August 17, 2026
Only 29% of Christians view reaching unbelievers as a very urgent priority
CMI® equips ministry workers to share the Gospel among unreached people groups around the world
ST. LOUIS — An estimated 3.6 billion people — 44% of the world’s population — have yet to hear the Gospel. Yet according to Project42, only 29% of Christians view reaching the world’s unreached as a “very urgent” priority.
Child Evangelism Fellowship® (CEF®), the world’s largest missions organization dedicated to children, is committed to reaching every child with the Good News of Jesus Christ. Central to that mission is preparing people to share the Gospel in underserved communities around the world. Through its Children’s Ministries Institute® (CMI®), CEF trains and equips workers and leaders to evangelize and disciple children, seeking to establish them in Bible-believing churches.
“CMI turns urgency into action by preparing men and women not only to teach God’s Word clearly, but to go where the need is greatest,” said Fred Pry, CEF Vice President of Administration. “We seek and prepare workers to carry the Gospel into communities where children might otherwise have little opportunity to hear it.”
CMI provides specialized, practical children’s ministry training not often found in Bible colleges or Christian universities. Featuring a robust range of resources both on campus and online, the program is designed to prepare students through coursework in children’s ministries, teacher training and leadership development.
The resulting impact is truly global in scale. One recent U.S. graduate had served alongside her husband in children’s ministry for 16 years before learning about CEF. After praying about full-time service, she joined the ministry in 2025 and completed CMI training. Now she plans to introduce CEF in new neighborhoods, start 10 Good News Club® ministries and train 500 teachers in Christmas Party Club® seminars this year.
Across the world in Sri Lanka, another student’s path to ministry began with their own introduction to the Gospel as a child.
“I grew up in a Buddhist background and first came to church when I was 10,” the student shared. “I heard about Jesus then, but I received Him as my Savior when I was 16. The Lord later called me into ministry, and I dedicated my life to serving Him with a deep desire to preach the Gospel to all nations.”
That calling eventually led the student to discover CMI.
“By the grace of God, the Lord opened the way for me to attend CMI,” the student said. “The training helped me understand children more clearly — their feelings, thoughts and spiritual needs.”
CMI also challenged a belief the student had carried into the program.
“Before CMI, I had doubts about whether a child could truly receive Christ,” the student remarked. “During my training, I learned that even a young child can respond to the Gospel. As a result, God showed me how important it is to share the Good News with children.”
For CEF, stories like these highlight how an investment in one worker can echo through families, communities and future generations.
“The need is great, but so is the opportunity,” Pry said. “Every worker we equip has the potential to reach thousands of children, preparing others to carry the Gospel into communities far beyond their own. When that impact continues from one person to the next, one trained worker becomes part of reaching the world.”
Child Evangelism Fellowship® (CEF®), founded in 1937, has been establishing the Good News Club® ministries in countries around the world for decades.
In 2025, more than 34 million children worldwide were impacted by the Good News through CEF ministries.
For more CEF news, see the ministry’s latest edition of the online magazine Impact™.
CEF is an international, nonprofit, Christian ministry that has been dedicated to seeing every child reached with the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, discipled and established in a local church since 1937. CEF is located in all 50 American states and in most countries around the world, with over 3,800 paid staff and tens of thousands of volunteers around the world.
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To interview a representative from Child Evangelism Fellowship, contact Hamilton Strategies, Media@HamiltonStrategies.com, Beth Bogucki, 610.584.1096, ext. 105, or Daniel Moyer, ext. 104.
