Unknown Nations Podcast

Greg Kelley: 

Well, hello everybody and welcome to the Unknown Nations podcast, highlighting what God is doing in the most spiritually dark places in the world. Today, we are going to take a fun dive, a deep dive into one of our core values at Unknown Nations, which is mobilization of indigenous leaders around the world.

I can't think of anyone better to join me in this conversation than Jerry Smith, who is our director of training. He does our international training with our leaders around the field. So, I'm super excited for you to get further acquainted with Jerry. But of course, my name is Greg Kelley. I have the privilege of being the CEO here at Unknown Nations, where we have the honor to serve God in these places, the most zero access, barrier ridden, spiritually antagonistic, spoken word reliant people groups on the planet, giving birth to the church in impossible places.

And Jer, we just can't do that, it's impossible for you and I just to keep getting on airplanes as wonderful as we are. And as limited, I think between us, we speak two languages. How's your Spanish these days? Is it okay? 

 

Jerry Smith:

It's pretty rough. It's been a long time. It's pretty rough. Yes. 

 

Greg Kelley:

So if the Lord gave the assignment for guys like you and I just to go around, we'd run against some pretty quick barriers and [it would] make it very difficult for us. So for that reason, we use these indigenous leaders and pour into them, but Jerry, I want to just start by talking a little bit about your story because at Unknown Nations we're not anti American or expat missionary, by any stretch of fact, Jer, was a missionary himself. So Jer, just start talking about you and Debbie and kind of your guys journey because you served faithfully in the field. God used you in amazing ways, but then obviously there was a transition that came along. So help us understand that. 

 

Jerry Smith:

Yes, my wife and I spent, along with our family, almost six years in Ecuador back in the 90s, and we got to learn how to do missions by making all the mistakes that you should never make. So we got a good idea of cross cultural work. We worked with some indigenous leaders in the mountains doing biblical training with them. We did a lot of evangelism in the cities during the summertime, and then, I taught and helped and finally ran a Bible institute within the city itself.

And at the end of the 90s we sensed the Lord was calling us to something greater. And that's when we first started hearing about Unreached People Groups. It was in the academy and it was in some of the books and teaching at the time, but it hadn't yet become a known entity within the church that our strategy had to be nations, people groups.

That's what our new strategy needed to be, not countries, but individual nations within those countries. And so for quite a few years, about 14 years, I was involved in a ministry of mobilizing national leaders around the world to raise up and send out their own missionaries. And our greatest success during that time was in Ethiopia. But it was then that I really became engaged with the fact that the American or the expat Western missionary is still critical, but the role has radically changed. Most of the places, even among the unknown areas where we work now, most of those places don't need evangelists.

They don't need pastors that, well, they need pastors, but not missionary pastors. They don't need worship leaders, that type of thing. What they need is for somebody to come alongside them, help them and resource them with things like training, especially with training, but other things in the cultures that you described that we're involved in, there's a reason they're unreached.

They're still unreached. It's because of many of these barriers. But the other thing that you said is they are word based cultures. It is so, so important when you consider the word. That's how everything was made and created. That's how we communicate with each other primarily. And these people are word based, they're word dependent, and what we can do is come alongside the national leadership and help empower them to do what they're already doing.

They have the passion, they have the culture, they have the gifting and the calling. So what we want to do is not come alongside and take up their role, a more apostolic role. We want to come alongside and be the brothers and sisters that can help equip them, encourage them. What we really want to see is help speed up the process.

 

Greg Kelley:

Yeah, absolutely. And let's talk about that a little bit, because I think, getting back to the point of we're not anti American. I mean, some of my dear friends, including you are either current missionaries or have been previous missionaries and there's movements right now across the US to launch people into foreign missions, which is great. But the places where the gospel's not been, I think Jerry and I would just advocate for a different strategy. 

I mean if a place like Yemen, Saudi Arabia, I'll give you an example, Jer, there's someone I know who is doing missions, I can't name the country specifically, it's in North Africa, super closed access country, and they went in there on a business visa, which is great, that's honorable, I love that, but if our exclusive strategy is to send a few business people who are going in there, so think about it, they're going in there without the government knowing why are you here, they're not, so I'm coming in as a missionary, right, and rightly so, you don't want to sort of expose yourself because you'd be immediately kicked out of that country, so you have to go in sort of under the auspices of I'm setting up a business, and then you're secretly talking to one or two people a week and maybe having coffee and doing friendship evangelism. None of those things are bad. That's a beautiful thing.

The point is we will never get the job done if we're exclusively relying on that strategy, not to mention the resource allocation. I mean, that person, it takes $70,000 minimally a year to invest in that person. So, there's churches, individuals who are resourcing that for one person, and I'm being a little facetious on the impact, they could have quite honestly vibrant Bible studies where maybe half a dozen people are coming and people might be coming to know Jesus. So we celebrate that initiative. But here's the truth of the matter, 65,000 to 70,000 people every single day are passing into eternity without a single gospel witness.

And I just got the most recent, I love this resource here, this is a great resource for anybody actually. It's put out by the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary. And the reason I love this, Jer, is it says status of global Christianity and then they update it at least twice a year.

So it's 2025, and it tells you the past, where we were at in 1900, 1970, 2000. And the trajectory is super exciting. The growth of Christianity is blowing up. Right. But then I looked down at this line that says, people without gospel access, it says in 2020, and we would call that, you and I would call that Unreached People Groups (UPGs). We'd call it ends of the earth. There's a little, little different variations of what the terminology is, but you and I consider the key is access. So people without access, which is this country that I had mentioned without saying the name, right?  That's that country. And it says over 2.2 billion people. 

Jerry, 2.2 billion people currently don't have access. Then I look at this last column, which is 2050, which is the projecting out because they know. We're Unknown Nations, they know we're churches, they know the amount of resources being allocated. So it tells us at the same pace and rate, which is by the way, an increase in giving to Christian causes by 400%. So between now and 2050, it'll be that kind of an increase. And that column of people without access to the gospel, Jerry, it increases by 500 million.  We cannot rely on sending onesies, twosies, individuals who are American or from Europe into these places just doing business as mission and say, "we're going to reach that country that way." 

 

Jerry Smith:

Amen. 

 

Greg Kelley:

Jer, help me, cause there was an awakening in the church, I don't know how many years ago, you would probably have a better handle, where we began to recognize we need to make the shift in embracing it, because I think that part of the challenge is that our mission's infrastructures were set up, the business model was you go, you guys go out. 

 

Jerry Smith:

And it was massive. It was massive. It was a big structure. Yes. 

 

Greg Kelley:

So that challenge was, okay, we're going to do the indigenous leaders. My whole business model is blown up, right? I mean, how difficult was that for that transition to take place? And how would you describe that ship beginning to turn and embracing the indigenous leaders?

 

Jerry Smith:

Well, it didn't take quite a century, but it almost took a century because this started back in the 20s with missionaries from Mexico discovering that there were people in Mexico that didn't speak Spanish. And that started the revolutionary concept. And so you started having Fuller Theological Seminary became kind of the headquarters for promoting the Unreached People Group. Ralph Winters was the great ambassador that really brought it to the church. And that began to impact the training seminaries and mission training organizations. But it was probably five, six decades before that message started actually getting into the church. 

And again, when you're describing the infrastructure that was already developed, it's the proverbial trying to turn the aircraft carrier, you know, around. You don't just turn something that big like that on a dime. And so, it began to get into the church in the 90s, and you're now running into more and more leaders within churches that when you say Unreached People Groups, they at least understand the concept. 

However, the big missing part is what you're hinting at, and that is the allocation of our resources. The allocation of our resources is still not yet caught up with the idea that if we're going to get the task done, and that's where the passion is. The passion is to get the task done now. I mean, we see that that is a possibility. We're the first couple generations that know what the task is, that know where it is, that know where it all lies.

That's kind of the first time it's ever happened in history to the church. And yet we still haven't gotten our resources allocated. I mean, consider how few of our resources within the church are actually reaching, or going to the very places we're talking about that statistic. You just mentioned the reason that keeps getting bigger and bigger, even though we keep working and working is because of resource allocation, having the vision about where we should be sending our whatever they are. If it's finances of its people, if it's humanitarian work, whatever it is, understanding that we need to be strategic and how we allocate those resources.

 

Greg Kelley:

Yeah. Yeah. And it's so much of it has to do with, it's not just a money thing. It's the Bible distribution. It's our humanitarian projects. It's our prayers. Obviously. I mean, how can we pray for something we don't know anything about? But it's also the manpower of it and what that looks like. I'm going to share a statistic with you and get your reaction to it. And again, this comes from some of these resources, out of Gordon Conwell and the Center for Study of Global Christianity.

So just to put it in context, when I commute to work, I have about a 15 to 20 minute commute and I actually one time counted, I took some back roads and I counted. Okay. So here in Grand Rapids, Michigan, I passed by 23 churches, 23 churches just on my commute. When I took these back roads on my way here, now that is not something, I'm not making fun of that.

I'm not speaking in any derogatory way about that. I am so thankful. I live in a Christian culture. That doesn't mean there's not people who don't need Jesus all around here. And maybe people who might say, I've never really heard a clear gospel witness. I didn't exactly understand that. But they certainly have access to the gospel radio, right? There's churches everywhere. There's Christians and it would be hard to go through your day. If you went shopping, if you got gas in your car, if you went to work, if you had a normal day where you wouldn't encounter a Christian in a day that would be very unusual.

Meanwhile, what is the stat? I think it's something like 90 percent of Hindus and Muslims, their entire life, they will never meet. Is that right? Is that the, is that- 

 

Jerry Smith:

Yeah, it's up there in that percentage. Yeah. 

 

Greg Kelley:

And so, think about that. In one day, I would be hard pressed to go through a day in my community and your community where you live without bumping shoulders with a Christian, 90 percent of these Hindus and Muslims of the world, their whole life and they would never meet a Christian. Well, that's not even the stat I was going to share. The stat I was going to share is that there's one missionary per every 220,000 people who are among the unreached. One. 

 

Jerry Smith:

Wow. 

 

Greg Kelley:

One. 

 

Jerry Smith:

Wow. 

 

Greg Kelley:

And that's the discouraging part of it. Here's the encouraging part of it. And Jer, I want your reaction to this. There's 78,000, not Christians (*anyone who self identifies as Christian in the broadest sense), but 78,000 Evangelicals (*Jesus followers who are actively living out their faith) for every remaining Unreached People Group. 

And I don't think you're going to say, "okay, all you guys pack up and go," but how should that encourage us and what should that translate into from a standpoint of action so that we can start shifting these statistics and the trajectory of them?

 

Jerry Smith:

Well, it has to do in the work that I was involved in for years with mobilizing, I think another statistic, Greg, from Fuller Theological, they were saying almost 20 times the money needed to complete the Great Commission is available to us. 

 

Greg Kelley:

It's there right now. 

 

Jerry Smith:

Yeah, it's there. And so when you're saying 70,000 Evangelicals for each Unreached People Group, to me, again, that's a cry. That is a cry for us to get the churches, especially the leadership in the churches, if leadership in churches could capture the vision, then the flock would follow that.

 

Greg Kelley:

Yes, they would. 

 

Jerry Smith:

And seeing the importance of it, having the proper biblical understanding of why this is important. I know that, for instance, we tell stories and we like to tell stories that really pull on the heartstrings. To talk about the effect of the gospel on other people, that is that is absolutely critical. But the bottom line is what we actually need to do is have a biblical understanding behind that, what our call is, what our responsibility is, in order to cast the vision to the church. The church needs a greater vision of what our mandate is and how reachable it is. We live in an era, I mean, another element that we witness a lot, Greg, when we go overseas is the power of the Holy Spirit. And how the Holy Spirit can transform a community in a very short time. 

When the power of the kingdom comes in into those communities. And so, it's my heart's desire to see that we have this, this understanding in our vision that not only what is our duty, I think a lot of people look at missions as a duty, and it is a duty, it's something we're to obey, but it's also an opportunity. It's a privilege. It's the ability to be a partner with God actively, not just in thought or word, but to actually partner with him and with others to really see this task done. This age that we're in, this crazy age that we're in, will finally be consummated and the new age will begin. That is with Jesus. That is what we're really striving for.

 

Greg Kelley:

Yeah. Amen. Amen. Well, Jer, I feel like we've really done a good job of kind of laying the groundwork of what the need is. I mean, it's just, it's just kind of overwhelming, but how are we going to get it done? And let me just say that here at Unknown Nations, we absolutely believe the assignment and understand it. It's to go make disciples.

Not converts, but to go make disciples. And with that, I would pair in, I think what Paul says in Ephesians four, and he talks about the five fold ministries, applications of ministry, there's the apostolic office, which is that missionary is that Paul was apostolic, that person who's going out and they're taking ground, right?

They're just going out like, "send me to the far corner, send me into the darkness." You got the prophet, that oversight, the spiritual sort of watchman who speaks the mind of God and declares his will, the evangelist, of course, and then the pastor and the teacher, Jer, is critical because we hear so many times, especially in the Global South, which is more of the developing world.

The Global South is really representative of where the majority of the people without access to the gospel are. Africa, Asia, far East, and we'll hear the phrase, the church is a mile wide and an inch deep. And essentially what that's saying is that we have a bunch of people who maybe will wave their hand if saying, "hey, do you know Jesus?"

But the depth of them is really missing. So we say, "Jesus told us to make disciples. What do we do about it?" And right now they say of all the churches, about five percent, one in 20 of the leaders of these millions of churches that are in the world are led by someone who has had sufficient training or detailed training.

That is a travesty because 19 out of 20 are people without sort of more of a formal education now, I want to be clear, and this is Jerry's area of expertise. We at Unknown Nations don't necessarily advocate like let's bring all these people. In fact, we would say just the opposite to Fuller or to the seminary.

Please don't, please don't do that. If that's a strategy you're considering, please don't do that. Don't bring that amazing pastor from Myanmar and say, "let's just bring them here for four years and sponsor them" because here's what's going to happen. The likelihood of them never going back is very high.

If you are extracting the most valuable resource of making disciples that you possibly could out of that country, it's the people. So if we don't bring them out to a Western environment- 

 

Jerry Smith:

Or even a Western model that's inside their own country. 

 

Greg Kelley:

Inside their own country. We have to take the training to the people. We have to do that. And so outline that a little bit, Jer, as far as what you feel like is the biblical model approach to create healthy leaders or building up the flock and making disciples, which was Jesus instruction. 

 

Jerry Smith:

You know, this is the big wrestling match of the ministry, of our ministry, and this is the area that, you know, we've been doing the distribution of the Word of God and seeing the miraculous happening with the Treasures and the, oh my goodness, I mean, every time I come back from the field, I am so inspired.

 

Greg Kelley:

Absolutely. 

 

Jerry Smith:

But our big wrestling has been, "okay, what do we do?" These people come, this is the challenge, as you know, Greg, they come from, backgrounds that have no Christian worldview context at all. So they're coming from the Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, and other types of backgrounds. And so when all of a sudden they get born again, they get saved.

They have the revelation of Jesus. They receive the Holy Spirit. They're filled with love for others. And yet the background that they've come out of right now, it's just a revelation they've had. And what they desperately need is a grounding, first of all. Primarily in the Word of God itself.

And that is where our challenge has always been. How do we take these, how do we take this Word of God revelation and then give them a solid biblical foundation so that they then themselves can take the word of God and learn from it and have, you know, learning how to hear the Holy Spirit and learn from the word of God themselves.

And this is what we're involved in by setting up our training centers, using all indigenous leaders, using all indigenous language resources and not, you know, we go in and we do some visiting and we do some teaching and we love it. I know how much you love it. We love going in and I'm always surprised. I'm always surprised when they say we need you to come. I'm thinking, "what do you mean you need us? Look what you guys are doing!" 

 

Greg Kelley:

Yeah, right, right. 

 

Jerry Smith:

But what they really need is they need somebody that can come in and help them stay grounded in the Scriptures. And maybe impartation, but the first thing is they've got to get trained in the Bible, and so we've been working with some tools now that I think are proving to be quite effective. The other thing is they need to be active. These pastors, these leaders, these men that are doing the missionary work, they have to be actively mentoring key leaders, they have to take these key leaders and they have to mentor them, either gather them and teach them, but be with them in the villages, be with them, show them how to minister, show them how to, you know, learning how to respond. Discipleship is really simple. 

It's not complicated. We make it complicated. It's simple, but it's difficult. I mean, think about Jesus model of discipleship. It was relational, it was personal, it was intimate, it was time consuming, it was starting with the small and letting that explode into the big. And this is the kind of model we're seeking to replicate with our leaders. Find your leadership and you personally be involved.  Don't just send them off somewhere. How did you get where you got? Well, show them how to get there.  And I know that's a little vague, but those are the kind of structures and systems that we're working on putting in place now. 

 

Greg Kelley:

It's critical. And the thing I would also emphasize in that training, Jerry, and I think this is something that's happened over the years, and I've talked to a lot of leaders here locally. And I tell them, "hey, I could take you to Africa. I could take you to Asia, and then seven days from right now, I could have a conference hall filled with 250 pastors that would love for your teaching." 

And sometimes that's an effective approach. Take up anointed leader over here. Pour into them, but the warning on that comes with, you can very quickly set up a transactional relationship where that hall that's filled with 200 to 250 amazing indigenous leaders are the recipient and you're the one who's delivering it and when it's done, they look at you and they say, "when are we going to do this again?"

Like, "when are you coming back?" It's a blessing. This person's pouring into them. That's a trap we can fall into. And I think what Jerry and I would say is in the training is also an impartation of mobilization so that we are saying, just as we're training you now, next time it's going to be you that we want to see that vision inside of them. In other words, so, because that's how it's going to get done. It's the second Timothy 2:2, that we talk about so much, Paul said, "the things you've heard me share in the presence of many witnesses, share with faithful men and other leaders who will share with others." That's four generations, why is that message, Jer, so critical of multiplication?

 

Jerry Smith:

Yeah, I mean, oof, there, you know, Jesus talks about the kingdom of God being like the, you know, the leaven that's cast into the bread and how it spreads all over. It's not the one individual that put the leaven in that makes things grow. It's what was put in. It's the model of what was put in.

 

Greg Kelley:

Yes. And if we're going to get, if the job getting done is being, is going to be done like that, it's not going to be done by massive conferences. And I'll tell you what, there's one Evangelist mentioned in Book of Acts, that's it. And what I've heard said is it takes, it takes dozens and dozens of apostles, prophets, teachers, and pastors to organize that harvest and make it effective.

 

Jerry Smith:

Yes. That's good.  One of the big things we have to do, Greg, is we have to have models that are replicable.  And what you were talking about, the big, the big conference, that's great, but it's not replicable. 

 

Greg Kelley:

Yeah. And so, you know, here's the thing about it. It makes you feel good. 

 

Jerry Smith:

Oh, yeah.

 

Greg Kelley:

And you can go back and raise a lot of money on it. And you can take your curriculum that was written for a Western audience. And I don't want this to sound like I'm beating out because these are all well intended, you know, strategies and ideas and God blessed you to write that book, but then to just make the assumption of, "well, this was such a blessing for the West Michigan audience. I'm going to put it in Urdu. I'm going to put it in Swahili. I'm going to put it in Arabic, and it'll be a blessing."

That's a really, really bad assumption because the message Jer and I are sharing is the contextualization. The gospel doesn't change, the delivery of it, that's, we constantly have to, I mean, there's no longer are we packing our stuff in caskets and going on boats. I can get on an airplane and meet Jerry anywhere in the world in 24 hours. The methodology can change. The message never changes. We could go on and on. 

 

Jerry Smith:

I know. You just sparked a whole bunch of new stuff in my mind. So yeah. 

 

Greg Kelley:

Yes. Yes. And you're just getting ready to head out. So I know that. So give me quick, quick little tidbit of how we can be praying for you and what your kind of objective is in this upcoming trip that you have. 

 

Jerry Smith:

Yeah, I'm going to be with a small team in the Horn of Africa and later in another country in Africa with a brother that's on the ground, in the field, in the bush. This guy's living in the bush doing the work with Unreached. And just that, you know, we, every time we go, we need prayer that God would lead and guide and protect, but that he would anoint. A great prayer that I have now in my life is as I'm reaching the age that I am, is that there would be impartation that when we go there would not merely be an exchange of information, but an actual Holy Spirit impartation of power or vision and, just, you know, empowering people to do the work and that the logistics would all work out. This has been one of the most logistically challenging times. 

 

Greg Kelley:

A lot of bottled water. 

 

Jerry Smith:

A lot of bottled water, 

 

Greg Kelley:

A lot of bottled water. 

 

Jerry Smith:

A lot of on time connections. 

 

Greg Kelley:

Yeah. Yeah. There you go. Yeah. You'll sleep like a baby buddy.

 

Jerry Smith:

I know. 

 

Greg Kelley:

Wow. Thanks bud. Thanks Jer for being with us. So thankful. Thanks for joining us today on the Unknown Nations podcast.

Friends, visit our website at UnknownNations.com so you can learn more about how you can get involved. Jer and I want you to be participants in this great journey, so you can subscribe and follow, and to join us on this amazing journey of hope and transformation.

Join us in making Jesus known to the ends of the earth. The impact you can have is immeasurable and together, friend, together we can see God's kingdom expand to the darkest corners of the world. We are going to see you next time on the Unknown Nations podcast.