• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Hesed.com

Mobilizing God's People to Reach the Nations!

  • Home
  • Let’s Get Started!
  • Beyond Our Wildest Dreams
  • We Swear Allegiance
  • Our Hearts Aflame
  • Reshaping Our Wineskins
You are here: Home / Buddhist World / Jesus Knows Their Names

Jesus Knows Their Names

By Frank Johnson on October 3, 2019 0

Holy Men in Nepal
Photo courtesy of Sebastian Pena Lambarri. Used by permission.

In a 2010 paper written for the Cape Town 2010 Congress of the Lausanne Movement, S. Kent Parks and John Scott deliver an impassioned plea for the “Forgotten Fourth” — the almost 2 billion people without access to the gospel.

These “separate peoples” are mostly Muslim, Hindu and Buddhist, and include significant urban populations. They have been described as unreached people groups, least-evangelized, least-reached peoples, and in what is possibly the most accurate and unsettling description of all, ignored peoples. Dr. (Ralph) Winter and others after him have tried to generate a global movement of the Church toward these peoples. Yet despite all the papers and discussions and conferences, today, 36 years later, this forgotten fourth without access to the gospel still makes up over 28% of the world’s population and 41% of the individuals in the world are members of a people group with no viable church.

Note: although the statistics cited in the quote above are from nine years ago, the situation has not changed much in 2019. According to JoshuaProject.net, 29% of the world’s population (an estimated 2.2 billion people) have had “virtually no exposure” to the gospel. 41.6% of the world’s population is part of an unreached people group, defined as a) less than 2% Christ-followers and b) less than 5% Professing Christians).

Parks and Scott call this 29% without exposure to the gospel “The Forgotten Fourth.”

Parks and Scott go on to identify at least 15 challenges the church faces that explains why the task of reaching the unreached appears to not have made a lot of progress while the world as a whole has changed dramatically.

They then make recommendations for a way forward through the challenges, including obedience-based discipleship and an urgency born out of our love for Jesus. They describe lessons that have been learned, consisting of “new approaches to ministry among least-reached peoples (that) are counterintuitive and defy conventional missiological wisdom,” citing examples from work among unreached peoples in Bangladesh, China, Ethiopia, India, Kenya, Mongolia, Nepal, Thailand, and Turkey.

The two billion people who make up these groups don’t know they are missing. But Jesus does. He knows every one of their names. And he is inviting us to join him in places like India, Pakistan, China, Nepal and Bangladesh where the highest concentration of unreached peoples live—reaching across culture and language, discomfort and danger, and often great distance, to befriend them and share the good news of the Kingdom.

Parks’ and Scott’s paper is well worth the read, and I would urge you to digest it carefully, allowing the Lord to spark a passion for the unreached in your heart as you read!

COUNTRIES IN THIS ARTICLE: Bangladesh, China, Ethiopia, India, Kenya, Mongolia, Nepal, Peru, Pakistan, Somalia, Thailand, Turkey, Uganda
PEOPLE GROUPS IN THIS ARTICLE: Bhojpuri Bihari, Maasai

Related Resources

In The Ralph D. Winter Story, Harold Fickett captures both the genius and the controversy of a self-described “social engineer,” named by Time magazine as one of the 25 Most Influential Evangelicals in America.


Print Friendly, PDF & Email
Tweet
Share
Pin
Share

Join Our Tribe

We invite you to become a part of the Hesed.com community and join us in our passion to reach the unreached.


Get Started Here

About Frank Johnson

Frank is a 1985 graduate of Bethany College in Scotts Valley, California (B.S. Ministerial Studies) and a licensed minister with the Northern California and Nevada District Council of the Assemblies of God. Frank has been an internet strategist for over 20 years, applying principles of digital media strategy to spread the gospel. In addition, he is the author of Find A Job Through A Temporary Service, “Bringing in the Outcast” (under pen name, John Norman) in Issue 43 (January 1, 1988) of Discipleship Journal, and numerous articles in the Santa Cruz Sentinel.

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

First Time Here?

Before you read any articles, watch any videos, etc., we strongly encourage you to read our five pillar articles. These pillar articles provide the foundation for all of our content.

Let's Get Started
We would be thrilled if you would join us in our passion, be persuaded by our conviction, and embrace our vision!

Beyond Our Wildest Dreams
Deep in our hearts is a desire to come home to the love we were created for, to be reconciled to our Creator.

We Swear Allegiance
God has reconciled Himself to us. What does it mean for us to reconcile ourselves to God?

Our Hearts Aflame
Our hearts are aflame with the urgency to make Christ known because we have been granted stewardship of the message of reconciliation.

Reshaping Our Wineskins
How does effective strategy in outreach help us to be faithful in our stewardship of the message of reconciliation?

About Us

Frank Johnson and David Arzouni have been friends, brothers in Christ, and ministry partners for over 35 years.

frankjohnson_squareFrank describes himself as an online strategist who advocates for world missions through storytelling to spotlight the work of God throughout the nations.

dfa_squareTogether with his wife Linda, David has brought the message of the gospel to West Africa as an Assemblies of God missionary since 1976.

Read more about Frank and David

Join Us In Our Daily Declaration

Lord Jesus,

This day, we cast our souls upon Your sacrifice as our only hope for purpose, meaning, and fulfillment here on earth and for life in the age to come.

This day, we swear allegiance to You, our King.

This day, we pray that You would set our hearts aflame for Your cause and for the over 3 billion people in this world who have yet to hear Your name.

We long for the day that we will stand before Your throne, surrounded by the most diverse community ever formed — from every tribe, every tongue, every people, and every nation — those whom You have purchased with Your blood — as we cry out together "Worthy is the Lamb!"

Until that day, we commit ourselves to loving our brothers and sisters in Christ — no matter what their people group, no matter what their language, no matter what their race, no matter where they are from — and to living in community with them — that the world may know that the Father loves them and that He sent You to save them.

This day, we devote our lives — our time, our money, our passion, our mind, our strength, our everything — to see Your gospel proclaimed in every corner of this world.

And we thank You for the astounding privilege of playing a small part in carrying Your name to the nations!

Join Our Tribe

We invite you to become a part of the Hesed.com community and join us in our passion to reach the unreached.

Helpful Resources

The old way of raising support means uncomfortable face-to-face meetings, paper newsletters, tons of phone calls, or speaking at churches and hoping people give. But chasing donations and hoping one-time donors become monthly supporters is stressful and unpredictable.

Fully Funded Academy is based around 7 core strategies for long-term support raising success and will help you develop a steady stream of recurring financial support with more stability and less stress so you can have greater impact in your mission to help fulfill the Great Commission.

Learn more ...

Filter Articles By Category

See Articles From All Categories

Come Hang Out With Us

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter

Partner Profiles

News From The Nations

Thoughts On Strategy

Service Opportunities

Book Reviews

Opinion

See All

  • Home
  • What Is Hesed?
  • Who Are We?
  • Your Story
  • Join Our Content Team
  • Contact
  • Terms & Conditions
  • Privacy

What Does It Mean to Join a Missionary Team?

There are four basic ways to join a missionary team and participate in God's story of restoring the nations to Himself:

GO: You can physically join a missionary team "on the ground" in their geographical area of service. This can be in the form of a short-term trip (1-4 weeks), a longer stay (1-3 years), or a career commitment.

PRAY: You can subscribe to the missionary team's email or print newsletter, follow them in social media channels, join their private Facebook group, etc. and commit to praying for them and the needs they share on a regular basis.

GIVE: You can financially support the missionary team or their organization (either through cash gifts and/or monthly commitments).

SUPPORT: You can provide logistical support to the missionary team in the form of administrative help, website development, social media channel maintenance, newsletter processing, and a host of other tasks and projects - anything that will allow the missionary team to devote more time to their primary calling.

As you consider how the Lord would have you join missionary teams, please join us in our Daily Declaration!

Join Our Tribe

We invite you to become a part of the Hesed community and join us in our passion to reach the unreached.

Hang Out With Us

Hesed.com on Facebook

Hesed.com on Instagram

Hesed.com on Pinterest

Hesed.com on Twitter

Affiliate Disclosure

Please Note: As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases.

© 1998 - 2020 Hesed.com

Our Daily Declaration

Lord Jesus,

This day, we cast our souls upon Your sacrifice as our only hope for purpose, meaning, and fulfillment here on earth and for life in the age to come.

This day, we swear allegiance to You, our King.

This day, we pray that You would set our hearts aflame for Your cause and for the over 3 billion people in this world who have yet to hear Your name.

We long for the day that we will stand before Your throne, surrounded by the most diverse community ever formed — from every tribe, every tongue, every people, and every nation — those whom You have purchased with Your blood — as we cry out together “Worthy is the Lamb!”

Until that day, we commit ourselves to loving our brothers and sisters in Christ — no matter what their people group, no matter what their language, no matter what their race, no matter where they are from — and to living in community with them — that the world may know that the Father loves them and that He sent You to save them.

This day, we devote our lives — our time, our money, our passion, our mind, our strength, our everything — to see Your gospel proclaimed in every corner of this world.

And we thank You for the astounding privilege of playing a small part in carrying Your name to the nations!

Pray for the Tsukuba Express Church Planting Team

Tsukuba Express Line

  1. Please pray for the areas surrounding these twenty rail stations: Akihabara, Shin-Okachimachi, Asakusa, Minami-Senju, Kita-Senju, Aoi, Rokucho, Yashio, Misato-chuo, Minami-Nagareyama, Nagareyama-centralpark, Nagareyama-otakanomori, Kashiwanoha-campus, Kashiwa-Tanaka, Moriya, Miraidaira, Midorino, Bampaku-kinenkoen, Kenkyu-gakuen, and Tsukuba
  2. Pray that God would raise up church planters and send forth laborers into the harvest fields surrounding these stations (Luke 10:2-4).
  3. Pray that God would help these church planters identify persons of peace in the areas surrounding these stations (Luke 10:5-8).
  4. Pray that God would enable these church planters to speak the word of God with boldness in these areas (Luke 10:9b).
  5. Pray that the proclamation of God’s word in the areas surrounding these stations would be accompanied by demonstrations of God’s compassion and power (Luke 10:9a).