1.2: Understanding the "Unreached"

Before we begin to pray, it’s important to understand who we are praying for. The Bible tells us that the gospel will be proclaimed to all “nations” (Matthew 24:14). The original Greek word used here is ethne, which means ethnic groups or people groups. This is the foundation for our focus on “Unreached People Groups” or UPGs.

It is estimated that of the 8.08 billion people alive in the world today, 3.42 billion of them live in unreached people groups with little or no access to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Let’s break down the terminology.

What is an Unreached People Group?

People Group: An ethnolinguistic group with a common self-identity. The most dominant identifier is their language, but they also share a common history and customs. For strategic purposes, it’s the largest group through which the gospel can flow without significant barriers.

Unreached People Group (UPG): An identifiable group of people who lack a community of Christians able to evangelize the rest of the group without outside help. Most missiologists consider a group “reached” when about 2% of the population are Christ-followers.

Unengaged Unreached People Group (UUPG): A UPG where no church, no missionary, and no agency has yet taken responsibility to share the gospel.

Frontier People Group (FPG): A UPG with less than 0.1% of any type of Christian. They have virtually no access to the gospel.

The Bible is clear that God’s heart is for every tribe, tongue, and people group to be represented before His throne (Revelation 7:9). Our focus on UPGs stems from our desire to see the Great Commission fulfilled.

For more information concerning unreached people groups, please visit the UPG page on our website.