–– Seth Meyers

Audio version of this article is available here: YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.

The population of the world now lives more in cities than in rural areas—approximately 57% to 43%. But that number is reversed for Africa where more than half still live in rural areas. 

A brief comparison of urban and rural areas

If the numbers are accurate, 1.4 billion people live in 54 countries on this continent meaning 800 million are in the rural areas. It is very difficult to determine what the word rural means precisely, but I have commonly used the tripartite metric of jobs, tar roads, and use of English. As these three become more rare, the area deserves the title rural more and more. 

Statistical precision is not vital to this inquiry. We all know that a man living without electricity or shops in Mozambique does not have the same life as a man living in Maputo. Even if our ideas of both men’s lives are fuzzy, we can have a clear enough conception to realize if we reflect, that a city offers many things that other places do not. The places that do not offer those things could be called “rural.” 

Those things are very powerful because they pull men from the village life to move in world-shaping ways to Cape Town and Nairobi and Lusaka. What pulls the men? Opportunity to work, to advance themselves, to own a car, and to support the people left back home. Because these fish swim in the urban current, they are more likely to speak English and to be near a Biblical church. Biblical church maps show all their marks around city areas in Africa. We thank God for His work, and godly men evangelizing in urban areas. After all, Paul the Apostle went to urban areas in Acts 13-21. There are more people in urban areas. A man’s evangelistic efforts can reach farther in shorter time using the tools of a modern economy, smooth roads, dependable cell phone signals, a population that uses the internet, and sowing seed in a field with high literacy rates. 

Urban areas need gifted pastors and growing churches. We thank God for every assembly and every man who works in the concrete jungle. We must even press for many other men to evangelize and plant English churches in population centers. May the Lord of the Harvest answer our prayers! 

Yet sometimes the church must turn its attention to the 800 million people outside the cities. Paul told the apostles in Jerusalem that he was eager to remember the poor (Gal. 2:10) which might serve as a helpful—though again not precise—synonym for rural. 

Three evidences the rural areas are unreached

1. The popularity of false religion

Prosperity theology that promises earthly comfort rather than union with Christ swarms the poorer places of Africa like termites on deadwood. But this evil, anti-gospel is simply a plug-in for the previous demonic doctrine of animism whereby men are trapped in ignorance and fear. The Zion Christian Church has been planted thousands of times by the enemy who sows weeds. Finding a pastor who actually teaches the Bible, loves humility, and lifts up Christ in an African language is very difficult. Recently, I attended a funeral in the village of Basani where the “pastor” spoke to hundreds of people without once referencing Jesus or His work. 

2. The lack of missionaries from the rural areas

A very strong evidence that rural areas are lost is their lack of sending out missionaries. The believers in Thessalonica sent out gospel teachers within the first year (1 Thess. 1:8), and other churches did the same (Acts 13:1-13; 3 John 6-8). After years of looking, I have still not met or heard of a man moving from a rural area to a poorer area to learn the language and plant a church. And yet obedience to this command of our Lord may be the clearest proof that the gospel has taken root. 

3. The desperate state of the urban areas

We all agree that the cities are in urgent need of more godly ministers, evangelism, and churches, right? Can we expect the rural, poorer areas to be at a more advanced state than the more developed areas that have long had access to light, that have opportunities to read, that have enjoyed Bible translations much longer? If our cities still have millions of the lost compared to hundreds of the saved, then would we not expect it to be drier further away? 

Conclusion

How will they believe on Him of whom they have not heard? How shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent? For our time and place in history, could we not also add: And how shall they be sent unless we are considering the area? But that is not really our own addition, because our Lord already told His disciples, “Lift up your eyes and look on the fields.” 

Have we looked on 55% of the African fields, 800 millions of peoples? May we pray and then send men to carry the heavy end of this log.