The mission mandate of the great commission given to the Church by the Lord Jesus is as valid today for us, as it was for the 1^st century apostles who received it first. Twenty-first century biblical Christianity faces four major challenges in the missions mandate we have been given. A lot of the thinking in many believers’ minds today was formed from the mission work of the 1950-60’s. Are we ready to face the fact that a lot has to be re-thought and strategies have to be changed?

The first major challenge of the 21^st century we have to face today is the reality of massive urbanization in our world. There are now hundreds of “Mega-Cities” around the globe, all crowded with the full spectrum of socio-economic demographics. The ultra-rich and powerful live within a few miles of the poor and powerless. As a friend of mine serving in East Asia said to me on my last trip to the area, “Missions ain’t no thatch huts in a jungle by a river anymore.” He said this while he and I were having lunch in the downtown area of a city of 3 million that is considered a smaller city in that nation.

With the new urbanization centers, we have an industrial and commercial, instead of agrarian emphasis that now controls life in the urban complexes. With the massive urbanization, technological paradigms have changed. For example, 31 billion searches on Google are done every month now. That fact makes me wonder, before we could Google our questions, who did we ask about these things? The internet has become the basis of business, retail, marketing, and communication globally.

The changes in communication are astounding. My 91 year old father in law asked me the other day what texting was. I pulled out my mobile phone and showed him, realizing just how much change he must have seen in his life time. The first commercial text message was sent in December 1992. Today, the number of text messages sent and received every day exceeds the total population of the planet. It took 38 years for radio to reach a market audience of 50 million. It took television 13 years, and it took Facebook only 2 years to reach the 50 million mark. The number of internet devices in 1984 was 1000, and in 2008, there were over one billion devices. Without a doubt, regardless of what you think about it, the internet, and all that it brings, is here to stay.

This massive urbanization that the church must face in our global mission is really simple to understand as to its cause. In the past decades we have experienced a global population explosion that is shifting the centers of power, money and influence into new and developing areas. The facts are as follows: During the last 9 minutes…

• 67 babies were born in the USA…
• 274 babies were born in China…
• And 395 babies were born in India.

It is our mandate to share the life giving Gospel of the Lord Jesus with each of these children and their parents. The question we will explore together in the weeks ahead is just this: how in the world are we going to do it?