Missions Catalyst

1. World: How Do We Get the Gospel to 3 Billion People?
2. Is the Great Commission Realistic in Our Modern Times?
3. USA: How Will Current Events Affect International Student Ministry?
4. Mozambique: Terror Attacks Continue, Adding Layers of Challenge for Ministry
5. Somalia: Former Addict Driven from Home for Accepting Christ
6. Ireland: Quiet Revival May Be Happening There, Too

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Source: Alliance for the Unreached

On  June 8, 2025, we invite you to stand with us on the  International Day for the Unreached, a day to raise awareness, pray, and take action so that every person on Earth has the opportunity to hear the gospel.

With 3 billion people still waiting to hear the gospel, the Alliance for the Unreached provides free, practical resources to equip you for global missions, right where you are.

Explore resources. Some of the resources they mention in their promotions have been hard to find on their website. We will keep looking and may highlight a few later.

Source: The Christian Post, June 1, 2025

Has the final directive of Jesus become undoable? This commandment was given by Jesus in a context far different from ours. The modern world is now characterized by progressive ideals, by emphases on scientific knowledge, and by lifestyles far advanced from antiquity. So, how could this command now be fulfilled by his followers?

I believe Christian discipleship remains a fulfilling component of human existence, and learning about Jesus isn’t anachronistic. If you are truly in Christ, you know assuredly what I’m talking about. 

Nevertheless, our cultural context cannot be ignored as we seek to make disciples. Historically, Western thought and culture have gone from being developed by Christian faith, to being intellectually enriched by it, and to now believing it’s useless. In a world of scientific advancement, it’s now [considered] uncultured to be associated with a 2,000-year-old teaching.

Read the whole article and another that argues, even after 2,000 years, Jesus is as relevant as ever.

The tensions are not the same all over. A new infographic compares Christian demographics from A.D. 325 and 2025—1,700 years later (Center for the Study of Global Christianity). Once again, the Church is more global than Western.

And on that note: In April, 1,600 people from 25 countries gathered in Panama for the 2025 COMIBAM Conference. One theme of the event was the truth that the Great Commission remains a timely, urgent, and global calling (Evangelical Focus).

Source: Justin Long’s Weekly Roundup, May 30, 2025

Two political trends are slamming into American universities, and ministries to international students will feel the shock.

The first is the geopolitics of China and the USA. Chinese students, in particular, are being targeted for visa revocation. The second is the political dustup between the administration and “elite” universities over DEI, campus speech, and the like.

International students may, as a result, be sent home (or elsewhere). The implication for missiological strategies in the USA: for a long time, there has been a strategy of “reaching the nations [that] are coming here.”

It is now perhaps time for international student ministry’s turn to feel what refugee ministry already did. This trend will also affect many Christian colleges that likewise rely on international students as a significant portion of their revenue stream. All of this might be reversed in another three years—given current patterns, it might reverse in another three months. But I wouldn’t count on it. I suspect that people who have student visas are living on borrowed time, and many may end up moving to universities in other countries.

Read the rest of this commentary.

Note that an annual event for people who work with international students takes place this week (June 5-7), and it’s all online (Association of Christians Ministering Among Internationals).

Source: Mission Network News, May 20, 2025

Reports of insurgency continue in Mozambique’s northern Cabo Delgado province, despite the government’s efforts to quell it.

A string of attacks starting on March 31 and leading into April displaced 15,000 people, according to one report. For some people, it was their third or fourth displacement.

“Paolo,” a partner with MegaVoice, explains that the insurgency started small in 2017 after the discovery of massive natural gas reserves. It has now become a seven-year-old conflict that has killed more than 4,000 people and displaced 800,000.

“Anyone in front of them, they were killing. They were burning house[s],” Paolo says. “[It] was not necessarily a religion conflict. [It] was because there’s a financial possibility in the region. But definitely these affect a lot of the [religious] work, especially because many missionaries moved from there because of security issues.”

But MegaVoice’s local partners have stayed. Paolo says these people are essential for distributing audio Bibles.

The full story explains the receptivity the ministry has found for audio Bibles in the local language.

The deaths and displacement are the tip of the iceberg, it seems. The United Nations has reported that nearly 5.2 million people in Mozambique need assistance due to a “triple crisis” stemming from “armed conflict, recurring extreme weather events, and months of post-electoral unrest” (quoted by multiple sources).

News about human suffering is never hard to find, is it? ReliefWeb reports that thousands of children in Myanmar’s earthquake zone face a new school year without schools.

Source: Morningstar News, May 27, 2025

Muslim parents in southern Somalia were overjoyed to see their missing 20-year-old son, a drug addict, return home free of substance abuse this month.

When they discovered that his transformation sprang from putting his faith in Christ, however, they drove him from their home in Hararoba, near Afmadow in Lower Juba Region, on May 19.

The young man had come to Christ on April 20 after an underground Somali pastor shared the gospel with him.

Serving the Hidden Church in Somalia. It describes a network of safe houses set up to shelter believers in similar situations (International Christian Concern).

INcontext recently published an infographic about how to pray for Somalia. The nation seems marked by deepening instability.

Source: Christian Today, May 30, 2025

The “quiet revival” in Britain, especially among younger men, may well be occurring in the Republic of Ireland as well, with new research suggesting increasingly favorable attitudes towards Christianity in the country, albeit with a fair amount of suspicion towards the Roman Catholic Church.

A poll of 1,000 people commissioned by The Iona Institute and conducted by Amarach Research found that Gen Z (18-24 years old) is more open to faith than Millennials (25-34 years old). A majority of people in Ireland (61%) described themselves as religious or spiritual in some way. The vast majority of the Irish population still identifies as Roman Catholic. However, only about 16% said they attend Mass regularly.

Half said their attitude towards Christianity was positive, compared to only 28% who said the same about the Catholic Church. Nonetheless, one in five (21%) had a negative attitude towards Christianity, while over a quarter (29%) were ambivalent.

Read the full story.

Also from Christian Today, read Ireland Sees Rise in New Age Weddings.