News and Stories

My first experience of overseas Christian ministry was a 6-month trip to South Asia as part of a team of young people, sent out from the UK. The understanding of what we were doing was shaped around Matthew 28:19. Our focus was going and making disciples.  We followed, both geographically and in our understanding of…

The Fourth Lausanne Congress on World Evangelisation, also known as the Seoul 2024 Congress, is taking place in Seoul, South Korea from 22-28 September 2024. The purpose of this significant gathering, as well as the multi-year and multi-faceted Lausanne 4 (L4) journey leading up to and beyond the gathering, is to accelerate collaborative action toward…

Stretching from the northern tip of Latin America up towards North America and Mexico, the Caribbean is an archipelago of over 7,000 islands and home to over 44 million people. While boasting exquisite natural beauty and popular for its beaches and as a holiday destination, the Caribbean continues to face social, financial, and environmental challenges. …

In a dialogue on the cultural perspectives of children and childhood, I approached a Chinese language translator for the term ‘children-at-risk.’ She replied, ‘Eer… the term is 有危险的儿童 [which means, “children who are in danger or risk situations”]; but I don’t think it aptly translates the urgency. A more appropriate term would be, “children outside…

In early June 2023, National Highway 2 that passes through India’s Northeastern state of Manipur displayed an unusual sight. It wasn’t the mayhem of vehicles but a human chain that stretched for 40 kilometers. Thousands of men and women from the Kuki-Zo tribe lined the road, some standing, some sitting, some kneeling, but all of…

A few months ago, I was speaking at a local Christian high school on integrity in leadership when a group of boys brought up a well-known Gen Z influencer. This individual has gained a large following by intentionally propagating derogatory views of women, and has consequently been banned from multiple platforms and ‘cancelled’ by various…

Around the year 200 AD, a young mother named Perpetua was asked, ‘Who are you?’ She answered, ‘I am a Christian’ and then met martyrdom in the arena.  How many people in the world today would answer similarly? This is the question Gina Zurlo and the researchers at the Center for the Study of Global…

A Brief History of Globalization and Its Setbacks All empires before 1500 were land-based and regional. They were usually comprised of contiguous lands conquered by armies marching on foot or riding horses. The greatest of these were those of Rome and China, and then the Muslim Caliphates and the Mongolians. The only link between these…

The top 50 countries where Christians experience the greatest levels of persecution today include a significant number of countries in the Eurasia region. This year, one third of the region’s 12 countries featured on Open Doors’ World Watch List.  Most of Eurasia once formed part of the communist Soviet Union, and each of the countries…

Editor’s Note: This article is part 2 of a four-part series on workplace evangelism. In Part 1, we made the case that the most strategic mission field today is the workplace. In Part 3 of this series, we will examine factors that create wise communication and identify both appropriate and inappropriate times to talk about…

At the recent Lausanne Generations Conversation (LGC23), I was refreshed and deeply encouraged, not to mention challenged, by the focus of the gathering which quickly became apparent to me—that God’s missional purpose is at work in every generation, particularly through intergenerational leadership. Our approach to mission is made richer when we can appreciate what different…

Across the world today, men and women are faithfully stewarding God’s call as leaders and people of influence in organizations, churches, schools, and marketplaces. What would happen if these men and women were to gather together to form God-inspired, catalytic connections within and across regions, generations, shared interests, and ideas? This is the unique calling…

The epistle to the Romans is often regarded as one of the finest and most stirring expositions of the gospel.  Early church father Augustine was converted reading the book. Martin Luther had an epiphany reading the epistle, sparking his personal renewal and eventually the Protestant Reformation. And when John Wesley heard Luther’s commentary on Romans…

Brent Burdick has been the director of Lausanne Global Classroom since 2015, overseeing the publishing of 17 comprehensive video episodes featuring the most pressing missional topics of our times.  Each Global Classroom episode is unique in its presentation of perspectives and insights from leading voices on the issue from around the world. Burdick’s recently published…

At about age 15, I spread open my hands in prayer, in a posture of childlike surrender, for God’s service in whichever way, place, and time he wished. And though I barely understood what that ‘service to God’ fully entailed, on my knees that day, I committed to actively serve God’s mission on earth with…

If one of the most highly regarded mission and biblical scholars of the last 30 years were to condense their most salient contributions to scholarship and church life into a single book, accessible to the whole church, that would be something to take note of. That is what we have in Christopher J.H. Wright’s The…

The Lord has called us to set our hope on the grace to be given us on the day when Jesus will return for his church, ‘to live holy and godly lives as [we] look forward to the day of God and speed its coming’ (2 Pet 3:11b-12a).  Speed its coming? What could that mean?…

Editor’s Note: This article is part 3 of a three-part series by Patrick Johnstone, author emeritus of Operation World, on the Sahel region. Read parts one and two. The Sahel is also an area in which pioneer evangelism, Bible translation, and church planting are most challenging and most needed. In my first and second articles,…

The new data is in. Globally, the number of people living with disabilities has increased from 1 billion in 2011 to 1.3 billion today—from roughly one in seven people to one in six. Why the significant rise? We can credit migrations, wars, crime, disease, and disasters, to name only a few causes. An increase in…

In order to fulfill the Great Commission, every believer needs to be a minister, and every workplace a place of ministry. —Bishop Efraim Tendero, World Evangelical Alliance Lausanne Global Workplace Forum, Manila, 2019 We call on Christian leaders to recognize that the workplace is the most strategic mission field in the world, and commit to…