Day 29: Unreached Peoples. Where I live, I pretty much assume that everyone has had the opportunity to hear about Christ. I am finding more and more that this is not necessarily the case, but there are definitely opportunities for most Americans to hear the gospel at least once. It is insane to me that there continue to be whole people groups who have never even had the opportunity to hear about a God who loves them and wants a relationship with them.
There was once a time that my husband and I were planning to head overseas to spread the gospel of Christ with an unreached people group. Then some unexpected things happened which have required us to stay here for at least a while. It is sometimes hard to feel like you have a place in reaching unreached people groups when you can’t go be with them teaching them about the gospel and showing them the love of Christ, but there is SO much that we can do. We can start with prayer. Every great Christian movement was first covered in prayer. I think sometimes we underestimate the power of prayer because we don’t have the faith that God will actually listen to us or come through for us, but prayer is SO powerful. A great way to start this is through using an app that was recommended to me called JP Unreached. It is the Joshua Project in app form. It gives you an “unreached people group of the day” and a little bit of information about that people group so that you can somewhat more specifically pray for an unreached group of people in the world. Another thing we can do is give. There are many missionaries that you can support that are sharing the gospel to unreached people groups. They need funding to be able to continue the work that they are doing. We can also encourage. I once had a friend spend a summer in Russia working with a local church there. When she came home she talked about how hard it was to feel disconnected from people at home. She said people wrote for the first few weeks, but then seemed to forget about her. IF it is safe for you to send mail, an email, or connect with them on social media, take some time to write a missionary an encouraging note to let them know you are praying for the work they are doing. Lastly, we can go. We all have a place to be spreading the gospel. For you, it might not mean an unreached people group, but it could mean an unreached person. You might go to another country and share the love of Christ in a location not your own. Or you might stay where you are; in many areas, especially around college campuses, there are members of unreached people groups right at your back door. You just have to open your eyes to where the gospel isn’t.
