The 2.3 Billion Without Gospel Access and The Future

2.3 billion people alive right now without gospel access. They will likely live and die without ever hearing the name of Jesus in a way they can understand and respond to.

According to the latest Status of Global Christianity report, that number is projected to rise to 2.76 billion by 2075. And although the percentage drops slightly, the absolute number of unreached people keeps climbing. The task ahead of us is larger than it has ever been.

The data confirms what many of us have observed and sensed for a while: the world is getting more religious, not less. It’s not just the podcasters and influencers. Atheism, contrary to popular opinion is actually in decline, projected to fall from 148 million today to 84 million by 2075.

Notably, Islam is currently growing faster than Christianity. People are hungry for God. The question is whether they will hear about the one true crucified God. If we are serious about the unreached, we must prioritize evangelizing muslims. Today, there is one missionary for every 400 thousand Muslims worldwide.

It is staggering to think of the task of the evangelization of the world going beyond our lifetime (I’ll be 86 in 2075). Every generation thinks it will be the one to close the gap. Maybe ours will. Maybe it won’t. But the Great Commission has always moved through generations.

That means moving beyond the next greatest evangelistic event and asking how we steward the task that was handed to us and pass it on to the next generations. Whatever our assignment, we need longer vision and a willingness to sow in prayer, evangelism and church planting in places where the first convert might take longer than we’d like.

Stewarding the Great Commission across generations also means honestly looking at our priorities. Are we prioritizing the apostolic function of the church or have our missionaries (important as it is) become an extension of the pastoral? Are we rethinking sending locations? Where are our missions budgets going? Are we only platforming charismatic conference preachers or are we raising a breed of apostolic leaders?

Pentecostalism (the movement I belong to) has grown from fewer than a million to 676 million in just over a century and is projected be over a billion in number by 2075. The Spirit has been poured out. We have been given so much. The question is whether our priorities reflect what we’ve been given.

And we cannot look past our own continent and the West. European Christianity is in measurable decline. From 567 million Christians (all affiliations) today to a projected 398 million by 2075. While Christianity will grow and thrive in the Global South, the West must be reimagined as a sowing field. I fear we’re managing our decline instead of contending for revival in the Church and the spread of the Gospel in our cities.

Samuel Zwemer wrote over a century ago: “The evangelization of the world in this generation is no play-word.”

So we pray. We strategize. We send. We make disciples of all the ethne and plant churches. Because 2.3 billion people cannot wait. Because some of what we sow today, future generations may be the ones to harvest.