The Africa Review in Five highlights African current affairs from a Christian perspective. Listen and subscribe through Youtube, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.
Today is Friday, October 6th, A.D. 2023. This is The Africa Review in Five, written by Paul Schlehlein and presented by Yamikani Katunga.
TARIF: The Most Unreached Place in Sub-Saharan Africa
According to Joshua Project, the people group in sub-Saharan Africa that is least reached with the gospel is the Yao people in the eastern region of Malawi.
Joshuaproject.net is a research initiative seeking to identify the ethnic groups of the world with the fewest followers of Jesus. This Christian organization uses ethnologic data to help coordinate the work of missionaries by tracking the people groups with the least followers of evangelical Christianity.
Joshua Project breaks down the world’s population of eight billion people into over 17,00 people groups. Each of these people groups are then placed into one of five Progress Levels based on their number of evangelicals, defined as someone who believes the Bible and trusts in Jesus Christ as their sole source for salvation.
People groups in Category 5 (called “significantly reached”) have a population of at least 10% evangelical. Their maps show that much of the United States, South America, Australia, Sub-Sahara Africa and northern Europe fit this category. People groups in Categories 2-4 (called “minimally reached” or “partially reached”) have populations between 2-10% that claim to be evangelical. This category represents about a third of the world’s population, many of them in places like Russia.
The final category is the most alarming. These people groups are called “Unreached’ because less than 2% of their populations are evangelical and less than 5% even profess to be Christian. These groups represent nearly half of the world’s population. Most of these people reside in the 10/40 Window, a rectangular area in the world from 10 degrees north to 40 degrees north latitude that stretches from Portugal and northern Africa eastward to Japan and Indonesia. The population in this window is over five billion and it comprises most of the world’s Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus. If you want to be a missionary, this is the first place you should consider.
But what about sub-Saharan Africa? Are there unreached people groups there as well? Yes there are and Joshua Project believes the Yao people of Malawi are the most sizable unreached people group in that massive region. Though there are also over one million Yao in Mozambique, the 2.5 million Yao in Malawi are considered to be more unreached. This means that two thousand years after Christ’s death on the cross, there are still whole people groups in spiritual darkness like the Yao that are .5% evangelical and 1% Christian.
On Joshua Project’s website, the Yao are a bright red dot. They are frontier. They are unreached. The only other people in sub-Saharan Africa with this level of need are the Forok Fur people of Sudan, with a much smaller population of 1.3 million.
There are several reasons the Yao are so unreached. First, they are strongly Muslim, 99% according to most statistics. Muslims are notoriously resistant to Christianity, often violently so. It is no surprise that mosques dot their territory.
Second, according to 2023 stats, Malawi is the 8th poorest country in the world, just behind African countries like Mozambique and Niger and just ahead of Chad. Poverty often deters missionaries.
This doesn’t mean that the rest of Africa is Christian. Nor do these facts about the Yao ignore other peoples in Africa that are just as unreached or even more so, like the Shindzwani people on the Comorian Islands or the Arabs in Morocco or the Muslims in Somalia.
But when it comes to sub-Saharan Africa, there is no sizable group that is lesser reached with the gospel than the Yao that live near the eastern banks of Lake Malawi in the Mangochi District.
The Yao people need scores of missionary teams and couples. If you cannot go, consider praying an adapted version of Psalm 67:3-5 over this people group. “Let the Yao praise you, O God; let all the Yao praise you! Let the Yao be glad and sing for joy, for you judge the Yao with equity and guide the nations upon earth. Selah Let the Yao praise you, O God; let all the Yao praise you!”
And that’s it for The Africa Review in Five on this Friday, October 6th in the year of our Lord 2023. Subscribe to the Missionary Minds podcast on Spotify or Apple podcasts. I’m Yamikani Katunga. Be not weary in well-doing.
Between Two Cultures 
Having looked at the Joshua project website significantly, I think it is amazing the research they are trying to uncover. Unfortunately, for nominally “Christian” places like Subsaharan Africa and South America, they are woefully incapable. Most of Zimbabwe, South Africa, Mozambique, and Botswana should be color-coded yellow, orange, or red. But they’ve sadly included the false prosperity “Gospel” and syncretistic organizations like the Zion Christian Church in their term evangelical Christianity. While the Yao are certainly unreached, and I will pray God sends them missionaries, they are certainly not unique in Bantu Africa.
Thanks for your comments, Caleb.
The argument is not that these countries you listed don’t need the gospel. Of course they do and desperately. But my experience for 17 years in South Africa and my travels through these countries many times makes me agree with Joshua Projects analysis. Red means less than 5% profess to be Christian. Orange means between 2% and 50% profess to be Christian. Yellow means that more than 50% etc. That doesn’t fit Botswana and Zimbabwe in my travels, and most certainly not South Africa.
I agree with Mark Christopher who recently said in his article “Grace Under Fire” that it would be difficult to throw a rock in many African countries without hitting someone who claimed to be a Christian. A true Christian? Probably not, but that’s not what the colors primarily mean.
In fact, the Yao are very unique in Bantu Africa, as are the Shindzwani in Comoros. To deny this may soothe our consciences but it will not help assail this Muslim stronghold.
Thanks for that thorough response. I now understand the goal. They definitely do need the church’s prayers and focus. Let us pray the false god of Islam is overthrown.