Why is Gospel Infrastructure Important?

Introduction

Each year, the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary presents an annual report of global Christianity in the International Bulletin of Mission Research. Their 2023 report estimated that $55 billion was given for foreign missions to support 440,000 foreign missionaries.¹

Even if their estimate is 10 times too high, that number represents an incredible commitment. And yet, problems persist in the missions world. Syncretism, fraud, and dependency continue to plague missions efforts. Now, missions will never be perfect because missionaries, like all people, are imperfect. Fair enough. Even still, in an increasingly globally connected and data-driven world, there is a critical need for deeper clarity in what we are trying to accomplish in missions.

Joshua Project was developed to provide clarifying data on the status of global missions. Their work is both helpful and influential in missions. However, since Joshua Project began defining terms like a reached people group as more than 2% evangelical, much of the missions world has operated as if that output metric is the objective goal of our missions programs. As a result, modern missions has suffered the negative effects of Goodhart’s Law, which states: “When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.”²

The unwanted effects of numeric measurements becoming goals in missions can be mitigated by additional data measuring the resources, efforts, and capabilities of a particular Christian population to provide long-lasting access to the gospel for everyone living there. Joshua Project measures a people group from the top down. But what would we measure if our goal was to ensure that every person in a particular place has access to the gospel? To answer this question requires understanding what I like to call gospel infrastructure.

Gospel infrastructure refers to the essential, biblically grounded structures that ensure long-term gospel access. The primary structures are Bible translations and churches. But pastors, theological education, and other factors also play key roles in establishing prolonged gospel accessibility. This article will explore why developing gospel infrastructure is crucial to provide the clarity needed for effective and enduring global mission strategy today.

Building for Generations

Missions is development, not just relief. Think of the simple analogy of a house. The goal of building a house is not just to provide a temporary shelter, but a durable home that will last for generations to come. Similarly, when the right gospel structures are established, the national church can pursue their own gospel ministry for generations without depending on foreign Christians for ongoing support.

Indigeneity is another popular analogy in missions. Botany teaches that for a plant to become indigenous to a new environment, the right conditions for specific temperature, light, water, and nutrients need to exist. Likewise, building gospel infrastructure is a long-term development solution that promotes self-sufficiency for the national church by creating the right conditions for its spiritual growth.

Why Each Structure Matters for Lasting Gospel Access

Christian missions is like planting the gospel in ground where it has yet to flourish. Developing gospel infrastructure is the means for the gospel to thrive. The idea of gospel infrastructure flows directly from the apostolic pattern: wherever the gospel took root, the apostles labored to leave behind local churches, well-trained leaders, and a growing understanding of Scripture (cf. Acts 14:23; 2 Tim 2:2; Titus 1:5). This pattern has been followed throughout the history of missions.

Let’s examine each of the elements of gospel infrastructure to see how they contribute to the long-term viability, indigeneity, and self-sustainability of gospel witness within a community. Each structure bears a unique contribution.

Bible

Good Bible translations are a foundational structure and should be pursued with diligence until completed. It can take years of focused labor to translate the Scriptures from the original languages into a new language. According to some estimates, thousands of languages still lack any portion of the Bible. But once this labor is completed, many thousands, sometimes millions, of people gain access to God through his word. The enduring legacy of the King James Version of the Bible, still used by many today, is evidence that a good translation can serve a language group for many generations.

Evangelism

Evangelism is an essential structure because without it the gospel can’t be believed. While evangelism done by missionaries is good and necessary, the most effective evangelism is often conducted by local believers. More evangelism does not guarantee more conversions, but the lack of evangelism guarantees the lack of conversions. After all, Paul asked the Romans, “how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard?” (Rom 10:14 ESV). Evangelism is also a good sign of health in the national church.

Healthy Churches

Healthy churches are the crown jewel of missions. They are essential for ongoing access to the gospel and continued perseverance of the native Christians. One local church is a great start. Ideally, that one will become a whole network of local churches working together in a place over time. Local churches are God’s instrument to protect Christians (Phil 1:27), to testify to the otherworldly truth of the gospel (Eph 3:10), and to produce and mature more disciples (Matt 28:18-20). National churches show that the Spirit of God loves a people enough to provide embodied witnesses for Christ from among their very own! As for the health of a particular church, that can be determined by a church’s commitment to follow God’s instruction for their life together. Healthy churches practice biblical principles for meaningful membership, function under the leadership of a plurality of biblically qualified leaders, and center their activities around faithfully teaching the Bible.

Now, by this standard, no church is completely healthy — there are only degrees of health and unhealth. It’s also important to remember that the health of churches among a people can wax and wane. That means diligence is necessary to lay good foundations, to continually monitor, and to course-correct.

Pastoral Training

Healthy churches are crucial training grounds for new pastors. When pastoral training is overlooked as a gospel structure, men are appointed to pastoral ministry before they’re ready. But God knows what he is doing. He will not raise up more Christians than there are pastors to pastor them according to the biblical qualifications found in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1. Discipling men until they meet all the biblical qualifications is a patient and necessary investment — but one that serves the lifetime of ministry for that pastor.

Theological Education

Faithful seminaries protect the purity of the gospel so the “faith that was once for all delivered” (Jude 3) may continue to be transmitted. Theological education defends against distortions and corruptions of the gospel. For this reason, some key indicators for a faithful seminary include a commitment to the inerrancy of the Bible, a capacity to sustainably train leaders, and, in time, a faculty composed primarily of national believers.

Christian Literature

Christian literature helps Christians grow in their understanding of the gospel and demonstrates how Christians engage with culture to make a positive impact for Christ. When national believers write new literature, their own countrymen will see that Christians are interested in addressing the specific theological and ethical questions of that community. Of course, this literature is ineffective unless there are good distribution channels and monitoring to ensure it is widely consumed.

Worship Music

Similarly, worship music allows Christians to express their faith in musical forms which accord with their culture. Robust worship songs enable Christian communities to teach each other the truths about Christ through singing. As with Christian literature, the effectiveness of developed worship music is heightened when songs are written and widely sung by local believers.

Base

One last element that contributes to gospel infrastructure is the base. A base is merely where many expat Christians are working to develop the other gospel structures. Therefore, it is not crucial for long-term gospel access. Expat Christians should always seek a solid base, such as a healthy church, so that they can receive spiritual nourishment and accountability while they advance the gospel. A Christian community is needed by all Christians, even missionaries. In some places, international churches, if healthy, can be both nourishing and strategic in planting indigenous churches. In other places, a strong church-planting team led by elder-qualified men can serve as a base. However, those expat Christians must commit to fulfilling the Bible’s guidelines for a local church, including meeting to worship in a language the missionaries can understand. Without a strong base, missionaries will suffer the same deleterious effects of any Christian who forgoes active involvement in a local church for extended periods of time. A base is a temporary aid until expats have learned the local language and can joyfully submit to qualified national churches and leaders.

Why Gospel Infrastructure Matters for Effective Missions

Gospel infrastructure provides a robust, biblically grounded framework to produce fruit that will remain. Here are some of the benefits of adopting this framework in missions:

1. By evaluating the status of these structures and developing them, the work of missions becomes clear and actionable. Evaluation will identify concrete gaps and provide a visible to-do list of the work that remains. This, in turn, helps clarify where to deploy new missionaries, how long they should stay, and what activities they should engage in while there.
2. With specific needs in clear view, churches and organizations can allocate limited resources more productively. Missionaries who are mobilized to that location will be constrained to activity that is actually needed and prevented from imposing unnecessary or unhelpful practices. In other words, gospel infrastructure can help us more effectively steward the billions spent annually on global missions.
3. Focus on infrastructure should lead to a greater commitment to catholicity in missions. Gospel infrastructure promotes greater collaboration and partnership between churches and other ministries who share in the work. Different entities can contribute according to their area of expertise in order to address distinct needs in various locations.
4. Developing gospel structures until they are complete promotes local ownership and prevents national churches’ unhealthy dependency on foreign aid. Gospel infrastructure must ultimately be defined, owned, and led by national believers. The missionary’s job is to equip and release, not to control or perpetually guide. Paternalism can be avoided by building sustainable local capacity for gospel witness and valuing the contributions made by local believers. For the structures to reach their full potential, interdependent relationships — where all partners are valued equally — must occur. Any reliance on the financial power of any partners will only stunt the growth of the infrastructure and, thereby, threaten long-term and sustainable access to Christ.
5. Used in addition to people group data provided by ministries such as Joshua Project, the gospel infrastructure framework gives higher-resolution data on the current status of missions in a particular place. This data is sourced from where it matters most: on the ground where the structures themselves are being developed. Specific needs in specific locations will be identified. This higher-resolution data allows more precise planning and resource allocation at the city or even neighborhood level.
6. The gospel infrastructure framework encourages focus on the conditions that provide for growth rather than on immediate, human-controlled outcomes. This focus fosters appropriate humility in expat Christians. They learn that disciple-making is normally a slow process that requires patience and trust in God to give the growth. A long-term vision on fruit that remains should lead to missionary efforts that will have a lasting legacy for future generations of believers.
7. The history of missions has shown that even the most well-intentioned expat Christians bring their biases to missions. Emphasizing biblically derived structures as well as local ownership of those structures discourages common missiological pitfalls like individualism or paternalism. Meanwhile, health, interdependency, church structures, biblical authority, and meaningful relationships are encouraged. Rather than merely asking expat Christians to take a back seat to avoid imposing their own ideas into the work, missionaries are encouraged to lead and equip in ways that are sensitive to local believers and the national church.

Conclusion

The importance of gospel infrastructure lies in its ability to provide a clear, actionable, and biblically grounded strategy for global missions. It guides the allocation of resources and personnel to the right places, for the right amount of time, to be engaged in the right activities.

We build gospel infrastructure not only for access, but to foster collaboration, prevent dependency, and, most importantly, honor Christ by obeying the Great Commission with enduring impact for generations to come.

Christ himself is at work in the world! Our generation-by-generation faithfulness to him is our measurement of success. By diligently aligning our human efforts with God’s word, we can be sure that he will produce everything he intends in the world.

“For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea” (Hab 2:14).

1. Center for the Study of Global Christianity, “Status of Global Christianity, 2023, in the Context of 1900–2050,” International Bulletin of Mission Research v#, no. is# (2023): [P#], https://www.gordonconwell.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2023/01/Status-of-Global-Christianity-2023.pdf.

2. Goodhart’s Law,” ModelThinkers, last modified 2025, https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/goodharts-law