Happy New Year to you, and Happy Anniversary to Frontier Ventures!
In 1976, Ralph and Roberta Winter launched the US Center for World Mission (now Frontier Ventures) in Pasadena, CA, and over the last 50 years, unreached peoples all over the globe have felt the godward impact. We will include an article focusing on the 50th in each issue this year. You can read Sue Patt’s retrospective on page 6.
I just read your Nov/Dec 2025 MF editorial (“Becoming Loving: Experiencing Failure and Being Loved”). I love what you shared and appreciate your heart and insight.
How is it that 50 years have passed since the founding of the US Center for World Mission (USCWM)1, and how is it that I now have a first-hand account of some part of 46 of those years? We all have only some part of any shared history, and the staff of this organization along with collaborators, have had a front row seat to massive global change in and through the mission enterprise.
We seldom think about how fundamentally social our own conversion stories are until we’re reminded by newborn Christians.
Among the frontiers of mission today, enthusiasm for church planting movements (CPMs) or disciple making movements (DMMs) often outpaces our understanding of what actually makes them work. Much of the current conversation focuses on theological precision or methodological replication, while too little attends to the social, structural, and cultural dynamics that shape missional transformation. If movements are to be sustainable and reproducible, our missiology must both deepen and widen.
Belonging and purpose. From the early stages of his ministry, Jesus identified two essential human needs. Samuel Perry, in his latest book, Religion for Realists, would agree. Belonging trumps belief. His thesis is one we need to consider deeply as we labor in the harvest.
Today, 97% of the remaining Frontier People Groups are either Muslims or caste Hindus—people groups who identify strongly with major world religions of at least 1 billion adherents. These “FPG” people groups from formidable religious blocs have no known movements to Christ and 1% or less Christians of any kind. They have either been bypassed by mission workers or have repeatedly rejected historical attempts to reach them.
Samuel Perry’s Religion for Realists makes an important contribution by arguing for religion’s real-world significance. He challenges assumptions about what drives religious growth which he says are grounded in the Anglo-Protestant tradition, arguing that these “operants” are actually driven primarily by human factors, summarized in the table below.
Untold collateral damage has been done in the world and to the witness of the Church whenever the Church, in a moment of hubris, has substituted epistemic humility with absolute certainty. There have been many iterations of this type of hubris throughout Church history, but the single common thread that runs through the medieval Inquisition, the Crusades, and most recently the rise of Christian nationalism, for example, is that the perpetrators all believed with absolute certainty they were doing God’s work.
In Religion for Realists, Christian sociologist Samuel Perry challenges readers to look at religion with fresh, “realist” eyes.
Are not the observers quickest to slap the label ‘syncretic’ on phenomena precisely those who are least interested in capturing ‘the native’s point of view?’ —David N. Gellner1
During 30 years of walking with the Lord in the work of disciple making movements (DMM), I’ve heard many questions, concerns, and criticisms. Some are sincere and many are rooted in misunderstanding. All of them deserve a thoughtful response.
About five years ago, I received an email invitation to join a heart study with Johnson & Johnson and Apple. After making sure it was legit, I signed up and received a watch as part of the study. I agreed to give them tracking data on my heart and health. In turn, they gave me things to read about heart health and goals for exercise, rest, eating… you get the idea. Those little activity circles on my new watch became part of my daily routine.
There’s a trend on social media where people give you an “unfiltered” tour of their houses, revealing baskets piled with laundry and sinks stacked with dirty dishes. It’s a response to years of Internet “influencers” displaying sparkling clean homes with Pinterest-perfect decor, leaving the rest of us feeling like lazy slobs.
I don’t know about you, but asking others to care about missions can feel like pulling teeth. It isn’t uncommon that I catch a flash of fear—or guilt—in a friend’s eyes when I ask if they’ve considered serving God overseas. As a writer and speaker, I’m used to making asks, calling audiences to action, or inviting them to adopt a different perspective. And there’s a pattern here that I’ve noticed: the bigger the ask, the stronger the resistance.
Enjoy coloring this page. We would love for you to print it out and share it with your kids, grandkids, nephews, and nieces.
What does this painting of St. Stephen spark in your imagination?