The global
Church project

The Global Church Project videos
YouTube

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Amazon & Barnes & Noble

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Introducing The Global Church Project

See all The Global Church Project filmed interviews

See the full suite of 152 videos with Majority World, Indigenous, and diaspora Christian leaders recorded for The Global Church Project on YouTube by (1) Going to my YouTube channel and scroll down to the video category “World Christianity”) – CLICK HERE or (2) Scrolling down to the video links at the end of this page.

Why this Project is Important

While every statistic available today shows that the church in the West is in multi-generational decline, the opposite is true almost everywhere. Non-Western cultures are now the Majority World.

The churches of these cultures have seen extraordinary (and sustained) growth for decades. Places like Africa, Asia, Latin America, Oceania, the Caribbean, the Middle East and Eastern Europe, First Nations and Indigenous communities, diaspora and immigrant Christian communities are also experiencing growth and revitalization.

Insights from churches in these cultures can help renew the worldwide church. They can invigorate other Majority World churches as they learn from each other. They can invest Western mission, worship, and discipleship strategies with new vibrancy.

Learning from Majority World, Indigenous, & Diaspora Christians

Majority World, Indigenous, and diaspora churches are redefining twenty-first-century Christianity. Those of us who are Western Christians must decide how we’ll respond.

Philip Jenkins has predicted,

By 2025 fully two-thirds of Christians will live in Africa, Latin America, and Asia… Scholars are fairly unanimous in acknowledging the accuracy of the facts. The ‘average Christian’ today is female, black, and lives in a Brazilian favela or an African village.

China is an example of the church’s phenomenal growth outside the West. If current growth rates continue, China will have more Christians within one generation than any other nation.

Philip Jenkins concludes,

We are currently living through one of the transforming moments in the history of religion worldwide. Over the last five centuries, the story of Christianity has been inextricably bound up with that of Europe and European-derived civilizations overseas, above all in North America. Until recently, the overwhelming majority of Christians have lived in white nations… Over the last century, however, the center of gravity in the Christian world has shifted inexorably away from Europe, southward, to Africa and Latin America, and eastward, toward Asia. Today, the largest Christian communities on the planet are to be found in those regions.

So, what do we mean by the term “Majority World?” Majority World Christians are those in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Eastern Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, and Oceania. I use the term Majority World because most of the world’s population is in those cultures today. The majority of the church is in those cultures, too.

I don’t use non-Western, Third World, or Developing World. These terms use Western cultures as reference points and imply Western superiority or centricity. The term Global South is too limiting, given the breadth of the group I am engaging. Majority World seems to work best.

Learning from World Christianity

What does all this mean for the mission, theology, worship, and church communities worldwide? And what does it mean, especially for the Western church?

I recently interviewed Lamin Senneh at Yale Divinity School. In that interview, Lamin offered a striking challenge to the Western church. Here’s my paraphrase of what he said:

“We in the West are confident and articulate people. Theology has served us well as a vehicle for our aspirations, desires, and goals. There is no shortage of theological books on all sorts of imaginable subjects. There are how-to manuals instructing us about effective ministry. These manuals tell us how to fix our emotions. They affirm our identity and promote our choices and preferences. They tell us how to change society by political action. They show us how to raise funds and build more prominent churches. They teach us to invest in strategic coalitions. All this language leaves us little time or space to listen to God. What if God has something else to say to us? What if that something else challenges what we want to hear? Yet, without reciprocity in the moral and spiritual life of listening and responding to the intimations of the Spirit, it is hard to see how God can be salient in the lives of modern men and women.

The Gospel suffers from a form of cultural captivity in the West. But, the renewal of World Christianity has lessons to teach us all. The de-Westernization of Christianity may, if we allow it, help us address the Western cultural captivity of the Gospel. Thanks to the grace, power, and sovereignty of the Spirit of Christ, this de-Westernization of the global church may help us find freedom from our cultural captivity. The astonishing growth and vitality of movements in World Christianity will make this truth even more evident over the following decades.”

Cultivating a New Narrative

A missional church commits to diversity and multi-ethnicity. It is enriched by Indigenous, Western, diaspora, and Majority World peoples.

We need a new narrative. The vast majority of the global church today isn’t white, Western, and middle-class.

And the astonishing growth of World Christianity isn’t happening in those places. It’s happening in cultures outside of the West. It’s happening among women, children, and people of colour. Where there is growth and vitality in Western settings, it’s usually among the diaspora and immigrant churches. Stephen Bevans says: “Today, the average Christian is female, a person of colour, and living in Africa or Asia.”

We must turn to the churches of Majority World, Indigenous, and diaspora cultures. Christians in these cultures help us rediscover what it means to be salt, light, and a city. They invite us into local-global missional conversations. To do this, we, as Western Christians, must enter into discussions with Majority World, diaspora, and Indigenous Christians. They have much to teach us. Listening to others helps us grow in our understanding and practice of mission, church, and theology. For far too long, we’ve been Eurocentric and Americentric. And we’ve marginalized or ignored Majority World and diaspora and indigenous voices.

New, Majority World voices are rising and redefining our understandings of theology, church, and mission. Many Majority World, diaspora, and Indigenous churches have extraordinary missional and theological vitality. Openness to these voices needs to happen now. It’s time for Western churches, theologies, and missions to mature. Only through global conversations and exchanges can they reflect God’s global mission.

Over the coming decades, I hope we’ll listen to the thoughts and practices of African, Asian, Caribbean, Eastern European, Oceanian, Middle Eastern, Latin American, First Nation, and indigenous thinkers. These dare us to examine our theologies, missions, and churches. They inspire us to renew the worship, community, and mission of Jesus’ church. They stir us to think in fresh ways about what it means to be salt, light, and a city. They help us become a global missional church—a truly global church.

Filmed Interviews

Here are links to 152 filmed interviews Graham has done with Christian leaders in Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, the Caribbean, Oceania, western countries, and among Indigenous Peoples. (Click on the person’s name to go to the video).

* Adam R. Taylor (Mobilizing hope – faith-inspired activism and following Jesus Christ)
* Ai Nohara Tetseo (Faith and mission in Okinawa and Japan today)
* Ajith Fernando (Jesus-driven ministry)
* Al Tizon (Shaping missional preaching, & mission as transformation)
* Alan Hirsch (Joining with God in mission)
* Alexander Chow (Learning from public faith, theology, and witness in China today)
* Ali Abu Awwad (Seeking a lasting and just peace in the Holy Land)
* Alvin Tunstill Jr. (Shaping thriving local African-American churches)
* Amal Nassar (The Tent of Nations – reconciliation and peacemaking in Israel and Palestine)
* Amos Yong (Pentecostalism, the Spirit, and Asian-American Christianity)
* Amy Williams (Urban youth ministry today)
* Areej Masoud (Any hope for Palestine, now or ever?)
* Ash Barker (Serving Jesus among the urban poor)
* Barbara M. Leung Lai (The Book of Daniel and multicultural and minority faith)
* Bonny Resu (Taking the whole gospel to the whole person in the Asia Pacific today)
* Bradley Noel (Pentecostal mission and witness in the West)
* Brooke Prentis (Honouring Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voices)
* C. René Padilla (Pursuing integral mission)
* Carol Kingston-Smith (Pursuing justice, advocacy, and reconciliation)
* Center for the Study of Global Christianity (the shape of World Christianity today)
* Charles Ringma (Missional spirituality – reintegrating prayer and mission)
* Charlie Abou Saada (Palestinian Christians are living stones in the Holy Land)
* Christopher J. H. Wright (The mission of God and the mission of God’s people)
* Cory Ishida (Growing and planting healthy and disciple-making Asian American churches)
* Craig Stewart (Helping local churches see transformation in their communities)
* Daniel Bourdanné (Renewing humility, mission, discipleship, and passion)
* Daniel Jeyaraj (What Indian Christianity teaches us today)
* Daniel L. Wong (Developing the art of multicultural preaching)
* Darrell Jackson (Mission shaped by love of God and neighbour, and by the Spirit)
* Dave Bookless (Being planetwise – caring for creation)
* David Ro (How God is working in and through Chinese Christians today)
* David W. Congdon (Rudolf Bultmann, Karl Barth, and the future of missional theology)
* Donald Goertz (Missional innovations in worship and leadership)
* Ed Brown (Caring for creation is a gospel issue)
* Elias Chacour (Blood brothers: Blessed are the Palestinian, Israeli, and other peacemakers)
* Elisa Padilla (Pursuing mission and practising hospitality)
* Elisabeth Sophia Lee (Interview with Grace Ji-Sun Kim and Elisabeth Sophia Lee)
* Emil Jonathan “Jon” Soriano (Returning to simple church and integral mission)
* Emmanuel Katongole (Rwanda as a mirror to the church worldwide)
* F. Douglas Powe Jr. (Transforming evangelism and moving from “just us” to justice)
* Farsijana Adeney-Risakotta (Working together across religions to build societies)
* Fernando R. Carvalho (Shaping a multi-ethnic and multi-lingual church)
* Fernando Segovia (Connecting Christians in the Global South and Global North)
* Franco Ferrer (Making disciples of all nations)
* Frank D. Macchia (Global Pentecostalism and the Spirit-baptized church)
* Frank Paul (Vulnerable mission)
* Gary Nelson (Leading in disorienting times)
* George Wieland (How God is transforming church & world through global movements of people)
* German Galvez (Shaping a vibrant and growing Latino church)
* Grace Ji-Sun Kim
* Graham Joseph Hill
* Greg Lake
* Grishma Parajuli
* Harvey Kwiyani
* Hyun Mo (Tim) Lee
* J. Dudley Woodberry
* Jack Sara
* James Bartle
* James Bhagwan
* James Bryan Smith
* Janice Nguyen
* Jayakumar Christian
* Jim Oehrig
* Jo Saxton
* Joel Edwards
* Johannes Reimer
* John Bond
* John M. Perkins
* Joseph Nyamutera
* Joshua Bogunjoko
* Joshva Raja
* Julie C. Ma
* Karina Kreminski
* Ken Kamau
* Ken Tang-Quan
* Kevin Doi
* La Verne Tolbert
* Lamin Sanneh
* Lisa Rodriguez-Watson
* Lisa Sharon Harper
* M. L. Daneel
* Madezha Cépeda
* Mahendra Bhattarai
* Mandy Marshall
* María Elena Mamarian
* Mark Galpin
* Mary Alice Trent
* Melba Padilla Maggay
* Michael Frost
* Michael Goheen
* Michael Krause
* Miroslav Volf
* Mitri Raheb
* Munib Younan
* Ngwedla Paul Msiza
* Nikki Toyama-Szeto
* Noel Castellanos
* Norberto Saracco
* Omar Djoeandy
* Oscar García-Johnson
* Oscar Muriu
* P. Bonny Resu
* Pablo Martinez
* Paul Cook
* Paul Msiza
* Paul Rattray
* Perry Shaw
* Peter C. Phan
* Peter Dickens
* Peter Kuzmic
* Peter Seeberger
* Purevdorj ‘Puje’ Jamsran
* Quang Nguyen
* Randy Woodley
* Ravi Jayakaran
* Ray Minniecon
* René August
* Robert Cousins
* Rosalee Velloso Ewell
* Ruth Padilla DeBorst
* Sam Marullo
* Sami Awad
* Samuel Chetti
* Sebastian Kim
* Seforosa Carroll
* Shaul Judelman
* Siu Fung Wu
* Soong-Chan Rah
* Stephen Owino
* Steve Bartlett
* Steve Chong
* Steve Scott
* Terry Casiño
* Terry LeBlanc
* Thir Bahadur Koirala
* Tim Costello
* Timothy Hyunmo Lee
* Tite Tiénou
* Tony Campolo
* Tracy Trinita
* Vee Tetseo
* Victor Rembeth
* Vítor Westhelle
* Viv Grice
* William Ouma
* William Thurmond
* Wong Young Soon
* Wonsuk Ma
* Xiaoli Yang
* Xiyi (Kevin) Yao