Lausanne World Pulse – Status of Global Mission 2007: An Annual Update
By Todd Johnson
This commentary and the accompanying table represent our twenty-third annual report on global mission prepared for the International Bulletin of Missionary Research (IBMR) each January since 1983. The full report is eight pages and includes five tables examining the total extent of Christ’s mission across the world. For this Lausanne World Pulse update we include only Global Table 5 and its commentary. Readers desiring the full version should contact the IBMR at www.omsc.org/ibmr.html.
Global Table 5 forms the climax of the 8-page report. It enumerates the multifold activities, presence and context of the missionary force. It depicts how to analyze seventy-nine variables across 225 years. Foreign mission personnel are involved in all sixteen major concerns and situations of Christianity shown in capital headings in Global Table 5. Missionaries are also involved in virtually every one of the seventy-nine spheres of activities enumerated there, often as far back as the year 1800 (first column of statistics).
Global Table 5 sets out global statistics for seventy-nine variables, each enumerated at the years 1800, 1900, 1970, 2000, 2007 and 2025. A trend variable in Column 7 provides 553 (79 x 7) additional comparative boxes of percentages and trends. Total foreign mission personnel have grown from 25,000 in AD 1800 to 443,000 by 2005. Of the latter, 245,000 are men and 198,000 are women. These figures refer to full-time workers, which means those employed full-time by churches and missions. However, the rest of the population should not be labeled as part-timers.
In fact, as Global Table 1 in the full version for IBMR explains, there are 688 million Great Commission Christians (rising to 703,225,000 by 2007) defined primarily as persons believing in and committed to Christ’s Great Commission and the worldwide mission of the Church. Of these millions, this analysis divides this vast bloc into two: 468 million function as background supporters of worldwide foreign missions. The remaining 220 million Great Commission Christians function as primarily supporters of home missions.