Lausanne World Pulse – What Happened to People Group Thinking?
By S. Kent Parks
A strange thing happened on the way to bringing the gospel to every “people group.” A growing number of Christian voices around the world began to suggest that the focus on people groups was overemphasized. These questions seemed to arise as the “AD2000 and Beyond” movement phased out. Further, the concept of “people group” began to be applied to other “groupings” which do not fit the category.
No universally accepted definition exists. Yet while the main terms Unreached People Group (UPG) and Least Evangelized People Group have some technical differences, they essentially define the same twenty-five to twenty-eight percent of the world which have little access to the gospel. A more popularized phrase—Least Reached Peoples—is sometimes used.1
One UPG-focused country network in an Asian country uses a term which places the responsibility squarely on the Church—the “Ignored” People Groups. So what happened to the momentum to reach those who have little or no access to the gospel? Some key misconceptions have emerged and seem to impede movement forward. These include:
1. Great publicity is confused with real progress. The great emphasis in many parts of the world, especially during the last twenty years, on reaching the unreached has led church leaders to believe that great progress has been made. Yes, some progress has been made. Yet, one-quarter of the world still has little access to the gospel.
Projections show that the percentage of the Least Evangelized Peoples will not diminish significantly in the next several decades.
Christians still give only about one percent of their money to Christian causes. Of this one percent, ninety-five percent is spent on the church. Less than one percent is used to reach twenty-eight percent of the world. And, only two to four percent of Christian cross-cultural witnesses serve this twenty-eight percent. Projections show that the percentage of the Least Evangelized Peoples will not diminish significantly in the next several decades. The world percentage of Christians is also not projected to grow if ministry and mission continue to follow current patterns.
2. “Balance” is sought. Key unreached peoples advocates and mission strategists from several continents have discovered they share a common experience. Each has been challenged by key national and/or international Christian leaders to have a more “balanced” view in their advocacy by not emphasizing the “unreached” too much.
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S. Kent Parks is facilitator for Lausanne’s Least Reached Peoples Special Interest Group. He also serves as co-facilitator for Ethnê06. Lausanne Occasional Paper No. 35, released by the 2004 Forum Issue Group on Hidden and Forgotten People (Least-Reached) is available online. (Document opens as a PDF file.) |