Lausanne Movement

S. Kent Parks, Ph.D., Facilitator

Background:  Increased focus on the Unreached Peoples (UPGs) or Least Evangelized Peoples (LEPs) is one of the major legacies of the Lausanne Movement.  The result of LCWE joining efforts with the World Evangelical Alliance Mission Commission to stimulate the AD2000 Movement has been the globalization of both awareness and activities focused on the 28% of the world which remains without access to the Gospel.  Many collaborative “UPG-focused” networks (people-specific, national, regional, and continental) is the richest effect of this synergy

As the AD2000 Movement phased out, leaders of these various UPG-focused networks sensed a need for periodic global “forums of relationship” in order to maximize and continue this collaboration (and to provide a common “UPG-focused” venue for leaders from LCWE and WEAMC).  The discussions at the Great Commission Roundtable and at Singapore02 resulted in what is being called the Ethnê Initiative. 

At Singapore02, a new pattern was begun where about half of the global steering committee would come from a regional network (in this case SEALINK of SEAsia) which would then invite key leaders from each other region.  After each 3-4 year cycle, the Steering Committee will be reformed.  Currently, discussions are ongoing with COMIBAM for them to appoint about half of the members of the next Ethnê Steering Committee.

Some leaders of the newly developed Ethnê06 Steering Committee were also members of the 2004 Lausanne Forum’s Least Reached Peoples Working Group.  At Pattaya, the whole working group agreed to be a part of the Ethnê06 effort.  At the same time, WEAMC invited Ethnê to dock.  Thus, a shared UPG initiative was launched.

Ethnê06:  The Ethnê06 Global Consultation was held in SEAsia in March 2009.  Over 350 mission leaders from 50 countries and every continent gathered to celebrate progress, assess status, and accelerate efforts to reach the least-reached peoples (LRPs) of the world (the phrase “least reached peoples” is a popularized term).

Over a third of the participants came from Asia. Ten percent came from Africa. Due to the costs there were fewer from Latin America and the Middle East, but representatives from those regions’ major networks were present. Another ten percent came from Europe, including many from Eastern Europe. Less than 25% were from North America, and of these, many have worked for years among unreached peoples.

Participants were delighted by wonderful reports from around the world -- and also sobered by the realities related to the world’s LRPs. Our world is enduring rapid cultural changes, numerous wars, millions who are hungry and hurting, and intensifying persecution in some areas.

The Good News and the Bad News:  The “center of Christian gravity” has shifted to the south (with two-thirds of all Christians) and the east (where 115 million believers live in East Asia).  Many gospel movements have blossomed among peoples such as the Bhojpuri of India, the Henan of China, and the Masai of East Africa.

Missions is also changing. More missionaries are being sent from non-Western churches than from the West, and there are now over 4,000 Third World mission agencies. Most notably, exclusively “sending” and “receiving” nations no longer exist: virtually every country both sends and receives. Many non-Western agencies are allocating substantial workers to the unreached; COMIBAM, for example, has 41% of its workers focused on the unreached, and Singapore has an estimated 25%. The Philippines Mission Association will train over 200,000 Overseas Filipino workers to be church planters.  Nigeria Evangelical Mission Association has collaborated to send over 5,000 missionaries and are projecting the sending of 45,000 more.

In spite of these advances, the unfinished task remains. Over 28% of the world has no access to the Gospel. Over 39% belong to an ethnic group without viable churches. There are over 4,000 “least-evangelized” ethnolinguistic groups and over 6,700 “unreached” peoples. Nearly two billion still need to hear the Good News for the first time.

The majority of Christians in the world are still not aware of the challenge of the unreached, and many that are aware feel little or no responsibility. Many church and mission leaders believe that missions to the unreached has been over-emphasized. Of the US$15 billion given to missions, less than 2% is given for mission to the unreached, and less than 5% of the world’s missionaries are focused on the unreached.

Will we change? If current patterns continue, the unreached will still represent one-fourth of the world’s population in 2025. “Insanity,” wrote Albert Einstein, “is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” Participants at Ethnê06 were challenged to ask not “What can we do?” but rather “What must be done?”

Once these least-reached peoples come to this point, God is obviously not finished with them. He wants to do much more both in the present and with future generations as the gospel is lived out in transforming ways for the glory of God.

The group will mobilize the global Body of Christ to adapt LRP prayer emphases to match a common calendar.  Hopefully, each region will launch outreaches during their specific month of prayer and for the two months immediately following. This initiative will begin just after the Global Day of Prayer (June 4, 2006) with an emphasis on the LRPs of the South Pacific, moving east to west through other regions until finishing in May 2007 with an emphasis on the LRPs of North America and the Caribbean.

Prayer resources for each of 12 regions will include videos, bulletin inserts, bookmarks and more. Currently resources are available in 10 languages, with more translations planned.

Frontier Crisis Response Network:  This group agreed that Jesus taught (Mt. 24) that disaster and crisis required our presence in the middle of relief and recovery as a part of divine strategy in finishing the task of taking the Gospel to the whole world.  At Ethnê06 a strategy group from many nations met to reflect on these issues, and a global Crisis Response Network has begun to form. Participants are assessing readiness among our collective contacts and gathering resources to better respond to needs when crises occur. The network will seek to deliberately partner with local believers so they may be empowered for long-term witness.  The group has already worked together in response to the Jogya, Indonesia earthquake and tsunami.

Holistic Gospel Movements:  The Holistic Gospel Movement Strategy group will share information, models, events, and initiatives.  They are developing secure forums for communication. They will conduct joint research projects: documenting movements, needs, and possibilities. They will hold think-tank meetings. Finally, they will work on training resources including manuals, radio programs, workshops, and a coaching network.

Younger “UPG-Passionate” Leaders:  An Ethnê Younger Leaders network has developed to facilitate cross-regional youth initiatives focused on LRPs. This network will organize joint outreach, develop cross-cultural mentoring relationships, encourage strategic prayer, promote LRP-focused youth gatherings, connect with student mission movements, share fund-rising strategies, mobilize local church and agency involvement, and compile and distribute youth-related LRP resources through youth-responsive media.

More details on Ethnê, and for connecting to regional networks, can be found at www.ethne.net. A more detailed report may be found in the April issue of Momentum, downloadable from http://www.momentum-mag.org.