Dr Jerry Rankin, the outgoing president of the IMB, our mission board, had these possible scenarios on his latest blog post.
As we forecast and develop scenarios based on what the world could look like in the coming years, consider these possible future realities:
• North Korea will cease to exist in the near future as it either succumbs to peaceful reunification with South Korea or is assimilated into China.
• Cuba will become more open to the world, at which time outside Christian entities will flow into the country claiming a piece of the action and destroy, through patronizing subsidy, one of the most spiritual, authentic movements to Christ we have seen in this generation. (Emphasis is mine. This is an important concept we will discuss in the near future. Sometimes money does more harm than good. Money can create a great spiritual apathy.)
• The Muslim world will change from within as moderates will become more assertive, squelching radical elements and bringing Islamic societies into more compatible relationships internationally; there will still be resistance to the gospel, but the gospel will find an increased response.
• African and Latin American countries will continue to be responsive, but church growth will be inhibited by increased secularization and syncretism as these continents flounder under continuing political and economic crises. Likewise, Russia and the former Soviet Republics will become more and more dysfunctional politically, socially and economically and experience a declining influence and role in international affairs.
• China will become more liberalized politically and, along with Korea, India and Vietnam, use their massive workforce and heated economies to supplant the G7 western nations that have dominated global finance in the past. With the changing demographics of Europe, I believe it will become the harvest field of the future as a spiritual hungry immigrant population replaces the post-Christian humanism seen today.
• What is the future with regard to missions? America’s political influence will rapidly decline along with the mortgaging of its financial future. Continuing polarization of society and a fragile economy will diminish our country in its potential for sending missionaries to be replaced by Koreans, Chinese, South Asians and Latin Americans who will emerge at the forefront of fulfilling the Great Commission.
• The nature of missions will radically change. There will be increasing and widespread hostility toward a Christian witness. More sophisticated governments are recognizing Americans who venture overseas with presumed humanitarian motives have unwelcome evangelistic agendas. The future missionary must come out of a marketplace ministry; credible global platforms for medical work, education, technology and business consultation must become the channels for sharing the gospel and planting churches.
• The IMB will move from being a missionary-sending agency that screens and vets those worthy of sharing the gospel overseas to become a facilitator for mobilizing the vast resources and potential of Southern Baptists to reach a lost world. The adoption of recommendations for a Great Commission Resurgence is just the beginning of new incentive for a changing denominational structure and revised priorities in the future. Churches will have a heart and commitment for missions as never before; we must serve them and assist them as they send out missionaries and engage the world or be marginalized in our relevance. (Emphasis Mine: I like their view of serving churches. Not sure I see a movement of churches that are dying to do missions. Instead I see churches desperately focused on themselves, sending fewer and fewer missionaries into the field. Of course this is simply an opinion of my own)
