The concept of unreached people groups is a helpful way for Christians to organize their efforts toward global disciple-making. Around the world, people group themselves along certain lines- lines that also present significant obstacles to the spread of the gospel from one group to another. Ethnography, the practice of studying and categorizing groups of people, provides the mission with a [...]

My friend Kyle Goen recently posted about his experience using the internet to meet people in Belgium. I’m proud of him for stepping out of his comfort zone (even further) in order to build relationships with people in Belgium. The concept is simple: lots of people are using the web to meet people. Sure, many (most?) of them are not [...]

Talk all you want about being missions-minded or globally-conscious, the evidence betrays your poorly-developed missiology.

The American who moves into the slums when his countrymen almost always live uptown. The third-world-born doctor, the female cab driver, mixed-race families. These are people who deliberately choose to not conform to social expectations. When someone bucks the system, people take notice. Basic to our missiology are the concepts of cultural norms and expectations. Every culture has pre-determined ways [...]

Most missionary strategy is developed with one major assumption: that a missionary presence of one sort or another might be welcomed by the people to whom we feel “called” to minister. With all the missions talk of “embracing” the “unengaged” and “reaching””unreached” people groups, we need to consider one elemental aspect of ministry across cultures: What if people don’t want [...]