International Mission Board President Jerry Rankin wrote recently about how Christ’s command to reach the world in Acts 1:8 is not intended to be understood as meaning that we are only to reach out to the world after we have reached our local communities, state and nation. We are to be reaching out in all of these areas simultaneously.

He is exactly right. One aspect of this that I have been particularly struck hard about in the last couple of days is just how simultaneous this witness really is considering the globalization of our society. Earlier this week here in Louisville, the “Right Here, Right Now” People Groups Fair was held on the campus of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary to introduce students to the huge diversity of people groups living in Kentucky and, especially, Louisville.

Sponsored by the People Groups Initiative, a joint effort by the North American Mission Board, Kentucky Baptist Convention and Long Run Baptist Association, the missions fair gave students the opportunity to hear from people group missionaries including Semester Nehemiah church planting project interns, Nehemiah missionaries and Mission Service Corp people group volunteers. Many students were recruited to work with established people group teams led by the KBC/NAMB Nehemiah people group specialist.

I’ve lived in Louisville for 16 years now but never realized myself just how diverse even our small city is. According to the Jefferson County Public School District, we now have 102 nations represented in our school system with  individuals speaking about 124 different languages.

Our city’s Muslim population now numbers more than 10,000 and we have 13 Islamic centers here. Our largest Islamic ethnic groups are Bosnian, Iraqi, Somali, Turks and Senegalese.

What this tells me is that is that there really is no clear dividing line anymore between local and global missions. All Southern Baptists and Southern Baptist entities need to be working together all the time to reach people whether they are just across the street or on another continent. And the exciting thing is, when we reach that one across the street, we very well may be reaching across to another continent because of the ties that person may have to another nation!

The video on this page will let hear from some of the people at the Right Here, Right Now missions fair and the ways they are involved in ministering to people groups in Louisville. Click here if the device on which you’re reading this post does not show embedded video to see the piece on the KBC’s YouTube channel.

– Robert Reeves