The Call to North India: To the Uttermost Part
By his breath the skies became fair; his hand pierced the gliding serpent. And these are but the outer fringe of his works (Job 16:13-14)
As I look back over the past six years since the AD2000 & Beyond Movement was launched, several key moments — “kairos” moments — stand out in my mind. The first was at the inaugural meeting of our movement in July, 1990, when it was recorded in our minutes that our primary target of concern would be the unevange- lized/unreached belt between 10 degrees north and 40 degrees north of the Equator and from West Africa to East Asia — an area of the world we designated the “10/40 Window.” The only possible way way to reach the people in the 10/40 Window was through concerted, global, fervent, focused prayer; so we prayed. Two worldwide seasons of prayer were conducted: first for the countries in the 10/40 Window in October, 1993; then for what we called the 100 “Gateway Cities” in October, 1995.
The second “kairos” moment was in a meeting with all the national leaders at the Global Conference on World Evangelization in Korea in 1995. After a full day of hearing reports from many countries in the world about their initiatives and goals leading to the year 2000, we were all broken with a passion for the individual peo- ples and nations represented by those in our gathering. We realized that though much had been accomplished and much momentum was building around the world to accomplish our goal of “a church for every people and the gospel for every person by the year 2000,” we needed to be even more focused on what remained to be done. So Joshua Project 2000 was launched in 1995 as a five-year effort to identi- fy and reached the approximately 1,700 peoples whom mission leaders agreed are most in need of a church planting effort. We have been amazed at the tremendous energy and resources that Joshua Project 2000 has unleashed around the globe. Unreached peoples are being identified, researched, profiled and adopted as targets of focused, fervent prayer and outreach with an urgency that is unprecedented.
I believe a third “kairos” moment is upon us now, especially for the church in North India. As you will see in the following pages, this part of the world is of enormous importance. The needs and the opportunities are staggering. And we believe God is moving there as never before. We can see “the outer fringe of His work” all around the area. The time is right. North India is poised to receive an outpouring of His grace and His glory. All the signs are there. It is my prayer that we will heed them and become a part of what God desires to do in this needy area of the world before the year 2000.