocks that can be easily remembered through the acronym, T.H.U.M.B. T-Tribal, H-Hindu, U-Unreligious, M-Muslim, and B-Buddhist. We will spend the next several weeks learning more about each of these in a little greater detail.

What keeps this part of the world from receiving the message of the gospel in the same way as other parts of the world? While there are several reasons, the most important to understand are that 1) the world’s major religions began in this part of the world and are firmly entrenched there, and 2) many of the countries in this part of the world are oppressive to the spread of the Gospel. However, Jesus declared, “the harvest is plentiful,” so we know that there is work to be done that He has prepared for us to do in the hearts of those living there.

We cannot neglect the rest of what Jesus said in Luke 10:2: “…the workers are few.” One of the biggest reasons that this part of the world is unreached is the lack of believers willing to go to these places. It is estimated that less than 4 percent of foreign missionaries today are working to reach these unreached peoples. Around 19 percent of missionaries work with people groups who are un-evangelized, meaning they are more than 2% evangelical, but still have large numbers of unsaved.  That means that the remaining 77 percent of missionaries are working with already reached people!  According to the World Christian Encyclopedia, of all the money designated for “missions” in the U.S., only two cents of every dollar is spent on reaching the unreached. The rest goes toward efforts to further evangelize reached people. While we won’t change these stats in a day, we can make lasting change by choosing today to educate ourselves on the state of the world and evaluate our efforts—making sure they are in line with God’s command to make disciples of all people groups.

Some practical ways we can begin are by exposing ourselves to missions efforts for unreached peoples. Another great way to make an immediate impact is by setting an alarm for 10:40 every day and pausing to pray for the unreached. And we challenge you today to share the THUMB acronym with three friends! When we open our lips to advocate and share these truths, other’s hearts are opened up and stirred just like ours. 

PEOPLE GROUP FOCUS: TRIBAL

These people are found mostly in Africa, China, Southeast Asia, and Papua New Guinea. They have animistic and superstitious beliefs (everything has a spirit, such as water, rocks, trees, animals). They must be careful not to offend these spirits and must appease them with sacrifices. They often worship idols and ancestors and visit witch doctors. 

Father, we pray You would burden our hearts for the unreached of the world. While we may have been ignorant of these realities and statistics, we know that each and every person there is sought after and loved by You. Draw us close to Your heart for them, Lord. We pray specifically for the Tribal people groups—that they would encounter Your Holy Spirit and be set free from their bondage to all these other evil spirits. We ask You to reveal to them the sufficient sacrifice of Jesus that atones for their sins, that they may live free and redeemed, not by their own actions, but by Him!  In Jesus' Name, Amen!