Graham Fest in India Draws 85,000 People on Final Night
India is the statistical center of gravity for the population that has never heard of Jesus Christ, according to Dr. Todd Johnson, research fellow and director of the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Boston. The term "statistical center of gravity" means there is an equal number of a people or type of people to the north, south, east and west of a specific point, which in the case of unreached people is found in India.
Johnson, who gave the presentation about the statistical center of gravity for unreached people at a frontier mission conference in 2007, also noted that research has indicated the most responsive people to Christianity are Hindu, Muslim and Buddhists, but most Christian outreach never reach non-Christians. More than 90 percentof all Christian evangelism is aimed at other Christians, and 86 percent of the world's Hindus, Muslims and Buddhists do not personally know a Christian.
"I think it is an interesting irony that God himself has prepared the peoples for the Gospel message, but we tend to be slow in contacting and being incarnational witness among these peoples," Johnson had said.
Get Our Latest News for FREE
Dr. Paul Dhinakaran, who leads Jesus Calls Ministries in India, said, "It is God's time for India."
"Franklin has sown to meet the needs of people around the world," Dhinakaran said to BGEA before the festival. "We pray during this Festival he will reapall that he has sown."
Other Graham evangelistic festivals scheduled for this year include events in Brazil (May 27-29), Alberta, Canada (August), Japan (Oct.22-24) and Latvia (Nov. 5-7), which will be the former communist country's first-ever evangelistic event.
