SAUDI ARABIA: A Tiny Church Grows

Rub_al_khalid_sunset_nov_07The small Church in Saudi Arabia needs mature believers to translate Scripture and to lead churches.

Source: Mission Network News, May 7, 2020

The small Church in Saudi Arabia needs mature and committed believers to translate Scripture and to lead churches. “It’s almost like the early Church in the book of Acts,” says Abd Al Fadi about Christianity among certain language groups in Saudi Arabia. He works with Hijazi Arabic in Western Saudi Arabia, Najdi Arabic in central Saudi Arabia, and the Saudi Gulf dialect in the East.

These groups have few Christians. Finding mature and committed believers to translate [Scripture] is difficult. Abd Al Fadi says, “Sometimes they’re busy with a job or concerned about being caught by their family or the government.”

Even if the translators complete their work, that doesn’t mean it can be distributed easily. “It’s one thing to produce the product. It’s another to deliver it to the right church or group that can benefit from it.”

Abd Al Fadi asks Christians in the West to pray that Christians in Saudi Arabia will join together in house churches and that the right materials will get to the right people.

Most of all, pray that like the early Church in Acts, the Church in Saudi Arabia would grow and multiply. Abd Al Fadi says he hopes within the next decade “We will hear about many Saudi believers who are out in the open, doing media or doing ministry and partnering with others as well.”

» Full story includes links to more in a series about unreached people groups. Consider tuning in to join them (and others) online for International Day for the Unreached on May 31.

» Also read Five Reasons Why Google Can’t Translate the Bible (Wycliffe USA).

MIDDLE EAST: COVID-19 Lockdown Ignites Spiritual Interest

Source: SAT-7, via Christian Newswire, April 21, 2020

Amid strict coronavirus lockdowns, millions of people across the Middle East and North Africa clamoring for a spiritual and practical lifeline are finding help right in their own homes through television.

In the region where Christianity began but is now a minority faith, Christian satellite television broadcaster SAT-7 has seen viewer numbers surge and social media interest skyrocket since the COVID-19 stay-at-home orders.

“There’s an explosion of spiritual hunger across the Middle East and North Africa right now as people stuck at home seek real hope and real answers,” said Dr. Rex Rogers, president of SAT-7 USA.

“Millions of people in countries like Iran, Iraq, and Turkey are clamoring to see and hear in their own language what it’s like to be a follower of Jesus in a time of crisis,” Rogers said.

In coronavirus hotspot Turkey, where 99 percent of the population is non-Christian, more viewers have contacted the SAT-7 TÜRK channel daily in the past few weeks than any day in the previous five years since broadcasts began.

In Iran, another virus hotspot, viewers’ calls and messages to the live, Farsi-language Signal show—beamed into millions of homes across the nation—jumped to seven times the usual number last month, as Iranians rattled by the pandemic turned to the show’s hosts for reassurance and practical advice.

» Read full story.

» See also Tyndale: Bible Sales up 44-60% During COVID Crisis (God Reports).

IRAN: Christian Sentenced to Flogging and Prison

Source: International Christian Concern, April 22, 2020

On April 21, 2020, Christian human rights activist Mary Fatima Mohammadi received a suspended prison sentence of three months by the Iranian government. The sentence included a directive ordering Mary to receive a flogging of ten lashes.

Mary has come under significant pressure from the Iranian authorities over the years because of her Christian human rights activism. In the latest incident, she was arrested because she was present in the area of a protest where Iranians had rallied regarding the government’s downing of Ukrainian Airline Flight 752, [which is] highly sensitive in Iran.

After her arrest, Mary disappeared for nearly a month before she was discovered in Qarchak Women’s Prison, a jail with a reputation for various types of gender abuse. While there, Mary reported that she was beaten and suffered other kinds of mistreatment. She was eventually released on bail and charged with “disrupting public order by participating in an illegal rally.”

Her court hearing was initially delayed because of COVID-19 but took place on April 17. Iran’s Human Rights Activist News Agency (HANA) reports that during the hearing, the judge repeatedly questioned Mary about her conversion to Christianity.

» Full story includes responses from Mary and commentary about the prison system in Iran.

» See also Iranian Christians Sent to Jail, Unable to Afford Bail (Article 18).

LAOS: Christians Flee Destroyed Homes

Source: Open Doors, April 25, 2020

[Three] months ago, in northern Laos, three Christian families woke to the thundering voice of the chief in the remote village where they lived. As he stood outside their homes, the leader of the community they had been part of their whole lives announced that he and the entire population of the village were there to destroy their homes.

That day, these families lost their homes and their community—because they left the tribe’s religion to follow Jesus. The families fled together into a nearby rice field where they cobbled together makeshift shelters. Days later, the villagers found where they were and destroyed their “homes” once again.

A couple of days ago, we received an update from the local pastor of the families’ church. After relocating yet again into another village, these families have been told by that village chief they must move once more because they might “anger the spirits of the village.”

» Full story includes a picture, reports how Christians have stepped in to help this family by providing housing and other needs, and describes religious persecution in Laos.

» From another part of Asia, read Pastor in Nepal Re-Arrested on New Series of Charges to Keep Him in Jail, Sources Say (Morning Star News).

SIERRA LEONE: Growing in Trust, Finding the Path of Truth

Source: International Mission Board, May 19, 2020

A former missionary reflects on crisis of belief during civil war in Sierra Leone:

Each day we were in the war of Sierra Leone, God would address the trust issue with me. I wanted to trust God, but I was so upset! I had such doubts. Everything was out of my control. I was grasping for control by praying—or more like telling God how things should be or how I wanted them to be. God used a refugee as the hinge pin that not only swung me back but jolted me into real focus.

A few months after the rage of my trust issues and the war, I was asked to go to the refugee camp in another country where a young man from Sierra Leone came after he escaped a rebel attack on his village. He had seen his mother, father, and brother killed before he ran.

As Alsuine ran, he kept saying, “Allah, I think I am on the wrong path of life. I need to find the right path.”

Christian workers gave him a blanket and rice and told him he could come any day to hear a lesson from God’s Word. [At one lesson] the center director read him John 14:6 in English, saying, “Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life; no one can reach God unless he walks Jesus’ path.”

This truth hit him to the core of his being (literally translated in Krio, “it goes to the bone”). With enthusiasm, he proclaimed that the true and living God had answered what he was seeking in life on his path of escape from the rebels.

As if that wasn’t enough, he turned to me with the sincerest heart, eyes, and words: “If it wasn’t for the war in Sierra Leone, I would still be walking the wrong path.”

It was like a knife that pierced my heart—the hinge pin that jolted me back, as the Father said once again, “Do you trust me?” This time, with every fiber of my being I said, “Yes!” It was humbling. It was hard. It was a turning point of growth toward fully trusting God.

» See full story with pictures.

Sharpening the Saw: Quizzes and Courses

I stumbled on a quiz about Ramadan last week. That first quiz led to a second, which led to me signing up for a super-short online course about Islam fielded by Pew Research. The course consists of four brief daily emails followed by a quiz. I’m 25% of the way through!

But it’s got me wondering. Why was I eager to take the quiz? Then why did I sign up for the course? Did I feel like Muslims are my jam and I would probably nail the quiz? Sure did. Was I embarrassed by my 75% score? Yep. Does the currently fettered state of life afford a little more margin to sharpen the saw? Does for me!

In another attempt to learn and grow, yesterday I spent some (virtual) time with one of my favorite people. Doug Lucas has just released a brief set of videos for his full-time global workers with Team Expansion. In the generosity that characterizes him, Doug is allowing us to peek over his shoulder as he challenges his people to frame the current situation by “Getting Back to the Basics,” “Taking Initiative,” “Communicating Actively,” and “Adapting to the Current Context While Staying True to Our Calling.”

These short talks encouraged and challenged me. I took away both calming assurance as well as actionable challenges. I commend them to you.

What about you? Are you sharpening your saw these days? Kevin Kelly says, “A worthy goal for a year is to learn enough about a subject so that you can’t believe how ignorant you were a year earlier.” Are you learning and growing, turning crazy, home-bound days into higher capacity for what lies ahead?

Maybe you’re barely holding it together. Chasing kids, scrambling for food, and just trying to hold on to your job or keep you head above water. Much grace to you. And thanks for reading this in the midst of that! Please receive what God has for you, rather than taking these musings as more “things you have to do.”

If you do have bandwidth to think, though, let me ask you this. Are there things you’d like to learn about mobilization, Muslims, missions in general? Would you find a mobilization or global outreach quiz compelling? Would you consider taking a short email-based course about a relevant missions topic? How long would be optimal? Would video lessons make it more fun or just longer to slog through?

» I’d love to read your thoughts, wishes and references to existing items like this. Please comment on our website, find us on Facebook or Twitter, or just respond to this email.

Swipe This Idea or Take a Seat at the Virtual Table

The good people at Truth Collective are doing the coolest thing next week: A virtual tea party!

“We need to honor the directives of our authorities, but there’s absolutely no reason we can’t enjoy one another, learn from Jesus, and experience tea-novelties from around the world, all from the comfort of our own slippers! At this tea party we welcome back Noushi, our esteemed TC Fellow from a Muslim background, to discuss the difference between perfect righteousness and relative righteousness and why it could be a pivotal difference between you and your Muslim friend.”

» Sign up for this one. There were still spaces available at the time of writing. Then pray and dream about hosting your own!

The Biggest, Most Important Challenge in 16 Years of Practical Mobilization

Are there 25 of us who would commit to finding, or starting, the team that would go to one of the largest unengaged Muslim groups?

We want to see the Great Commission competed, right? Even though we may disagree about what that looks like. We want to see God’s Kingdom come, right? Again, with diverse understanding of its nature.

There must be steps and stages on the way to God’s vision of consummation. Different benchmarks, waypoints, and goals. What if the start of the problem were defined as simply as this? “We must get one reproduction-oriented team of people on the ground among each unengaged people group.”

Those teams might come from anywhere. And there would be much more to do after they arrived. But could we make that a starting point? Some of us living among all.

Friends of mine who’ve invested many years in global, Great Commission work among Muslims have developed a researched and tested list of over 500 Muslim people groups they call unengaged. That first team has yet to arrive. In many cases, it’s hard to even find believers who are thinking about moving in with them.

If I’m lucky 1500 people will read this email. Are there 25 of us who would commit to finding, or starting, the team that would go to one of the largest unengaged Muslim groups? Just two dozen of us who would receive grace from God to open the flow of his grace to one of the peoples least impacted by the gospel?

I’ve compiled a subset of my friends’ list. Take a quick look at it and a long gaze at your Father. If he directs, put your name and email beside one of the peoples on the list. Together, we might be able to start the very beginning of what will ultimately be the fullness of God’s Kingdom among some precious people.

Plans to complete the Great Commission are nothing new. Some say there have been over 2600 since Jesus gave the challenge. I’m not presumptuous enough to think this idea is the solution to everything. But I’m feeling very committed to doing what I can do to find “engagers” for these 25 groups.

Here’s the massively over-simplified plan:

  1. Choose a people: Prayerfully go over the list and put your name and email by one of the peoples. If there’s already a name there, that’s good news. Join them.
  2. Become a champion: Learn, advocate, visit (virtually or IRL when permitted), become a stake holder.
  3. Find a cheerleader (I volunteer!): Mentoring, encouragement and connecting will be essential.
  4. Charge ahead. This assumes you’re operating out of the grace of God and not simply your own ambition. But God does want this done, right?

In the words of NASA’s Gene Kranz, flight director for the ill-fated Apollo 13, “let’s work the problem.”

Thank you for considering this challenge. I’m convinced God wants some of us from somewhere living as ambassadors among every people for whom that’s not currently reality. How wonderful if he were to allow you and me to join him in making that happen.

» Please watch this video where I start the cheerleader process, then consult the list.