In the United States Christianity is openly mocked in most media: television, movies and print.  Nightly News portrays a world seemingly in despair with no hope.  The U.S., Canada, and Europe continue their downward slide away from God in their rejection of anything having to do with Christ and the Bible.  Even common sense and tenets of basic human morality are regularly attacked and vilified.

Yet the truth is that, in our time, worldwide, God is winning.  The Holy Spirit is greatly moving in what was once called “the Third World”. We need to be thankful and even amazed at what God is doing!

“Look at the nations and watch – and be utterly amazed.  For I am going to do something in your days that you would not believe, even if you were told.”  –Habakkuk 1:5

Every day, 20,000 Africans come to Christ.  Africa was 3% Christian in 1900 and is now over 50% Christian (Vision 2020).

In 1900 Korea had no Protestant church and the country was deemed impossible to penetrate.  Today Korea is 30% Christian with 7000 churches in Seoul alone and several of these churches have over 1,000,000 members (Vision 2020).

On June 15th, 2006, 3,000,000 believers paraded through Sao Paolo, Brazil in the world’s largest “March for Jesus” (William Stearns).

In A.D. 100, there were 360 non-Christians for every true believer.  Today the ratio is less than seven to every believer as the Holy Spirit does more than we could ever ask or imagine (Vision 2020)

There are currently 60-80 million Christians in China with between 10,000-25,000 converts a day (Open Doors).

About 500 Muslims come to faith in Christ every month in Iran–a country ranked among the top ten persecutors of Christians in the world.  Many of the new believers are young, since 70% of Iran is under the age of 30 (Vision 2020).

The number of Christians in Indonesia has grown from 1.3M forty years ago to over 11M today.  (Operation World).

The Jesus Film has been translated into nearly 1000 languages and over 200,000,000 people have indicated decisions for Christ as a result of the film (Campus Crusade).

If Bible translation had continued at its historic pace, providing a Bible in every people group’s heart language would have been accomplished in 2150.  Thanks to God’s working through Wycliffe’s Vision 2025, the work has been accelerated by over 100 years and is now on pace to be completed in 2042 (Wycliffe).

Missionary-founded churches in Japan are being turned over to nationals to lead, so missionaries can plant other churches.

No Christian was officially allowed to live in Nepal until 1960.  Now there is a church in every one of the 75 districts of Nepalwith estimates of over half a million believers (Operation World).

Are we seeing a Bangladesh “Book of Acts”? A Church leader there wrote to a friend recently: “By your strong prayers the Lord has saved 4,452 people and planted 150 churches from January to June, 2006. Prayer request: Our goal is to plant 300 churches and see 9000 saved in 2006.” (Vision 2020).

Christian radio through HCJB is being invited into places such as Russian prisons that would not allow missionaries.  Soldiers are abandoning pillaging missions when they listen to the stolen radios HCJB had distributed to the people and they are accepting the Lord.  These “fixed-tune” radios are broadcasting Christian programming in native languages (HCJB – Truth in Motion).

Every day 50,000 people in countries served by Asia Access come to Christ (Asia Access).

In 2005, Fellowship of Christian Athletes had over 5,500 campus clubs called “Huddles” with more than 275,000 participating (Fellowship of Christian Athletes).

The government of Papua, New Guinea recently mandated Bible teaching in every school in the country (Vision 2020).

2006: FCA receives above 100,000 at over 150 “Fields of Faith”events around the country.  In 2004 this was initiated with 6,000 people (Fellowship of Christian Athletes).

More people worldwide are committed to praying for worldwide revival than ever before.

Based on forecasts from organizations such as the World Bank and the United Nations, the world net population is forecasted to grow at less than 2% annually.  In other words, if Christians can lead others to receive Christ faster than that, the lost can be reached at an increasing rate.

If only 1 out of every 6 believers “reproduced” themselves one time each year, the entire world would be reached for Christ by the year 2020!

Our Lord’s Great Commission can be accomplished…people from every tongue, tribe, people, and nation can be told about the awesome grace and mighty power of God…and God is giving His people the opportunity to be a part of making it happen in the lifetime of this current generation!

Join us to learn more about what God is doing in the world, our church and our lives in our series, Unstoppable based on the book of Acts.

http://www.RidgeFellowship.com

Source: http://www.prayerfoundation.org/world_christian_growth_statistics.htm