People Groups/Adopting People Groups/Church Planting Movements

University Baptist Church Intro to Missions – Session 6 FUSION

People Groups In our effort of discovering and reaching every tongue, tribe and nation on the planet, it is important to recognize who remains to hear the gospel. Who are the people groups that still need a movement of indigenous or local followers of Christ who can disciple their own people? Understanding terms is important if we are going to be strategic in our efforts to finish the task of the great commission in world evangelization.

What is a people group? In 1982, the Lausanne Committee in Chicago defined people groups as “the largest group within which the Gospel can spread as a church planting movement without encountering barriers of understanding or acceptance.” Joshua Project defines a people group according to the highest of the two barriers (understanding and acceptance).

Understanding In the majority of the world, understandability acts as the main barrier and therefore it is appropriate to define people groups primarily by language, with the possibility of sub-divisions based on dialect or cultural variation.

If understandability is the most important barrier, than a linguistics, or an ethno-linguistic, approach is used – making it so that one people group doesn’t speak more than one language, although more than one people group can speak the same language if cultural or dialect differences warrant. In most of the world, this approach is used.

The barrier of understanding suggests that language is always important when defining a people group. If in a particular situation the understanding barrier is more important than the acceptance barrier then defining people group by language, perhaps exclusively by language, is appropriate. And this seems to be the case in most cultures and situations.

However, if “people group” was defined strictly by language, a person would have to take into account that some castes speak 50-60 languages and therefore, there would be over 16,000 people groups in India alone! This would be an overwhelming and daunting task for church planters. If groups were only divided by language, church planters would be attempting to plant among castes and tribes that mistrust or hate each other. People may understand each other, but do they accept each other?

Therefore, there must be another exception.

Acceptance In some parts of the world, acceptance is a greater barrier than understandability. In these regions, caste, religious tradition, location, and common histories and legends may be used to identify the primary boundary of each people group. Language can be a secondary boundary.

However, where the cultural/relational (acceptance) barrier is more important (ie South Asia), then the caste/tribe is the first criterion for separation. With this approach, one people group may speak more than one language, and again, the same language can be spoken in other groups.

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This compromise (allowing one people group to speak more than one language) is a way to present a simplified picture of the church planting task, at the risk of over-simplifying the understandability barriers within people groups.

Understandability and Acceptance

Situations where Situations where Ministry Objective understandability is the acceptance is the highest highest barrier barrier Language-based outreaches such as Bible translations, audio and (I) Focus on linguistic groups, (II) Focus on linguistic video recordings, radio, TV, not ignoring local ethnic groups, not ignoring local Internet, mass evangelism issues ethnic issues campaigns. (III) Focus on linguistic Planting, establishing and growing (IV) Focus on ethnic groups, groups, not ignoring local the church within its local culture not ignoring language ethnic issues

According to Joshua Project, in a perfectly ideal world, a people group would always mean: (a) all individuals in the group understand each other reasonably well; and (b) cultural/relationship barriers do not seriously impede the transmission of the gospel.

But this isn’t a perfect world!

How many people groups are there? Depending on how a people group is defined will determine how many people groups there are. Different definitions yield different counts. Some say 27,000. Others say 16,000. Some suggest 12,000. Still others say 10,000. Which numbers are correct? Could they all be correct?

Here is an illustration to help us understand why this confusion exists. Suppose someone innocently asks, “What is the largest country?” What is the answer? It all depends on what is meant by “largest.” The answer is Russia if largest refers to geographic land area. The answer is China if largest refers to population. The answer is the United States if largest means financially. All are different, yet are correct answers to the same simple question. The underlying issue is the definition… what is meant by “largest?”

So the core question is what is meant by the term “people group”? Even when using the terms understandability and acceptance, there are still multiple definitions for people groups.

Varying the Definition of a People Varies the Resulting Lists

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Peoples Defined By Resulting List Examples Totals Language Linguistic peoples ! Ethnologue ~7,000 Linguistic peoples (Particularly ! Registry of Peoples and Language / Dialect ~11,000 supports language based ministry) Languages ! Integrated Strategic Planning Database ! World Christian Ethno-linguistic peoples Encyclopedia Language / Dialect ! Operation World ~ 13,000 Ethnicity (Particularly supports language based peoples lists evangelistic / discipleship outreaches) ! Original Joshua Project list ! PeopleGroups.org Language / Dialect Ethnic peoples Ethnicity ! Joshua Project

Religion ! Registry of Peoples ~ 16,000 (Particularly supports church planting Caste (ROP) outreaches) Culture Language / Dialect Ethnicity Unimax peoples (ie when there are no Religion significant barriers of either Caste understanding or acceptance to stop ! World Christian Culture the spread of the gospel) Encyclopedia estimates Education ~ 27,000 ! US Center for World Politics (Particularly supports church planting Mission estimates Ideology and all types of evangelistic / Historical enmity discipleship outreaches) Customs Behavior

What about Country Boundaries? All the above models consider country boundaries when defining people groups. For example, if the Tatar people group are in 21 Central Asian countries, they are counted 21 times. Some hold that in the purest sense people groups should be counted without reference to political boundaries. The suggestion is that modern country boundaries did not exist when the command of Matthew 28:19 “to make disciples of all the ethne” was given. Others suggest that in many cases political boundaries do not distinguish peoples. The “pure peoples” model counts the Tatar living in 21 Central Asian countries as one people group, not 21. The current Joshua Project count for peoples-by-country is 16,256 and the count for pure peoples is 9,833.

So what is the Answer? A summary of all of these definitions: a people group is a significantly large grouping of individuals who perceive themselves to have a common affinity for one another because of their shared language, religion, ethnicity, residence, occupation, class or caste, situation, etc, or combinations of these.

So after all that, what is the answer to the simple question of how many people groups are there? It

3 University Baptist Church Intro to Missions – Session 6 FUSION depends. If referring to ethno-linguistic peoples about 13,000; if referring to unimax peoples about 27,000; if referring to ethnic peoples about 16,000; or if referring to ethnic (cultural-ethno-linguistic) peoples without reference to country boundaries about 10,000.

All are right answers… depending on the perspective.

When thinking about definitions, it’s important to think about perspective as well. Because this is a mission class, our perspective will be that of church planting – because, as you may remember from our lesson on missional doctrines, mission involves/is church planting.

People Group Adoption Defined One method and strategy gaining popularity through the world, especially in the US and among IMB churches, is people group adoption. The word adoption can be defined in a number of ways: the act of accepting with approval or a legal preceding that creates a parent-child relation between persons not related by blood. Biblically, it has been used to mean “place as a son”.

When a person adopts a child, they commit to care for, nurture and prepare that child for life. Similarly, in people group adoption, a church pledges or commits to focus concern on one people group which needs the gospel. A church makes a commitment to an unreached people until there is an indigenous, reproducing church established among them. Aspects may include prayer, research and networking toward church planting. It can also include sponsoring a missionary, funding specific ministries such as Jesus Film distribution, or actually sending lay teams to the people to work in partnership with a missionary already on the field.

Adoption is biblical because it is patterned after God, who is calling and adopting sons and daughters from every tribe, tongue, and nation, “He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will” (Ephesians 1:5). When we adopt a people, we are His agents or ambassadors.

Adoption is effective because it makes sure that every group has a group of Christians praying for and reaching out to them. Adopting a people is a “do-able” piece of the Great Commission, where each church, large and small, can play a part.

Why the emphasis on peoples? When Jesus said in Matthew 28:19, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations,” the word translated nations is the Greek ethne, the basis for our word ethnic. It is not a political or geographical unit, but a people, a tribe, defined by culture and language. God wants all ethne discipled. We focus on reaching ethne because they are God’s focus.

Christ mentioned a consequence of a successful witness to every ethne. He said in Matthew 24:14, “And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations (ethne), and then the end will come.” God intends for us to complete this assignment before He will return.

Through the efforts of thousands of missionaries in the part, there are now Christians present in every country. But within many countries, many peoples have no witness in their language or culture. By churches focusing on a people through adoption, all people may receive access to the gospel. The

4 University Baptist Church Intro to Missions – Session 6 FUSION adoption strategy provides the vehicle for Christian groups to become deeply involved in finishing the task.

People adoption focuses primarily on the goal of reaching the people, rather than on the means. To “adopt” means to commit to seeing a church planted among one unreached people, remaining focused when a church planter returns home and changes fields. Through adoption, the goal of a church for every people becomes achievable. God has hidden each people in His heart and seeks to adopt them into His family. In people adoption, we act as His agents to welcome our brothers and sisters home, into the relationship that God, in Christ, prepared for them.

What is an Unreached People Group? The 1982 “peoples” definition began a process of identifying the unreached peoples of the world that is still not complete. Admittedly, 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 25-28% of the world which has little access to the Gospel. A more popularized phrase - Least Reached Peoples - is sometimes used. One UPG- focused country network in an Asian country uses a term which places the responsibility squarely on the Church - the "Ignored" People Groups. The IMB refers to UPGs and Least Evangelized peoples. These terms are, for the most part, used interchangeably.

An Unreached People Group does not have a Christian witness among them with the numbers and strength to reach their own people. Obviously, if there are no Christians within this group, there will be none who can share the Gospel with them. And this is the situation in which 2.4 billion people of the world live… and die.

However, not all un-believers are unreached. Unreached people group refers to a group of people with no viable or relevant church, a non-Christian neighbor of most Americans would not be termed ‘unreached.’ They are unsaved and need the gospel of Jesus Christ; yet they probably have a church available in their own language and culture. They could go to church if they chose. In other words, they may be termed ‘unsaved’ or ‘un-evangelized persons,’ but not ‘unreached’ because they are part of a ‘reached’ group.

Our UPG – The B People In 2010, UBC officially adopted an Unreached People Group (UPG) in the Deserts of Africa called the B People. We are committed to do everything in our power by the grace of God to help facilitate a church planting movement led by nationals, while partnering along IMB missionaries and other Great Commission partners.

Through this process, we committed to provide financial assistance, pray for, send teams, train and disciple national leaders, mobilize national Christians, and meet the physical needs of the people. We committed to do everything we can to bring the good news of Jesus Christ to the B people.

Who are the B People The B People are a Muslim people living in the Deserts of Africa, among the 2 million B People in the country there are three known believers.

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Church Planting Movements © To the Ends of the Earth by Jerry Rankin (Week 5: Church-Planting Movements)

From every corner of the globe the reports are coming in. Only a few at first, but now more and more frequently, reinforcing one another with their startling accounts of hundreds, thousands, even tens of thousands coming to faith in Christ, forming into churches and spreading their new-found faith.

• In Southeast Asia, when a strategy coordinator began his assignment in 1993, there were only three churches and 85 believers among a population of more than 7 million lost souls. Four years later there were more than 550 churches and nearly 55,000 churches. • In North Africa, in his weekly Friday sermon, an Arab Muslim cleric complained that more than 10,000 Muslims living in the surrounding mountains had apostatized from Islam and become Christians. • In a city in China, over a four year period (1993-1997), more than 20,000 people came to faith in Christ, resulting in more than 500 new churches. • In Latin America, two Baptist unions overcame significant government persecution to grow from 235 churches in 1990 to more than 3,200 in 1998. • In Central Asia, around the end of 1996, a strategy coordinator reports, “We called around to various churches in the area and got their count on how many had some to faith in that one year. When they were all added up, it came to 15,000 in one year. The previous year we estimated only 200 believers altogether.

Someone has said, “If you don’t know where you are going, any road will do.” However, if we know where we want to go, we must take the right road. Strategic planning not only identifies the road to take but also determines the use of budget resources and missionary development.

The objective of a church-planting strategy of evangelism is more than an increase in the number of churches. Planting new churches is the surest way to increase the number of believers. But missionaries themselves cannot produce a rapid multiplication of new churches. The strategy depends on churches starting churches. The churches must catch the vision of the missionary or national church planted to extend their witness and to nurture believers in another location.

Church planting occurs when a single church is started. A church-growth movement occurs when several churches are started and begin other churches. For a church-planting movement to occur, a spiritual element must be present in a new church’s DNA. One church starts another, which starts another. Two churches become 4, 4 become 8, 8 become 16 in rapid, exponential multiplication.

Defined A Church Planting Movement (CPM) is a rapid and multiplicative increase of indigenous churches planting churches within a given people group or population segment.

Rapid As a movement, a Church Planting Movement occurs with rapid increases in new church starts. Saturation church planting over decades and even centuries is good, but doesn’t qualify as a CPM.

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Multiplicative There is a multiplicative increase. This means that the increase in churches is not simply incremental growth – adding a few churches every year or so. Instead, it compounds with two churches becoming four, four churches becoming eight to ten and so forth. Multiplicative increase is only possible when new churches are being started by the churches themselves – rather than by professional church planters or missionaries.

Indigenous Churches They are indigenous churches. This means they are generated from within rather than from without. This is not to say that the gospel is able to spring up intuitively within a people group – we know that in order to believe, they must hear. The gospel always enters a people group from the outside; this is the task of the missionary. However, in a CPM the momentum quickly becomes indigenous so that the initiative and drive of the movement comes from within the people group rather from outsiders.

A Church Planting Movement is not… A church planting movement is more than evangelism that results in churches. Evangelism that results in churches is part of a CPM but the end vision is less extensive. A church planter might satisfy himself with the goal of planting a single church or even a handful of churches, but fail to see that it will take a movement of churches planting churches to reach an entire nation of people.

It is more than a revival of pre-existing churches. Revivals are highly desirable, but they’re not CPMs. Evangelistic crusades and witnessing programs may lead thousands to Christ, and that’s wonderful, but it isn’t the same as a CPM. CPMs feature churches rapidly reproducing themselves.

When a local church trains and deploys people to plant multiple churches among their own people, it is not a CPM. This is a highly productive method of spreading churches across a population segment or people group, but the momentum remains in the hands of a limited group of professional church planters rather than in the heart of each new church that is begun.

Finally, a CPM is not an end in itself. The end of all our efforts is for God to be gloridied. This occurs whenever individuals enter into right relationship with Him through Jesus Christ. As they do, they are incorporated into churches which enable them to continue to grow in grace with other like-minded believers. Any time people come to new life in Jesus Christ, God is glorified. Any time a church is planted – no matter who does it – there are grounds for celebration.

A CPM has the greatest potential for the largest number of lost individuals glorifying God by coming into new life in Christ and entering into communities of faith. A CMP occurs when the vision of churches planting churches spreads from missionary and professional church planter into the churches themselves, so that by their very nature they are winning the lost and reproducing themselves.

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Ten Universal Elements Ten Common Factors of a CPM Seven Obstacles to a CPM of a CPM 1) Worship in the heart language 1) Imposing extra-biblical 1) Prayer 2) Evangelism has communal requirements for being a 2) Abundant gospel sowing implications church 3) Intentional church planting 3) Rapid incorporation of new converts 2) Loss of a valued cultural 4) Spiritual authority into the life and ministry of the church identity 5) Local leadership 4) Passion and fearlessness of believers 3) Overcoming bad examples 6) Lay leadership 5) A price to pay to become a Christian of Christianity 7) Cell or house churches 6) Perceived leadership crisis or 4) Non-reproducable church 8) Churches planting churches spiritual vacuum in society models 9) Rapid reproduction 7) On-the-job training for church 5) Subsidies creating 10) Healthy churches leadership dependency 8) Leadership authority is decentralized 6) Entra-biblical leadership 9) Outsiders keep a low profile requirements 10) Missionaries suffer 7) Linear, sequential thought and practice

Review Missionaries are capable church planters – but will always be limited in number. Local church planters hold more promise, simple because there is a larger pool of them available. CPMs hold an even greater potential, because the act of church planting is being done by the churches themselves, leading to the greater possible number of new church starts.

Conclusion God is not just concerned with reaching more and more people as He seems to be with reaching every people group. John Piper compares the situation in which we find ourselves to two sinking ocean liners. If the promise of the Navy General was that no matter what ship in his felt went down there would be some rescued from that ship, and if he enlisted his crew for that one purpose, what would they do if there were two ocean liners sinking at the same time? After reaching the first sinking ship you might see that there is great need and that you could justify staying to save as many as you could from the first ship, rather than going to the second. You could even argue that in the effort and time it required to get to the second ship, you could be better steward by staying at the first. Perhaps the people at the other ship were unwilling, and this seems to be a fruitful ground for desperate swimmers. There is plenty of need here. However, this was not the General’s command. He specifically ordered His crew to save some men from both ships, not just one. This is why it is necessary for men to take the rescue boat to each ship. These must be representatives and survivors at the General’s banquet from every ship. God has promised to reach some from every tribe, tongue, and nation and people. He has enlisted us to rescue them and one day there will be a banquet, where all nations and people groups are represented before the throne.

The task is finish-able. “God shall bless us; let all the ends of the earth fear Him.” (Psalm 67:7) God has indeed blessed us with all the resources that we need to finish His Great Commission.

Let’s look at how the statistics break down in view of what it would take to reach each individual Unreached People Group. Basically, for each of the 6,534 Unreached People Groups there are 552 churches in the world. That means that if your church teamed up with 551 other churches to send out a team of ten people and financially support them, it doesn’t sound impossible to pull off. In fact, there

8 University Baptist Church Intro to Missions – Session 6 FUSION are 103,500 Evangelical Christians per UPG, plenty for putting together teams of ten. How much money would it take to send out these teams? A generous guess would be 3.26 billion in annual support. Sound like a lot of money? Christians earn 16.3 Trillion each year. If only the Evangelical Christians (a much small group, 1/5th the size of all Christendom) gave five dollars each year, this would supply above and beyond the needed finances. The task of world mission is not being held up by a lack of finances, or churches, or people.

What can you do? Next week, we will go into these options further – but directly related to people groups, you can pray, send and go.

Pray Prayer is foundational. Make prayer a priority. Pray for guidance. Prayer information is available for the Kuvi/DK. Another resource is Operation World. The IMB also has a prayer guide for the unreached peoples.

Send Every year, at least one trip per year is planned to serve our unreached people group. There are a number of ways to get involved in these trips. Also, be informed regarding missionaries you support, or may come to support. Where are these people serving? Who are these people serving?

Go Go to India! Our church will be taking a group to India in October. Will you go?