Month: September 2022

1. Video Series: Five Habits of a Global Christian
2. Website: The Unreached in North America
3. Online Course: Preparing for Sexual Integrity in Missions
4. Global Christianity: A Guide to the World’s Largest Religion from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe
5. Book: Life-Changing Cross-Cultural Friendships
6. October Events: Helpful Training, Inspiring Conferences & More

Read or share the email edition.

Source: Pure Life Academy

If you help train and send young adults on mission trips, you know the sort of challenges they will face. They may not know what they are getting into and how what they see and experience may affect them. So what can you do to equip them in advance? Preparing for Integrity in Missions is a short course individuals can complete online. It’s just five 15-minute sessions, designed to be completed over five weeks.

The course is meant to equip students and single missionaries to better cope with unexpected pressures and emotional/sexual temptations that can otherwise lead to moral failure on the field.

Learn more or register to review the course. The cost is low: US$9.95.

Pure Life Academy is a project of Be Broken Ministries. Their Director of Training is interested in developing online courses on related topics for other audiences (long-term missionaries, parents or families, etc.). He’d love to connect with missionary training directors and member care providers to assess felt needs. Can you pass this along?

See other resources from Be Broken or contact them with your comments, questions, or suggestions.

Source: Global Frontier Missions

Sometimes participation in the Great Commission gets relegated to taking a short-term missions trip one week out of the year. How can we make it a lifestyle cultivated day in and day out, all year round?

Whether you’re new to the whole missions thing or you’ve been intentionally pursuing the lifestyle of a global Christian for a while now, we invite you to consider five foundational habits for this journey: Pray, welcome, go, send, and mobilize.These videos are short, just two to three minutes long, so they are easy to share. Learn more or watch the videos. Also available as a playlist on the GFM YouTube channel.

You may also remember a series of longer videos that cover similar ground in a different style and with more examples. 6 Ways to Reach God’s World was created by OMF International and the Perspectives Study Program. Watch both to see which better suits your purpose.

Source: UPGNorthAmerica.com

Over recent months, a team of mission-minded folks has been working on a collaborative “organization neutral” website to identify the least-reached diaspora (immigrant) communities in North America, mobilize prayer for them, and encourage an increase in ministry efforts.

The site includes interactive point-of-interest maps with mosques, temples, markets, etc. as well as virtual prayerwalks for specific cities. See pages about Afghans in the San Francisco Bay area and Moroccan Arabs in Chicagoland, for example.

Visit UPGNorthAmerica.com. They are still building this site and looking for content and feedback. What would you add or change? Let them know.

Global Christianity: A Guide to the World’s Largest Religion from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, by Gina A. Zurlo, Zondervan Academic, 2022. 352 pages.

Global Christianity succinctly describes how Christianity has changed since the year 1900 and continues to change today. It includes information on Christianity in six continents, in six religious traditions and major movements, and in 234 countries and provides helpful maps, charts, and bullet points.

The book is based on research conducted for the 2019 World Christian Encyclopedia, now condensed and updated in this much less extensive and less expensive volume for a broader (but primarily American) audience.

I grabbed a highlighter and went through the 30 or so summary pages that precede the “Afghanistan” entry, marking pithy statements and figures I might be able to use in PowerPoint presentations and social media posts. For example:

• In 1900, nine of the ten countries with the most Christians were in the global North. This completely reversed by 2020, when there were only two global North countries in the top ten. (p. 4)
• Africa’s population continues to grow more than 2.5% per year. By 2050 there will likely be 2.5 billion people on the continent. (p. 7)
• In 1900, seven of the ten countries with the most Catholics were in Europe. By 2020, only three European countries were in the top ten. (p. 21; those countries and their Catholic population figures included)
• Of the roughly 5 million pastors and priests across World Christianity, only an estimated 5% have formal theological training. (p. 23)
• Country with the largest population of Protestants: Nigeria. Fastest growth: Albania. Largest decline: United States. (p. 27)

Author and religious demographer Gina Zurlo is the Co-director of the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.

You may be wondering, as I did, if this book should replace that 2010 edition of Operation World on your bookshelf. Global Christianity is more up-to-date and includes topics you won’t find much in OW. But keep them both, because this one isn’t designed for prayer, specifically, and is very much focused on Christianity in its various contexts rather than the whole world. Each of the 67 countries with more than 5 million people who identify as Christian gets a two-page spread and 108 countries with fewer Christians get a full page. But for the 59 countries with fewer than 100,000 people who identify as Christian, the entries are only half a page and do not include some of the most interesting data points covered in the other entries (such as the number of Bible translations, churches, and missionaries sent from and to that country).

It may also be helpful to acknowledge that the book includes a brief but clear explanation of its methodology and sources but does not footnote specific statements.

Learn more. The book retails for US$29.99 but it looks like you can currently get a paperback copy from the publisher for US$20.99, with Amazon selling the Kindle edition for US$19.99.

See also Quick Facts about Global Christianity and Status of Global Christianity 2022 (Center for the Study of Global Christianity).

Source: Missions Catalyst Events Calendar

October 3 to February 12, Perspectives on the World Christian Movement (online). New online classes begin regularly.

October 4-6, GACX Forum 2022 (Minneapolis, MN, USA). Sponsored by a global alliance for church multiplication.

October 4-7, Pastoral Training in Member Care (Asheville, NC, USA). For anyone involved in caring for global workers; usually held annually.

October 4-30, Equipping for Cross-Cultural Life and Ministry (Union Mills, NC, USA). Provided regularly by the Center for Intercultural Training.

October 5, Preparing Missionaries to Go to the Hard Places (online). Webinar from Missio Nexus.

October 7-8, EMS Annual Conference (Dallas, TX, USA and online). An annual event from the Evangelical Missiological Society. The International Society for Frontier Missiology will also participate in this event.

October 13, Mobilizing Latin Americans (online). Free webinar from Sixteen:Fifteen, part 3 in a series on mobilizing people of color.

October 17-19, Standards Introductory Workshop (online). Learn about the Standards of Excellence in Short-Term Mission.

October 17-21, ABIDE re-entry debriefing for global workers (Joplin, MO, USA). Provided regularly by TRAIN International.

October 18, Contend: Monthly Day of Prayer For Mission Mobilization (global). Coordinated by GMMI and held on the third Tuesday of each month. 

October 18-19, Amplify Outreach (Wheaton, IL, USA). Conference from the Billy Graham Center focused on evangelism, apologetics, and church leadership.

October 20 to November 17, Strategic Storytelling for Movements (online). Accelerate your media strategy through the power of story. Offered regularly by Mission Media U.

October 20-21, Support Raising Bootcamp (Knoxville, TN, USA). Provided by Support Raising Solutions.

October 21-22, NWA for the Nations (Fayetteville, AR, USA). Northwest Arkansas Missions Conference.

October 22-23, Voices of the Persecuted Church Conference (Dallas, TX, USA). Provided by the Back to Jerusalem Movement.

October 24-27, Thrive Retreat (Prague, Czech Republic). For cross-cultural workers from the US and Canada who serve overseas.

October 24 to November 19, COMPASS (Palmer Lake, CO, USA). Language and culture acquisition provided by Missionary Training International.

October 27-29, Refugee Highway Partnership North American Roundtable (Beaverton, OR, USA).

October 27-29, 24:14 DMM/CPM Conference (Spring, TX, USA). Multiplying disciples and churches across North America.

October 28-29, Help! We’re Going on a Short-Term Trip (Philadelphia, PA, USA). Seminar for team leaders from CultureLink, this time in partnership with Catalyst Services.

October 28-29, The Mobilized Church Workshop (St. Louis, MO, USA). Provided by Sixteen:Fifteen.

View the complete calendar, updated regularly. We welcome submissions.