Source: Mission Network News, April 18, 2025
The rescue of kidnapped American pastor Joshua Sullivan in South Africa has drawn attention to the crime-ridden nation.
South Africa ranks in the top five countries with the highest crime indexes in the world. Police statistics between 2023 and 2024 data periods show a nearly 19% rise in commercial crimes. Kidnapping shot up by 8% during that time as well. Carjacking, murder, and armed robberies are also ills that plague the nation.
Marietjie Prollius of Trans World Radio says the increasing violent crime isn’t so much driven by political anger as by life in poverty.
“Part of it is also that there’s a lot of influx from other [African] countries. People come here to make a better living, but then they don’t find jobs, and then they’re kind of destitute here.”
That spiral can quickly lead people into situations they never thought they’d be in. For them and others caught in circumstances of their own or of others’ making,
TWR sends that hope by broadcasting biblical content in the heart languages of South Africans. The team invites and responds to listener prayer requests. Sometimes, they can connect them with counseling services.
“Many of them contact TWR and ask for prayer for safety, for their children just walking from and to school,” she says, “asking for prayer for children that get involved in gangs, asking for children that are involved in drugs.”
Read the full story. See also American Missionary Rescued After Being Kidnapped While Preaching in South Africa (The Roys Report).
Also from Mission Network News, see China Formally Bans Foreign Missionary Activity. The new regulations go into effect on May 1. Surprising? No. But this will raise new barriers.