According to UN calculations today, October 31st, 2011, is the “official day” when 7 billionth person will have been born on planet Earth.
What does a continually increasing population number reality mean for the global Church in regards to the Great Commission of Jesus Christ (Matt 28:18-20)?
This means that our strategies have to flex with the growing reality we face if we are going to be effective in carrying out the Commission.
A recent Time magazine article breaks down some of the realities of what seven billion people means for us.
Roger Martin, chair of the NGO Population Matters, writing in the Guardian recently:
The 7 Billion Day is a sobering reminder of our planet’s predicament. We are increasing by 10,000 an hour. The median UN forecast is 9.3 billion by 2050, but the range varies by 2.5 billion — the total world population in 1950 — depending on how we work it out.
Every additional person needs food, water and energy, and produces more waste and pollution, so ratchets up our total impact on the planet, and ratchets down everyone else’s share — the rich far more than the poor.
The author brings to light the massive impact of each person’s physical needs, but what about their spiritual need?
This reality has seriously challenged me to look even deeper into what we can practically do to see “Church Planting Movements” multiplied in every nation of the world and among all unreached people groups.
I believe that “CPM” is our only real hope.
I believe we should not settle for anything less than “movements” to Christ.
We can’t continue to operate under the old paradigms that we have brought to the missions world through our forefathers. We live in a new generation that requires us to push further, faster.
I have discovered an extraordinarily practical book on how we can work to this end.
It is based on powerful real world breakthroughs using what has been called a “A Discipleship Re-Revolution
I’ve been locked into the idea of church planting movements since David Garrison’s first booklet on the subject was released in 1999 and then turned into a full book.
However I have been in a fog about how these types of movements could practically happen until I read this book.
The lights have been coming on. I have been remembering key moments in my own life that have continued to lead me toward this end.
More than ever, we need the whole Church to take the whole Gospel to the whole world. All “units” are needed to thrive; traditional, mega, and organic.
But I am convinced more than ever that our forward edge in missions among the billions who have little to no access to the Gospel must be nothing less than church planting movements.
There is a whole new culture and paradigm shift that we will have to willingly go through if we are going to play our part. To be sure, there is a price to be paid.
We cannot be passive and scattered in our approach and yet still expect to do something of significant eternal value.
If you want to explore if you are up for the challenge, you should buy this book and begin to read it with a pen and notebook by your side.
T4T Online on Vimeo.
Let me know what you discover for yourself.
Further Reading:
