The Joshua Project is an evangelical Christian organization based in Colorado Springs , United States, which seeks to coordinate the work of missionary organizations to track the ethnic groups of the world with the fewest followers of evangelical Christianity. To do so, it maintains ethnologic data to support Christian missions . It also tracks the evangelism efforts among 17,446 people groups worldwide—a people group being "the largest group within which the Gospel can spread as a church planting movement," according to the project's website—to identify people groups as of yet unreached by Christian evangelism.
6-705: The project began in 1995 within the former AD2000 and Beyond Movement, which itself sprang from the 1989 Global Consultation on World Evangelization (GCOWE) prior to the Second International Congress on World Evangelization . From 2001 through 2005 the Joshua Project was at different times informally connected with the Caleb Project, and the International Christian Technologists Association (ICTA) and World Help. In 2006,
12-533: Is listed as speaking at least one of 6,510 languages. Notes Bibliography Second International Congress on World Evangelization The Second International Congress on World Evangelization , often called Lausanne II or Lausanne '89 , was a Christian conference held in Manila , Philippines in 1989. The conference is noted for producing the Manila Manifesto, a renewed and expanded commitment to
18-486: The 10/40 Window concept, which contrasts the major needs and few resources devoted to this part of the world. Over 300 mission works came out of this congress. The congress was attended by 3,586 people and included delegates from the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe as well as women and laity. The chairman of the congress was Leighton Ford (brother-in-law to Billy Graham). Some delegates were prevented from attending
24-471: The Lausanne Covenant , an influential document in modern Evangelical Christianity. The First International Congress on World Evangelization was held in 1974. It was inspired by the work of preacher Billy Graham . It was most notable for producing the Lausanne Covenant . The second congress was held on 11 to 20 July 1989. It was an influential world conference of over 4,000 evangelical leaders that
30-1248: The Joshua Project officially became part of the U.S. Center for World Mission , later called the Venture Center . The goal of the project is to bring definition to the unfinished task of the Great Commission by providing accurate, regularly updated ethnic people group information critical for understanding the scope of the work required. Focusing on ethnicity, the project maintains a database of " unreached peoples " listed by country and language. As of 2010, they list 9,803 ethnic groups. These are further divided into 16,350 peoples-by-countries, counting national minorities individually for each of 236 countries, of which 6,642 are classified as "unreached peoples". Ethnic groups are organized hierarchically in 251 "People Clusters" which in turn are divided in 16 "Affinity Blocs" ( Arab World , East Asians , Eurasians , Horn of Africa-Cushitic , Iranian-Median , Jews , Latin-Caribbean Americans , Malay peoples , North American peoples , Pacific Islanders , South Asians , Southeast Asians , Sub-Saharan Africans , Tibetan / Himalayan peoples , Turkic peoples and Unclassified). Each ethnicity
36-574: Was held in Manila, the Philippines, in 1989 to discuss the progress, resources, and methods of evangelizing the world. The theme of the congress was "Proclaim Christ until He comes". It was here that the Christian mission strategist Luis Bush first highlighted the need for a major focus of evangelism in the "Resistant Belt", covering the middle of the eastern hemisphere. Further research in mid-1990s led to
#808191