The 10/40 Window

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This is the Truth Network. This is Pastor Matt Willis. Pastor Matt, thanks for being on here today. I'm glad to be with you, Stu. And what you're going to share today is the way all of our folks can get involved, and in North Carolina in particular, they can attend other places. Maybe they can watch it or they can be familiar with it and be encouraged. What got you excited about missions?

I want to back up and get your passion. Yeah, so in answer to some of your questions at the beginning as well, to think about, you know, I am not from a Jewish background ethnically, and I think maybe some of your listeners are, but probably the majority aren't. And if we came from non-Jewish backgrounds, we all used to belong to an unreached people group. Someone, you know, from Jewish background had to cross over and deal with the heathens that our ancestors were to be able to share the gospel with our people. And so what a privilege it is for us to now go to the other unreached people groups of the world, engaging them with the love of Christ and the truth of the gospel.

Yeah, it's a very fundamental concept. What if those guys had stayed in Jerusalem? What if they hadn't gone out? What if Philip hadn't chased that eunuch down there in the desert, you know, in Acts? What if Paul hadn't been converted and gone out to these missionary journeys?

Where would we be today? And this is so compelled you that it's kind of neat. Like when I was first introduced to you as our pastor of missions at Calvary Baptist Church in Winston-Salem, you know, I was thinking, okay, who is this guy?

I don't know. But then when someone said, well, he spent seven plus years with his family in India, instantly you had my kid. I had your credit. You had credibility with me because that's a pretty tall chore.

Third world country, lots of pain, lots of lostness, lots of violence. So tell us a little bit about that and maybe how God used that to put the heart of a missions pastor in you. Yeah, so my grandparents were missionaries to Indonesia, and so my dad grew up in Indonesia, and the mission organization that my grandparents were with was the IMB, the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention. But my dad was a businessman working for IBM, so it was a little confusing sometimes, okay?

My granddad works for IMB, my dad works for IBM, you know? But it was great for me to have a model of a dad who's a Christian disciple as a businessman, and then a granddad who's also a missionary and author. And God called me to be a missionary when I was 18 years old. I knew as an 18-year-old that he wanted me to spend part of my life serving him internationally.

I went on a mission trip to China, which is how I met my wife. She's American, going on the same mission trip when we were in college, and I went back the following summer and talked with people again and again, asking them, Hey, have you ever heard of Jesus? And they said, No, I've never heard of him, but if you keep going, the next village is over there. You know, you can ask if they've heard of Jesus, but I don't know. Maybe he lives over there.

I've never heard of him. Wow. So they thought you were asking about some person. Yeah, that's right. I'm looking for somebody.

That's right. Sometimes they're like, No, is Jesus your friend in America? That question burdened me again and again that people didn't know the name of Jesus Christ.

Not once had they ever heard it, and they're 70, 80 years old. And so that got me on a path to India, which is the greatest concentration of lostness on earth. And I want you to tell everyone what the 1040 window is. I was just in your office, not even an hour ago, and you showed me, I videoed you explaining the 1040 window, because I've had people ask me that before.

Stu, what is the 1040 window? It sounds like oil for your car, or it sounds like some puzzle or something, but can you explain what that is and why your heart particularly beats for that area of the world to be reached? Yeah, so it's the latitudinal line on the globe of 10 degrees north of the equator all the way up to the 40 degrees north of the equator.

And it really starts, for missions purposes, in North Africa, and then as it goes east through the Middle East, through South Asia, Central Asia, South Asia, and then Southeast Asia and East Asia. And that represents the vast majority of the unreached people by the Gospel, the people who have heard little to nothing yet still about Jesus. Okay, and that's as many as a couple billion people, maybe more?

More than a couple billion, for sure. Folks that have never heard the Gospel, and it breaks my heart, I heard you shared a video with me that I want to make available to our listeners from those guys that talk about how we spend more money on Halloween costumes for our pets in America than we do on reaching people that have never heard about Jesus. What's up with that? Talk about priorities, brother. I don't want to beat people up and guilt people, but man, there's something going on here. We need to wake up. Yeah, that's right. I think the statistic is to the 29% of the world that is the most unreached. Right?

That little bit of money gets to them. In the video that I shot with you earlier today, I talked about pray, give, go, and live. And I think the most important one of all of that is live with a heart and mind on mission. Because if we fall more in love with Jesus and we obey his commands in Scripture, we're going to pray more, we're going to give more, we're going to go more.

So it's not an arm-twisting thing. God is on a mission and a move whether or not we're going to join him. And there should be an underlying missio-centric message in every message our pastor preaches. How are we taking this out there? Out like the church that has the amazing sign over their back door, you are now entering the mission field. Everywhere you go, whether it's IBM or IMB, you're a missionary. You have God in you, and there's people that need to hear about him, and that's why we're still here. We are witnesses.

That's a noun, not a verb. You've got something really cool going on at your church, Calvary Baptist Church in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. You're inviting people from all churches, people from all over.

There may be a way for them to come in interactively on video, too, if they aren't comfortable yet coming in person or if they're too far away. Tell us about Nathan Shank. Tell us about this really cool event you have coming on.

You should be charging $20,000 a head for this, but it's free. I can't believe it, Matt. Tell us real quick about this event. Well, talking about preaching about missions, one of Nathan Shank's favorite verses is Romans 15, 23. Just a few verses before that is the apostle Paul's life mission statement, which resonates with me. He says, it's always been my ambition to preach the gospel where Christ was not known so that I would not be building on someone else's foundation. But verse 23, Paul says, there's no place left for me to work in these regions. I've proclaimed the gospel fully from Jerusalem to Illyricum, which was about 25 million people in 15 years in those three missionary journeys and acts. How can Paul say that 25 million people have heard enough of the gospel or they're only one or two generations removed from a Christian that he could say, hey, church at Rome, please support my mission trip to Spain, because the series is covered. There's enough Christian leaders multiplying here.

I'm going on to Spain. And so there's a website that I would point your listeners to that's noplacelleft.net. That encapsulates the idea behind that text, and Nathan Shank is one of the main leaders. And I consider him to be one of the greatest missionaries on the planet today.

noplacelleft.net. They go to that site, it'll tell us where we can take the gospel. I mean, imagine the thrill, just the intensity and just the joy of sharing God, the gospel, Jesus, with someone who's never heard.

What's that like? And how can our listeners do that? Yeah, well, the Lord has brought the nations to us as well, who are here in the United States. And so I feel like God couldn't make it any easier for us. He's like, I brought them right here to you. No passport needed, don't have to drink the water, speak the language, just go down to the market. And there's a guy from India who's in America, and you lead him to Christ.

So Rajesh is from India, from Mumbai, and he works at the Indian restaurant here in Winston-Salem. And I was there eating lunch, and I asked him like I do, other waiters and waitresses, hey, we're followers of Jesus, we're going to pray for you before we eat. How could we best pray for you? That led to a gospel conversation where he ended up saying, could we exchange phone numbers? Because I have some more spiritual questions I'd like to ask. And a week later, he accepted Christ in my living room.

Praise God. How can people come to this event? It's November 28th and 29th.

What a testimony, man. November 28th and 29th of 2020, and we may play this program in 2021 or 2022 as the best of, but for those that are able to get to North Carolina to your big event at Calvary Baptist Church, give us a quick plug. So the website to go to would be calvarynow.com slash missions.

There are multiple events that are happening on that Saturday and Sunday. There's actually one that you won't find on the web page, but I just want to kind of give you a little taste of that for you listening, that if you are a ministry leader, if you are not complacent with the status quo, you say, I want to see multiplication. I want to see a movement of God in my area of ministry.

We have an event all day Saturday that's free. We'd love for you to contact Calvary's missions office. You'll see our phone number on the website as well, calvarynow.com slash missions. calvarynow.com slash missions.

Meet Matt Willis there. Thank you for your ministry. Thanks for serving as a pastor of missions. There really is a pastor of missions, and that's you, right? That's right.

It's awesome. And we're all to be missionaries, though, right? It's not just someone who's the professional, but you're mentoring us. You've been mentoring me for some time, encouraging me on how I can be more effective with what I do.

That's why we do what we do, folks. That's why God still left us on this planet, to reach people with the good news of Christ while we still have time. Who are you sharing the Gospel with today? What dear Indian friend at a restaurant like Matt just shared, like Radesh, who are you, could lead to Christ? How can I pray for you?

How hard is that? Here's a little Gospel track. I'm too bashful about sharing. Here's a Gospel track. Read it. Watch what God does. Matt, thank you so much, man. I appreciate it.

You're welcome. Thank you. We need to pray to the Lord of the Harvest to send out harvesters in His field, and those harvesters are tough. You're hearing me. I'm one.

You're one. If you're listening wherever you are and you know Christ, you are here to make Him known. Matt, quickly, those five things you said about missions, we can all do.

I love how you broke it down. So pray, give, go, live. And just to unpack it a little bit more, pray for our neighbors and the nations. Give to Christ's cause, the Church. Go share and show the Gospel, and live with a heart and mind on mission. I love it. Pray, give, go, live. Go, live. I like the fact it rhymes, too.

That helps a guy like me who's not as quick to remember it. God bless you, man. Thank you. God bless you.