President's Blog

Ever wonder how many people throughout the world have committed themselves to Christ’s mission to evangelize the world? How many missionaries have been sent? What are today’s global resources for world evangelism?

I came across this information from the “World Christian Trends” work done by the William Carey Library and researchers David Barrett and Todd Johnson. I thought you might be interested:

Global Resources to complete the Great Commission

When it comes to resources to fulfill the Great Commission (to evangelize and disciple all nations) Christian resources do abound. This is a list produced from data collected in the early 2000s:

• 88 billion professing Christians

• 565 million professing Christians under 15 years of age

• 648 million practicing Christians

• 600 million weekly-worshipping Christians

• 45 million worship centres (local churches)

• 33,800 distinct denominations

• 4,000 foreign mission boards or societies

• 5,800 home-mission boards or societies

• 23,000 para-church agencies

• 400 medical mission agencies

• 5,500 Christian hospitals

• 30,000 Christian medical centres

• 170,000 elementary Christian Schools

• 50,000 Christian high schools

• 1,500 Christian universities

• 4,800 seminaries or theological colleges with 1.1 million seminary students

• 1 million ordained clergy (8% are women)

• 52 million full-time Christian workers

• 420,000 vocational full-time foreign missionaries

• 1 million home missionaries

• 26,100 new Christian book titles every year

• 12,000 major religious (Christian) libraries

• 7 million Bibles distributed each year

• 7 million New Testaments distributed each year

• 6 million Scripture portions distributed each year

• 3 billion Christian books printed each year

• 5 billion Christian tracts printed each year

• 4,000 Christian radio/TV stations

• 120,000 full-time personnel in Christian broadcasting

• 3,000 evangelistic mass campaigns each year

• 332 million Christians own a computer

• 845 current global plans for world evangelism

• 210 current global mega-plans for world evangelism

• 57 current global giga-plans for world evangelism

Impressive, but dig deeper...

Pretty impressive, eh? But the reality is that the vast bulk of these resources mostly benefit the “Christian World”. Even when it comes to foreign missions, 85% of personnel and money is devoted to “Christian” lands such as North America, Brazil, Kenya, etc.

The present annual cost of mission to Christian lands is $163 billion, which is more than seven times as much as the $250 million it costs to send approximately 10,200 foreign missionaries to frontier fields (i.e. countries where less than 1-2% of the population self-identify as evangelical Christian).

We certainly need to continue supporting home missions or missions to “evangelized” fields. A strong home base is critical to completing the Great Commission, but we must remain vigilant and intentional about still giving a fair share to missions in those tougher un-evangelized fields. I imagine many of our church mission budgets may not represent this reality.

Fellowship International Missionaries

Currently, a number of amazing  Fellowship International personnel are looking for partners to enable them to go to those fields that are the least evangelized (less than 1-2% evangelical). I know many of our churches prayerfully consider financial partnership with new missionaries during budget discussions in the Fall. Please consider these folks.

1. Jesse Lam (Japan) fellowship.ca/lam

   • Jesse serves as a musician ministering to musicians. Currently, he focuses mainly on his musicianship, his theological studies, and his mastery of the Japanese language.

2. ECM (Persian Diaspora) fellowship.ca/ecm

   • *As this email/blog is being posted on the internet, I need to be cautious in communicating about this couple because of the nature of their ministry. Even mentioning that they minister among a “Persian” population can be sensitive in some settings. If interested, contact me and I can provide you with more details and perhaps even a photo for this couple.

3. Jacob and Rachel Hwang (Ahousaht, First Nation) fellowship.ca/jacobandrachelhwang 

   • The Hwangs deeply desire to see God plant an Ahousaht First Nation church among young people who are less impacted by history. Their major role is becoming spiritual parents until the next generation develops true disciples of Christ.

4. Daniel and Isabelle Dupuis (Abitibi, Québec) fellowship.ca/dupuis

   • Daniel and Isabelle are working to develop disciple-making movements by sharing the love of Christ, discipling those who are open to a relationship with Christ, and equipping and training them as they seek to impact the lives of friends, family members, and contacts around them.

5. Tim and Kelly Klaassen (Nanaimo, British Columbia) fellowship.ca/klaassen

   • Tim and Kelly work to equip churches in living out the Gospel mandate of Matthew 28, Acts 1, and 2 Corinthians 5 — making disciples, and being witnesses and ambassadors for Christ Jesus, all with the presence and power of Jesus through His Holy Spirit.

Come to FNC 2025 (November 3-5, 2025) in Toronto where many of our missionaries will be in attendance – we can help connect you to a Fellowship International missionary if you wish. Contact Byron Chae (bchae@fellowship.ca) or Farrah Soliman (fsoliman@fellowship.ca) and they’ll set it up.