As the Mission reaches its half-way mark, sydneyanglicans.net republishes Archie Poulos’ helpful reflections on the goal to see 10% of Sydney in Bible-believing congregations that has energised the efforts of the past five years.

Peter Jensen, the Anglican archbishop of Sydney, has envisaged 10% of Sydney actively involved in church.
Is this just a wish-list that can't be met? Or is there reason (under God) to think that it is possible?

And why 10%?

I noticed in the week before the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras in Sydney that the homosexual community kept quoting the figure that 10% of the population is homosexual, even though all the studies continue to show it is 3% of men and 1% of women. I can only conclude that 10% is a magic number! If 10% of people are involved in something then it legitimises the activity and makes the whole community take notice. So 10% of people in church is a great goal, as that would mean that all of the community would then be confronted with the Lordship of Jesus.

But can we reach that? We are told something like 2-3% of the community are in church now. Here's the great challenge:

Do you think that under God's good hand you might see one of your friends become a Christian every five years?

If that were the case for every one of the 2%"”if every Christian saw one person come to Christ over five years"”we would have 10% of our community in church within 9 years!

A friend of mine exclaimed "your maths is all wrong!" when I suggested this to him, until he realised he hadn't taken into account the compounding effect of new converts sharing the gospel with their friends as well. They are often the keenest evangelists.

So, it is possible. The hard bit is that everyone needs to be evangelising their friends. We need to mobilise the greatest human resource God has given us "” each other "” to pray and act and proclaim the good news, in order that this might happen.

In the end 10% is just a number. It is people, not numbers, that matter. But numbers do help us to work at our goal. What a privilege to be involved with God in seeing people saved and his name being glorified in every corner of our community.