Research has shown that in the decades to come one of the fastest growth areas for the church in America are ethnic peoples that live in our own communities.  From 1990 to 2020, South Carolina’s total popluation grew by 48% – from 3.5 million people to 5.2 million people.  In that same period, SC’s foreign-born population (those born in another country but now living in South Carolina) grew by an astounding 449% – from 49,964 to 271,280.  In those thirty years, the percentage of foreign-born peoples in South Carolina grew from 1.4% of the total population to 5.2% of the population.  Every indication is that these trends will continue in the future.  What is happening in South Carolina is happening around the nation.

In response to this trend, national Southern Baptist agencies (International Mission Board, North American Mission Board, Send Relief, WMU) have partnered to form the Diaspora Missions Collective. The DM Collective exists to cast vision, mobilize and equip our churches in North America to help fulfill the core missionary tasks among these peoples.

A few years ago, the Send Team of the SC Baptist Convention established the FINISH initiative, to help SCBaptist churches to do this work in our own state.  As such, SCBaptists are being invited as an early adopter of the DMCollective’s mission and to work closely with others across the country to excel in this cutting edge 21^st century missions strategy to reach the nations that God is bringing to the United States.

Every SCBC church and association is encouraged to join this effort to find, identify and develop engagement initiatives to see even last peoples reached right in our own back yards.  The nations among us are waiting!