Pressure Point #5 International Migration 3

• Between 1990 and 2010, the more developed countries gained 45 million international immigrants, an increase of 55 percent.
• Between 1990 and 2010, the migrant population of the less developed countries increased by 13 million (18 percent).
• Between 2000 and 2010, nine countries gained over one million international migrants: United States (8 million), Spain (4.6 million), Italy (2.3 million), Saudi Arabia (2.2 million), United Kingdom (1.7 million), Canada (1.6 million), Syria (1.3 million), Jordan (1 million), and United Arab Emirates (1 million).
• By 2010, immigrants comprised 22 percent of the population of Australia, 21.3 percent of Canada, 13.5 percent of the United States, and 10.4 percent of the United Kingdom.
• The main nationalities granted British citizenship in 2008 were Indian (11,285), Pakistani (9,440), Iraqi (8,895), Somali (7,165), and Zimbabwean (5,710).
• By 2017, one Canadian in five could be a visible minority race.

While it is easy to get lost in the numbers from across the globe, we must remember that each one represents someone created in the image of God in need of salvation or to serve on mission with Him. In light of the work of the Divine Maestro, the church must ask how she should respond in the age of migration. This pressure point creates many challenges and opportunities. Not only has the Lord told us to go into the entire world, but He is also bringing the world to our neighborhoods.

The United States receives 20% of the world’s international migrants, making her the largest migrant receiving country in the world.  It it is estimated that 361 unreached people groups reside in the United States (and 180 in Canada) including representatives of 106 of the world’s 3,100 unengaged-unreached people groups. The top four sending countries of international students to study in the United States are China, India, Korea, and Saudi Arabia.

The call to reach the nations that have migrated to our neighborhoods is not a call to neglect to send missionaries to Majority World countries where large numbers of unreached peoples exist. We have been told to go and must continue to do so, for the greatest needs for the gospel and church multiplication exist in the non-Western world. However, something is missionally malignant whenever we are willing to make great sacrifices to travel the world to reach a people group but are not willing to walk across the street. The church is foolish to think that it pleases the Lord when we travel to another country to reach a people when representatives of that people group fly past us over the Pacific and land in our airports to settle in our communities, but we make no effort to reach them. In view of this pressure point, the churches and mission agencies that are likely to thrive in the realm of missions are those who integrate their domestic and international strategies and stop operating from the long-standing model that consisted of silos separating the “domestic” and “foreign.”

If you are interested in looking at this pressure point in more detail, I have written extensively about it on this site HERE and in my book Strangers Next Door: Immigration, Migration, and Mission.

Click here to pre-order Pressure Points: Twelve Global Issues Shaping the Face of the Church.

(image credit: Microsoft Office)