A new wave of evangelization

A new wave of evangelization is needed. In our North American culture it is of interest to note some current trends in our society and our Christianity. While confidence in the gospel is down, crime and violence in society are up. While interest in traditional evangelistic crusades has waned, cultural festivals have increased. The North American culture is now saturated with a carnivalesque culture. Where will a new wave of evangelization come from? From within the North America itself. If more young evangelists are trained, encouraged, and supported, and if non-traditional forms of evangelism are encouraged and embraced, a harvest for God can be reaped. Among the wonderful promises in Isaiah 55, God says that His word will not return to Him empty (v. 11). There are sufficient numbers of Bible and theological institutions within the region from which a new generation of evangelists could be developed.

God’s missional people must be prayerfully reliant on and led by the Holy Spirit. He is found in the beginning and at the end of Scripture (Genesis 1:1and Revelations 22:17). In the beginning, the Spirit hovered over the undifferentiated mass of newly created matter to provide order. As the end of human history approaches, the Spirit and the bride invite the return and final judgment of Christ. From the beginning of recorded time to the last moment of history, the Spirit of God is at work. We have long since ceased to be interested in meetings where mission leaders are called together to a room filled with charts, maps, graphs, and statistics. All one needs to do to find plenteous harvest is simply to follow the leading of the Spirit.  The implications of Acts 1:8, it was the Spirit who calls, inspires, reveals, and administers the mission of God to the ends of the earth. Intentional, strategic planning, bathed in prayer, along with a sensitive openness to divine interruption by the Holy Spirit. At times, we are privileged to “catch the tide of the great moving gush of the Spirit, yet finally and lastly, our successes and victories are hammered out on the anvil of daily faithfulness and prayer.” With profound conciseness, we advance on our knees or we do not advance at all.”

With that strength we can look at the 10/40 Window which is the rectangular area of North Africa, the Middle East and Asia approximately between 10 degrees north and 40 degrees north latitude. The 10/40 Window is often called "The Resistant Belt" and includes the majority of the world's Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists. The original 10/40 Window included only countries with at least 50% of their land mass within 10 and 40 degrees north latitude. The revised 10/40 Window includes several additional countries, such as Indonesia, that are close to 10 or 40 degrees north latitude and have high concentrations of unreached peoples. See the original and revised country lists to the right. An estimated 4.59 billion individuals residing in approximately 8,621 distinct people groups are in the revised 10/40 Window. The 10/40 Window is home to some of the largest unreached people groups in the world such as the Shaikh, Yadava, Turks, Moroccan Arabs, Pushtun, Jat and Burmese.

The 10/40 Window has several important considerations: first, the historical and Biblical significance; second, the least evangelized countries; third, the unreached people groups and cities; fourth, the dominance of three religious blocs; fifth, the preponderance of the poor; sixth, the strongholds of Satan within the 10/40 Window.

The Great Commission is unequivocal: we are to disciple all the ethnic groups in the world! For 25 years we have struggled to define, classify and list the world’s people groups. Only in the last six years have we had in our hands reasonably complete, published lists of the people groups of the world. The results are extraordinary, but complex.