10/40 Window: Do you need to be stirred to action?

Most of the people groups still unreached by the gospel live in places stretching across the maps of northern Africa and Asia. Christian missions strategist Luis Bush started calling this rectangular area or band: "the 10/40 window." He used that easy-to-remember name because it lies across Africa and Asia from 10 degrees latitude north of the equator to 40 degrees latitude north of the equator.

Read Luis Bush' April 1996 10-40 window message: "Getting to the Core of the Core" [ click here (requires Adobe Acrobat reader) ]

The task remaining: Click on red 10/40 window area of this world map for staggering statistics

World evangelism statistics: Of the 55 least evangelized countries, 97% of their population lives within the Ten Forty Window.

Unless something changes soon, most of these unreached people will never hear the Gospel. Why? Well, Bryant Myers of World Vision has estimated that only about one and a quarter percent ( 1.25% )of Christian mission giving is going to missions work in the 10/40 Window. Open evangelism is difficult and even impossible because of governmental restrictions in many 10/40 Window countries. Those are creative access areas.

What will you do in the next five days that will move the Church toward reaching people in the 10/40 window with the gospel?

The vision of a dying world: The people in the mission fields

Working on a school report about missions? Here are some facts to use.

Missions statistics from the places of the 10/40 Window:

• Center of population:Two-thirds of the world's population -- more than 3.2 billion people -- live in the 10/40 Window.
• Unreached and unevangelized: 95% of the people living in the 10/40 Window are unevangelized. Many have never heard the Gospel message even once. There are either no Christians or not enough of a Christian movement in many cultures of the 10/40 Window to carry out vibrant near-neighbor evangelism. If those groups are to be evangelized, believers will need to leave their own culture to enter another where they will seek to plant the gospel. Such cross-cultural evangelism is required because there are people groups with no church movements that are understandable or relevant to them.
  • Good news: There's a difference between unreached and unreachable. In 1989 there were only four known Christians living in Mongolia. That country now has an estimated 10,000 indigenous believers. Also, Christian television programming can now be received in many closed 10/40 Window nations.
• Poverty: Eighty-five percent of those living in the 10/40 window are the poorest of the world's poor. [ PowerPoint on Third World development ]
  • Good news: Christians delivered more than $1 million worth of food to just one 10/40 Window refugee camp in a recent year. In one North African country that is hostile to the Gospel, abundant rain fell after an Easter service. A local news channel reported, "Christians have brought rain to the desert."
• World religions: Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism are centered within the 10/40 Window. [ more info ]
• Least evangelized cities: Half of the world's least evangelized cities are in this window.

Statistical data on unreached people groups:

The statistics of the numbers of non-Christians can be staggering [ fate of the unevangelized? ]

• 865 million unreached Muslims or Islamic followers in 3330 cultural sub-groupings
• 550 million unreached Hindus in 1660 cultural sub-groups
• 150 million unreached Chinese in 830 groups
• 275 million unreached Buddhists in 900 groups
• 2550 unreached tribal groups (which are mainly animistic) with a total population of 140 million
• Forming a smaller -- though important -- unreached group are the 17 million Jews scattered across 134 countries
• Good news: Missions researcher David Barrett says the country with the most rapid Christian expansion ever is China where there are 10,000 new Christian converts every day.

Bible translation availability

• At least some part of Scripture has been translated into 2,212 of the world's 6,500 languages
  • 366 languages have the entire Bible
  • 928 other languages have the New Testament
  • Individual books (such as the Gospel of John) are available in 918 additional languages
• 80 percent of the world's people have access to at least some portion of the Bible in a language they can understand.

"I will praise you among the nations, O Lord" -- Psalm 18:49

Global harvest: Countries in the area designated as the 10/40 Window

Afghanistan Algeria Bahrain Bangladesh Benin Bhutan Burkina Faso Cambodia Chad China Cyprus Djibouti

Egypt Eritrea Ethiopia Gambia Gibraltar Greece Guinea Guinea-Bissau India Iran Iraq Israel

Japan Jordan Korea, North Korea, South Kuwait Laos Lebanon Libya Macau Mali Malta Mauritania

Morocco Myanmar (Burma) Nepal Niger Oman Pakistan Philippines Portugal Qatar Saudi Arabia Senegal Sudan

Syria Taiwan Tajikistan Thailand Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan United Arab Emirates Vietnam Western Sahara Yemen

World A, World B and World C

Some mission strategists have divided the world's population into three groupings: World A, World B and World C

• World A is made up of those areas where the population is considered to be less than half evangelized.
• World B are those areas where the population is over 50% evangelized.
• World C are those areas of the world that are at least 60% (even if only nominally). [ see statistics ]

What can you do about the unevangelized and unreached parts of the world?

Four things you can start doing today. Also, read what Phil Bogosian says about those 66,000 people who are dying without any knowledge of Christ every day. [ read more ]

SNU missions course materials and syllabi