The Global Century By Mike Barnett 17 The Global Century By Mike Barnett

Changing Times

Retreat and Retrenchment Colonialism ended after WWII – by 1969 almost all colonies were independent states Mid-century; protestant missions were in drastic decline Rise of national churches and closing of countries to missionaries Theological liberalism questions the legitimacy of conversionist missions – and their seminaries see declining numbers of missionary candidates

Mission marginalization Loss of biblical categories, terms, definitions Church growth became church enlargement Everything was seen as missions

Missiological warnings Venn & Anderson – the three-self church is essential (self-supporting, self-governing, self-propagating) Hudson Taylor – contextualized missions Roland Allen – spontaneous expansion of the church Cameron Townsend – Importance of “heart language” McGavran – think “people movements”

A Standstill? 1964 – secular press comments on the death of Paul Carlson in the Congo – “the end of the missionary movement” The word “missionary” applied to all ministry Others pushed to continue pursuing the Great Commission in a new way.

The Lausanne Movement

A meeting Billy Graham called for Christian leaders from around the world to gather for ten days in Lausanne, Switzerland. The meeting began in July, 1974 Out of it came the Lausanne Covenant; and a re-energized mission movement Three themes emerged: “World evangelization requires the whole church to take the whole gospel to the whole world.”

The whole church Not just churches from the West Not just those identified with a particular culture, social or political system, or human ideology In the face of the world-wide cold war, it was an essential caveat

The whole gospel Recombining evangelism and social concern in a Biblical way – the whole gospel

The whole world The focus must be on cross-cultural evangelism At the time, nation-states were in view, not people groups “People blindness” was the term, the result was a complete re-orientation of mission thinking

Engaging the least-reached peoples of the earth with the gospel AD 2000 and Beyond

The search for hidden people New prayer Prayer was mobilized for the hidden peoples Operation World: demographics on every nation and the main people groups in it New research Four major databases were developed documenting unreached peoples A new window – research revealed a pattern Most unreached in the “10/40 window”: 10 degrees to 40 degrees north of the equator from North Africa to Asia

A new approach New paradigms New missionaries Many mission agencies, including the IMB re-invented themselves to address this new understanding of the task we face New missionaries Professional missionaries banned form the 10/40 window Now: short-term, non-resident, platform, business-based

A new way of working together New partners and networks Regular congresses and consultations to gauge progress and tune strategy New kinds of regional partnerships and organizations that network the efforts of others like DAWN and AD2000 & Beyond network New strategies Mission teams facilitating movements, women to women, Jesus film Most crucial: church planting movements

Conclusion Lausanne I was a sea-change in missions Ralph Winter pointed out our “people blindness” The evangelical engagement with a lost world was re-entergized