To the Utter Ends of the Earth

It is breathtaking to consider how widely the Gospel has been preached and received in the two millennia since Jesus commanded his followers to disciple the nations. However, there remains much work to be done. I am encouraged by the modern church's renewed emphasis on "home missions." But I pray that we retain our focus on "foreign missions" as we recover the importance of sharing the Gospel with our neighbors. As Bruce Ashford notes below, our neighbors have relatively easy access to the Gospel compared to the billions in the world who "could leave their homes and search for days and months, and never find a church, a Bible, or a Christian."

(Bruce Ashford, regarding his new book, Theology and Practice of Mission: God, the Church and the Nations.)  "Revelation 5 is perhaps the most breathtaking and powerful vision in all of Scripture, and it serves as the climax of a major thread that runs throughout the Scriptures–God’s determination to make himself known to the nations so that they may worship him. In this vision that God gives to John, all of heaven bursts forth into praise of the Lamb who was slain. Among those represented are worshipers from every tribe, tongue, people, and nation. This is the vision that drives us–that our Lord will be worshiped from all corners of the globe.

And yet there are almost 2 billion people who have little or no knowledge of Christ. In many corners of the globe there are no churches, no Bibles, and no Christians to bear witness. I repeat, there are hundreds of millions, upwards of 2 billion people, who could leave their homes and search for days and months, and never find a church, a Bible, or a Christian.

Our great privilege and responsibility is to bequeath to them the treasure that was given to us–the faith once for all delivered to the saints. I hope that the recent movement toward church planting and revitalization leads toward an equally powerful movement to take the gospel to every corner of the earth until there is a church within walking distance of every house on this planet."