Unreached Peoples in the 1040 Window

What if you were a refugee on a boat and could choose any country to live in for the rest of your life? Which country would you choose? If you were like most people, you would choose from the list on the right. But why? What makes these countries on the right so much different than the countries here, on the left? This list is made up of nations that have the most religious freedom for Christians. And this list is made up of the nations where Christians experience the most persecution.

Look at the relationship between religious freedom and free countries. Religious freedom is the common thread that forms the bedrock of free societies around the world. But those countries that are the most aggressive against the gospel of Jesus Christ are also the least evangelized countries in the world, and 97% of the least evangelized people live here in the 1040 window.

The people who live in the 1040 window, they're not unreached like your uncle or grumpy neighbor who don't go to church or doesn't want to hear about Jesus Christ anymore. The people who live in the 1040 window, they're unreached in the way that they've never had the chance to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. Most foreign missionaries are still working in areas that already have the gospel.

Very few missionaries actually work to reach people in the 1040 window. From the money designated for missions in the US, only 5.4% is used for foreign missions. Of that 5.4%, only .37% is used to take the gospel to the unreached people, and of every $100 given to missions, only about two pennies are used.

But only one penny goes to the 1040 window. So for every 100 missionaries, only one goes to the 1040 window. And that one missionary, for every $100 donated, will only receive one penny.

And according to the latest research, $140 billion was used for church programs in the USA in 2011. Less than $8 billion was sent overseas, and only 1% of that was used for missions in the most needy area of the world, where two-thirds of the population live. To put things into perspective, that's less than 1% of what was spent on dog food.

But there is hope. God is stirring things up in the east. China is seeing one of the largest revivals this world has ever seen.

The floods of revival are raining down, and some estimate that as many as 30,000 people are coming to Christ in China every day. The most populated country in the world is being swept up in the winds of revival, in spite of its communist government. The Chinese who are coming to Christ are not content with keeping their Christianity to themselves.

They have been given the baton of the Great Commission to take the gospel into the countries in the 1040 window, and what they call, back to Jerusalem. For thousands of years, China has been trading and working with countries on their borders. As new believers in China are reading stories in the Bible like those of Paul and Barnabas, they too are leaving their homes and going out to give their lives on the mission field.

The term back to Jerusalem is not a new one. It started in the hearts of the Chinese believers almost 80 years ago, and it is now the war cry of the underground church in China. The missionaries and evangelists from China are going to go from country to country, village to village, and person to person, to spread the good news of Jesus Christ, from the Great Wall of China all the way back to where it all started 2,000 years ago, back to Jerusalem.