Missions Catalyst 10.20.10 – World News Briefs

In This Issue: Stand Up and Sing!

• IVORY COAST: God Speaks in Our Language
• ALGERIA: Christians Acquitted of Eating during Ramadan
• IRAN: Pastor Faces Death for ‘Thought Crime’
• CHINA: Christians Blocked from World Evangelization Conference
• ITALY: Treasure Hunting Helps to Plant House Churches
• BURUNDI: A Week of Bold Outreach

Missions Catalyst is a free, weekly electronic digest of mission news and resources designed to inspire and equip Christians worldwide for global ministry. Use it to fuel your prayers, find tips and opportunities, and stay in touch with how God is building his kingdom all over the world. Please forward it freely!

World News Briefs, edited by Pat Noble, are published twice a month.

IVORY COAST: God Speaks in Our Language

Source: World Venture Newsletter, October 15, 2010

“Stand up and sing, for God has given us the Bible in our own language!” was the refrain as the crowd of largely Senoufo people joyously sang in their traditional back-and-forth, call-response style. A worship leader called out the praise verses:

“Stand up and dance for God has thought of us, the Cebaara people! It is great joy for us now to hold in our hands the Word of God in Cebaara! It is joy for us to learn God’s message in our language! It is great joy for us to hear God speak in our language!”

Saturday, October 2, 2010, was an historic day in the West African nation of Cote d’Ivoire (the Ivory Coast). After over half a century of hard work translating the texts of both the Old and New Testaments, and many delays, the Cebaara Bible dedication ceremony was, indeed, cause for great rejoicing.

Held in the main northern city of Korhogo, the Senoufo capital, the dedication was a national event attended by many government officials and the leaders of many Christian groups in the country.

Cebaara is only the third indigenous language of the 60 in Cote d’Ivoire to have the entire Bible. A central dialect of the Senoufo tribe, it is spoken by nearly 900,000 African people. There are currently five other translations in process.

>> Full story with picture.

ALGERIA: Christians Acquitted of Eating during Ramadan

Source: Compass Direct, October 5, 2010

An Algerian court today acquitted two Christian men of eating during Ramadan in spite of a prosecutor’s demand that they be punished for “insulting Islam.”

Authorities on August 12 arrested Salem Fellak and Hocine Hocini for eating lunch on a private construction site where they were working. Ramadan, Islam’s month of fasting during daylight hours, started this year on August 11.

The incident took place in an area of Algeria where the country’s Protestant church has grown with relative freedom in recent years.

Officers at a nearby police station saw the two men eating and confronted them for not fasting. When police realized the two men were Christians, they accused them of insulting Islam, according to local French-language press reports.

“I do not apologize for anything, and I regret nothing,” Fellak said before the verdict. “I have the right to not fast. I am a Christian, and until found guilty, the Algerian constitution guarantees respect for individual freedoms.”

The Algerian Constitution gives the right to all citizens to practice their faith, although it declares Islam the state religion and prohibits institutions from behavior incompatible with Islamic morality.

>> Full story with picture.

IRAN: Christian Pastor Faces Death Penalty for “Thought Crime”

Source: ASSIST News, October 9, 2010

A Christian pastor in Iran who was sentenced to death for what is being called a “thought crime” has less than a week to live. While all of the other prisoners arrested in a wide-ranging crackdown by Iranian authorities have been released, Youcef Nadarkhani still faces the death penalty on October 24. However, Present Truth Ministries has good news to share about Youcef’s wife.

“We have received news that Monday, October 11, Fatemeh Pasandideh (Youcef Nadarkhani’s wife) has been released [and] has now been reunited with her two boys. Give thanks to God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ for his grace and mercy in answering our prayers and allowing [her] to be released.”

[Present Truth’s Jason] DeMars asks Christians in the West to continue to pray for Youcef Nadarkhani and to approach government authorities to lobby for Youcef’s acquittal and release.

“He is still in prison and has been sentenced to death. We have a week to spread the word to others to pray and to inform government officials of the violation of his human rights.”

>> Full story with picture.

CHINA: Christians Blocked from World Evangelization Conference

Source: Mission Network News, October 15, 2010

The first Lausanne Congress was in 1974, after which the Lausanne Covenant was created, aimed at keeping the mission alive. When the second Congress convened in 1989 in Manilla, 200 seats were empty.

These seats belonged to the delegation from China. This year, as the third Congress convenes, those same seats are likely to be empty once more.

However, [Bob] Fu [of the China Aid Association] says the official church approached the Lausanne organizers and expressed interest but refused to sign the Lausanne Covenant which specifically requires members to commit to world evangelism and the Great Commission.

Authorities then warned delegates against attending, detaining one for 15 days, confiscating passports, and preventing still others from leaving their homes. Fu explains, “Unfortunately, the Chinese government designated this evangelical world conference as ‘anti-China.'”

>> Full story with picture.

>> See also Chinese Christians Blocked from Attending Capetown 2010, a list of links compiled by Justin Long.

ITALY: Treasure Hunting Helps to Plant House Churches

Source: Joel News International 748, October 4, 2010

After starting and developing a house church network in Switzerland, Graziano Crepaldi felt God’s call to also invest in his homeland, Italy. He found a few people whom he trained and coached, and today there are 12 house churches. Most were started by ordinary people who pray and move in the gifts of the Spirit (prophecy, healing, deliverance). Graziano calls this activity “treasure hunting.”

“Italians are open to spiritual things,” says Graziano. “So we teach our people to hear from God, prophesy, and pray for healing. Before we go on an outreach, we ask the Lord to show us a ‘treasure.’ This can be a word of knowledge for someone or a description of a specific person. Then we ask him to lead us to that person so we can share what we saw, pray for healing, or deliver a word of knowledge. In this way many people have a genuine encounter with the Lord and are healed or delivered. Our focus is to bring the Kingdom of God.”

>> Subscribe to Joel News.

>> Editor’s note: This article is based on an interview also posted at the Simple Church web site. Another encouraging church-planting story comes to us from Zambia: New Church Planted during World Cup (OM Headlines).

BURUNDI: A Week of Bold Outreach

Source: Great Lakes Outreach, September 24, 1010

“I asked you to pray as our young teams of evangelists were about to launch out on a week of bold outreach in Burundi. God is amazing!

“The statistics of the week are staggering: 607 young evangelists from different provinces of Burundi were sent out to 34 different areas. They spent a week visiting people in their houses, in market places, and wherever they could meet them. During that week, 17,789 people accepted to pray to receive Jesus as Savior and Lord of their lives. Among these people were 51 witchdoctors.

“Twenty paralyzed people were healed, eight deaf people recovered their hearing, two blind people were able to see again. Five people on the point of committing suicide gave up with that plan and 23 couples on the brink of divorce reconciled.

“Please pray for the follow up and discipleship of all these new believers. Also please pray for the situation in general in the nation as there is seemingly a new rebellion forming, and a number of people have been killed in the last few weeks. If the war is renewed, it would be simply terrible for already broken Burundi. Let’s stand against that in Jesus’ name.”

>> Full report with lots of stories. Sign up for updates from Great Lakes Outreach.



Questions, comments, submissions? Contact us.