By Albert Shim, Pastor

Last fall we heard from Ji-Jon and Juliana about Pacific Crossroads’ ministry to international students. I am excited about this ministry for a number of reasons, and as we start a new year, I’d like to revisit our vision as a church and explore how serving the international community clearly aligns with that vision. There are three strands here I’d like to consider that, hopefully, I’ll be able to tie together at then end.

1. Our Vision: Crossroads

Our stated vision is: Changed Lives by God’s Power, Renewing Los Angeles for Christ’s Fame. There is a lot packed into that one statement that speaks to who we are and who we hope to be as a church. It speaks to personal and corporate transformation – yet not one that is feigned by a self-righteous moralism, but one that is wrought by the power of God and His indwelling Spirit. It speaks to our missional impulse – that we don’t exist for ourselves. It speaks to our urban context – that we care about our city and want to see Los Angeles renewed. And finally, it speaks to the great “Why?” – it is for God’s fame.

Now, is this vision myopic? Why just Los Angeles? Is there a global concern? I think there is and I think it’s there in that last clause: “for Christ’s Fame.” We are passionate about God’s fame, and fame is not fame if it is tribal:

“…the fame and greatness and worth of an object of beauty increases in proportion to the diversity of those who recognize its beauty…there is something so universally praiseworthy and so profoundly beautiful and so comprehensively worthy and so deeply satisfying that God will find passionate admirers in every diverse people group in the world. His true greatness will be manifest in the breadth of the diversity of those who perceive and cherish his beauty.” (John Piper, Let the Nations Be Glad, 216)

That’s fame. All nations. Every tribe and language. Every people and nation.

So, we want to impact Los Angeles, and by it the world. That’s Strand One.

2. Unreached and Unengaged

If the first strand is the vision of Crossroads Church, then the second is the vision of our Global Missions Committee. This is something that I wish we spoke more about, but a primary focus of the Global Missions Committee is work among people who remain unreached and unengaged by the gospel of Christ.

A people group refers to sociologic and ethno-linguistic groupings of people who perceive themselves to have a common affinity with one another. In general, they see ‘us’ as ‘us,’ and ‘them’ as ‘them.’

An unreached people group is a people group for whom there is no viable, indigenous, self-reproducing movement in the local church. In general, it means that less than 2% of the population profess to follow Christ such that there is virtually no access to the gospel among the vast majority of the people.

Now if that weren’t bad enough, there is also what’s referred to as unengaged people groups. These are people groups for whom there is no evidence of a viable, contextualized, church-planting strategy being implemented. No one is trying to reach them. Or if they are trying and there is a plan to reach them, it is not yet being implemented to any significant degree.

Here is where it gets heart-breaking.  Of an estimated 16,700 people groups, almost 7,000 remain unreached by the gospel of Christ. That is 42% of all known people groups. Furthermore, it is estimated that there are roughly 3,700 unengaged people groups – again, those among whom there is no evidence that a church-planting strategy is being implemented.

That is a scandal.

42%.

3,700.

There are billions of people without a single neighbor who can tell them about Jesus Christ – billions who even if they wanted to hear the gospel of grace could not and would not.

And if I may make a few additional observations, we live in the context of the richest and best-resourced church in all of human history. We have the best-educated pastors and the most state-of-the-art, multi-million dollar church buildings. Buildings.

That’s Strand Two.

3. Cities

Now, also critical to our vision is the City. Why? Well, cities are strategically important. They are centers for political, cultural, economic and intellectual power. And typically, the direction of influence is from the cities to the suburban and rural communities. And so one way to influence those non-urban communities is to reach their urban centers.

This is not a veiled elitism. Cities are also centers for great injustice, immorality, crime, poverty and racism. And so reaching cities, means reaching down. That’s about as non-elite as it gets. But I hope you can see the strategic importance of saturating cities with vital, gospel-centered, missional churches.

But let me add to this a little more. The global urbanization statistics are staggering:

• In 1950, New York City was the only city with >10 million people. Now, there are more than 20 such cities, most having arrived in the past two decades, with many more on the horizon.
• At some point in the middle of 2009, the number of people living in urban areas surpassed the number of those living in rural areas.
• According to the UN, between 2009-2050, the world’s population is projected to increase by 2.3 billion people. During the same period, the world’s urban population is expected to increase by 2.9 billion. This means that the major cities of the world will absorb ALL of the growth over the next four decades…and then some. People will continue to move from the rural areas to urban contexts.

The ends of the earth have come and are coming to the cities.

That’s Strand Three.

Ministry to International Students

OK, so let’s get back to Los Angeles, Crossroads and international students, and try to tie those three strands together.

What does all this mean for Los Angeles and for our ministry to international students? Well, I hope by now you can what I’m getting at, but consider the following facts:

• California is the top host state for international students.
• USC is the top host university for international students.
• These students represent many of the next generation of leaders in business, academia and politics for their home countries.
• Of the top 11 countries that send students to the United States, 7 of them are considered “creative-access” countries closed to foreign missionaries.

If we, as a church in Los Angeles, with a vision for the city, with a stated concern for the marginalized, with a burden for the unreached, and with a passion for Christ’s fame, then we simply have to know how to love, welcome and minister to international students. In this ministry, volunteers are fully engaged with the vision of Crossroads.

Let me close with a quote and a verse:

“Is it not a fair test of missionary concern whether or not we share the eternally Good News with distant peoples who in God’s providence have come to our own shores and community?”  - Carl F. Henry

Deuteronomy 10:17-21: For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God… He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him food and clothing. Love the sojourner, therefore, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt. You shall fear the LORD your God… He is your praise. He is your God…

We are not bound to love these students simply by virtue of our locale or for the sake of a strategy. We are bound by God’s heart for His world. God loves them and so must we.