Knowing Utah: Another Excellent Example

I recently wrote a post on the importance of doing our homework on upgs living in our neighborhoods.  A failure to do this research is poor stewardship.  Such omissions often mean we end up pouring more resources and people into reaching reached people groups.

In this post, I want to draw your attention to another important aspect of the homework that is valuable to your strategy:  percent evangelicals and evangelical church to population ratios.  Knowing this information will help you to focus on areas that are the least reached and keep you from planting churches where a saturation of such assemblies exists.

I have written extensively on this topic in Discovering Church Planting, Developing a Strategy for Missions, and elsewhere on this blog.  (A general guideline is one evangelical church (of one hundred members) for every 1,000 people in an urban context and one such church (of fifty members) for every 500 people in a rural context.).

If you downloaded your free copy of Unreached Peoples, Least Reached Places, you know that one of the least reached places in North America is the state of Utah.  I was recently in Utah with Travis Kerns of the North American Mission Board, and with pastors of Christ Fellowship and First Baptist, Provo.

Here is a glimpse at some information on a handful of counties in Utah.  Travis provided me with these important numbers.  You may find his more extensive table HERE.  While I want you to see the great need in the area and respond accordingly, I also want you to see another excellent example of one who has done his homework.  Here is an example to follow!

It is amazing what you will understand when you do your homework.

Do your homework.  Don’t settle for hunches.  Such is the way of the Kingdom steward and the one who walks with the four billion on his or her heart.