in this issue September/October 2000, Vol. 4 No. 5
- Features
- People Profile
- Agency Profile
- Opportunities
- Resource Reviews
- News and Needs
- Web Site Review
Spreading Gospel Takes Joint Operations
feature
by Bruce T. Sidebotham
Most of the world's remaining unreached peoples are not asking for missionaries.
They are hostile to the gospel message and resist all who would share it with
them. Therefore, the cost for goods, services, and ministry endeavors which
take the gospel into the harvest field must be borne by the harvest force itself.
In war, citizens cooperate and make great sacrifices for noble causes. To get the gospel proclaimed in all the world to all peoples before the end, God desires his people to exhibit similar selfless cooperation and sacrifice.
Resources
The resources for worldwide evangelization are prayer, money, and people.
Prayer, while requiring a minor sacrifice of time and attention, takes a major step of faith.
Money is a matter of priority and percent. For example, when I was a poor college student, I matched each penny I spent on luxuries (like a ski trip or a stereo) with a gift to missions.
The people needed are all volunteers.
These resources of prayer, money, and people reside abundantly in congregations and fellowship groups of reached communities. However, without being charitably donated, the resources might as well not even exist. Once given, they are brought to bear on the unreached areas of the world through a complex network of joint ministry operations.
Resource Allocation
The United States Army divides its branches of service into combat, combat support, and combat service support depending upon the degree of exposure to enemy fire. Similarly, organizations leveraging resources to impact harvest fields can be grouped into sending agencies, support agencies, and service agencies according to the degree of their engagement.
Sending Agencies
Combat arms like the infantry, armor, and artillery engage the enemy barrel to barrel if not face to face. These are like the agencies which send missionaries and tent-makers to live among people for whom no church in their language exists. These "sent ones" share Christ, disciple converts, and establish fellowships of new believers through relational ministry. Sending agencies pour the resources of prayer and money into these personnel who have direct ministry contact with unreached peoples.
Support Agencies
Combat support arms, like the signal corps and military intelligence, provide tools and services which multiply the effectiveness of units actually shooting at the enemy. In cross-cultural ministry, support agencies provide tools and services which enhance the effectiveness of the "sent ones."
These organizations pour prayer and money into their people and equipment for work like radio broadcasting, Bible translation and distribution, medical care, famine and disaster relief, community development, well drilling, engineering, and aviation. Like "combat multipliers" used by the armed forces, these activities could be called "ministry multipliers" for the way they enhance the effectiveness of tent-makers and missionaries doing face to face relational ministry.
Service Agencies
Finally, combat service support branches like the transportation and quartermaster corps provide tools and services which, though they aren't actually used in combat, make it possible for the combat units to fight. These are like agencies providing services used by churches, missionaries, and ministries that help those in the field to serve effectively.
For example, Barnabas International sends pastors to remote locations in order to counsel and encourage "sent ones" enduring hardship and isolation. Servants Missionary Service (SMS) mails prayer letters for missionaries to their supporters. Adopt-A-People Clearing House facilitates churches in adopting unreached people groups as projects for prayer and support. Missionary Training International (MTI) works together with churches and mission agencies to prepare and nurture volunteers for life and ministry abroad. The Interdenominational Foreign Missions Association (IFMA) helps their member agencies maintain standards of integrity in finances and Bible based theology. This organization, Operation Reveille, helps military Christians pray for and support ministry among unreached peoples in their respective areas of professional concern.
Interrelationships
Degree of exposure to unreached peoples differentiates service, support, and sending agencies in the same way that degree of exposure to combat differentiates combat, combat support, and combat service support units in the Army. An organization's immediate contribution indicates the degree of its exposure.
For example, the "product" offered by a service agency may be a better prepared, supported, and represented field missionary, or a better informed sending church. The "product" provided by a support agency may be thirty minutes of radio broadcast or a devotional booklet in an unreached language, or it may be medicine or air transportation for a critically ill unreached person. But the contribution of the "sent ones" is to produce congregations and converts among the unreached people.
A service agency "product" does not get consumed by unreached peoples. Rather, it gets used by either those doing or those supporting cross-cultural outreach. While support agency "products" do get consumed by unreached peoples themselves, these items do not achieve the objective. Mission accomplishment results from converts and new congregations produced by the "sent ones."
As in joint military operations, no single agency or service is better than the others. All contribute vitally to accomplishing the mission.
Some large agencies contain service, support ,and sending functions within one organization. Campus Crusade, for example, sends missionaries to work among unreached peoples, and produces tools like the JESUS video for them to use. Christian Missionary Alliance sends missionaries to unreached areas and also sends teachers for schools of missionary children. Underneath the Wycliffe umbrella, the Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL) trains and sends Bible translators while the Jungle Aviation And Radio Service (JAARS) establishes lines of communication necessary for translation work to proceed. Many denominational agencies who are making converts and planting churches according to their own distinctives also operate schools and hospitals in unreached areas.
Still, the classification of ministries according to degrees of exposure remains valid. Even within these large multi-function organizations, the divisions between service, support, and sending are more than just theoretical; they are structural. Separate departments and leadership usually exist for these different functions.
New Paradigms
The days of large mission agencies doing all of the functions necessary for effective cross-cultural ministry "in-house" by themselves are ending. This is the day of specialization and cooperation.
Even large fairly self sufficient mission agencies like Campus Crusade, the Navigators, Wycliffe, and the Southern Baptists are increasingly specializing and partnering with others. Small agencies, which can't function effectively alone, are springing up fast. Whole organizations like InterDev and the AD2000 and Beyond Movement have formed to do nothing but facilitate other organizations in working together.
The old paradigm in cross-cultural ministry focused on either geographic areas or evangelistic methods. The names of many agencies established under this paradigm reflect this approach. Here are just a few: China Inland Mission (CIM), Central American Mission (CAM), Sudan Interior Mission (SIM), Greater Europe Mission (GEM), Far East Broadcasting Co. (FEBC), Food for the Hungry, Christian Literature Crusade (CLC), and Wycliffe Bible Translators.
As times have changed some agencies have changed their names. China Inland Mission (CIM) became Overseas Missionary Fellowship (OMF). SIM merged with Latin American Mission (LAM) so that the letters no longer stand for their original designation. CAM added the word International and also no longer designates its letters. CLC changed its name to Every Home for Christ (EHC). An executive at GEM admitted to me recently that some in the organization are pushing to redefine "greater Europe" in a less geographically rigid sense.
A new paradigm focusing on unreached people groups is spawning new agencies and forcing the old ones to adapt. Names of the newest agencies like Pioneers, Frontiers, Team Expansion, Heart of God Ministries, and Mission to Unreached Peoples (all founded since 1980) reflect the new paradigm.
As cross-cultural ministry has gone from geographic and method oriented approaches to people group oriented work, it has matured from focusing on agendas to focusing on results.
Focusing on agendas divides the effort. There was a time when those involved in literature evangelism thought that literature would evangelize the world. Those in gospel radio thought that radio would evangelize the world. Those doing Bible translation thought that getting the Bible into every language would evangelize the world. The Southern Baptists thought they would complete the Great Commission and the United Methodists thought they would do it.
Today's focus on achieving results among unreached people groups unites effort around common objectives rather than dividing effort along lines of ministry agenda. Phil Butler of InterDev reported that a consultation for people groups in Central Asia was attended by over 200 representatives from 125 different agencies and local churches. Agendas represented included Scripture translation, production and distribution, production and distribution of audio and visual media, Christian broadcasting, face-to-face evangelism and church planting, tract production and distribution, relief and development, and tent-making.
When the objective becomes establishing reproducing fellowships of believers within a particular people group rather than propagating a particular denomination or evangelistic method to a global scale, then all of the various methods can be integrated and brought to bear for achieving a very specific purpose. In military terms this is equivalent to joint air, land, sea, and even space operations integrating not only infantry and artillery but every conceivable resource, including the whole electromagnetic spectrum, in order to bring overwhelming force to bear on a very specific objective.
This new paradigm not only facilitates cooperation across many denominational and organizational boundaries, it facilitates partnership across international boundaries as well.
Today, for the first time in over a thousand years, non-Western Christians outnumber Western ones. As a result, non-Western Christians are increasingly participating in the effort to reach the remaining peoples of the world.
The new paradigm of specialization and cooperation towards particular people group centered objectives facilitates cross-cultural partnership between many nationalities of "reached" peoples. Europeans, Asians, Africans, and Latins are all cooperating with one another in many fields.
Americans have important roles to play, but these roles will become more and more limited and specialized according to jobs that Americans can do best. We must be ready to become part of a multi-faceted and multinational movement taking advantage of uniqueness in every personality, nationality, and profession.
Kyrgyz Church Grows Nine Fold in Nine Years
People Profile
Steve Richardson, Director of Pioneers, reports, "When the Soviet Union disinte-grated
in 1991, there were less than a dozen known believers among the Kyrgyz people,
and no known churches. Today there are more than 2000 believers in 45 churches!"
The Kyrgyz inhabit one of the highest plateaus in the world wedged between three of the world's most spectacular and inaccessible mountain ranges, the Himalayas, the Hindu Kush, and the Tein Shan.
Almost 2.7 million Kyrgyz people live in the former Soviet Republic of Kyrgyz-stan where they compose just over half of the population in a country with 80 other ethnic groups. Nearly half a million Kyrgyz spill out into neighboring China, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. Another 40,000 live scattered throughout cities in Russia.
Most Kyrgyz consider themselves to be Muslim. Many continue in the beliefs
and practices of ancient animistic traditions.
The Kyrgyz are related to the Kazak and other Turkic peoples of Central Asia, though they look very Mongolian.
Generally, the land and climate is not suitable for farming, so this 80% rural population survives by herding hardy breeds of sheep, goats, yaks, horses, and camels. They are almost entirely dependent upon their livestock for food, shelter, clothing, and transportation.
Kyrgyz follow their herds in nomadic fashion as extended family units living in portable tents, or yurts across land that is free of snow only 60 days per year. Kygyz women are respected and are free to ride about the grasslands without wearing veils. Kygyz men husband their animals and hunt. Their belts, saddles, and bridles are sometimes covered with gold and precious stones. Kygyz love music and story telling. Their folklore is well developed. Tales are often sung to the accompaniment of a three stringed guitar called a dombra.
Kyrgyzstan was the first Central Asian republic to break away from the Soviet Union. Of the Central Asian republics, it is closest in form to a western style democracy. Freedom of religion for worship, choice, and witness is constitutionally guaranteed, although there is an opposition movement that wants an Islamic state.
A.D. 2000 and Beyond Movement Mobilizes the
Whole Protestant Church for the Whole Unreached World
agency profile
A decade ago researchers reported that Christian organizations and denominations
had thousands of different evangelization plans focusing on the end of the millennium
in the year 2000. The AD2000 and Beyond Movement was founded to facilitate and
coordinate these plans. With the slogan, "A church for every people and the
gospel for every person by the year 2000," it has mobilized cooperative evangelism
and church planting efforts worldwide.
Organizationally, the AD2000 and Beyond Movement has a very small full time staff operating out of just a few rented rooms in a Colorado Springs office building, but its worldwide impact has been profound. Ralph Winter, the founder of the US Center for World Mission, calls it "the largest, most pervasive global evangelical network ever to exist."
Four features of the AD2000 and Beyond Movement have given it strength and vitality.
- It is a grass roots movement. It functions from the bottom up through encouraging and facilitating national, regional, and network leaders around the world in what the Lord is calling them to do.
- It serves the whole Protestant Body of Christ overcoming barriers between traditional Evangelicals, Pentecostals, and Charismatics.
- It is led by non-Westerners. Its director is from Argentina, and other key leaders are from Mainland China, India, and Korea.
- It seeks to avoid duplication of effort by getting various ministries communicating with one another. For example, through the AD2000 and Beyond Movement, three organizations discovered they had been simultaneously working on a Bible translation for a language in Mali, but had been unable to cooperate because they were unaware of each other's efforts.
The AD2000 and Beyond Movement is energizing churches and ministries worldwide
to focus on the 10/40 Window. Either within or on the margins of this region,
which lies between 10 and 40 degrees north of the equator and stretches from
Africa to Asia, live 95% of the world's poorest and least evangelized people.
Over the past decade, the AD2000 prayer initiatives, called "Praying Through
the Window" have mobilized over 30 million people to intercessory prayer for
peoples, cities, and countries of the 10/40 Window.
Periodic Global Consultations on World Evangelization (GCOWE) organized by AD2000 and Beyond are shaping the course of modern church history. GCOWE '95 held in Seoul, Korea was attended by people from more different countries than any other Christian gathering in the history of the world. It gathered 4000 Christian leaders from 186 countries. That's 26 more countries than were represented in Seoul at the 1988 Olympics.
The Joshua Project initiative of this movement identified 1,739 ethnolingusitic peoples in dire need of church planting movements and has been mobilizing research, prayer, resources, and activity to reach these peoples.
The National 2000 Initiative aims to see the body of Christ in every nation mobilized and coordinated for establishing churches in every major city and among every major ethnic group within its nation.
Finally, the AD2000 and Beyond Movement is sponsoring Celebrate Messiah 2000 to be held in Bethlehem from 27 December 2000 to 02 January 2001. It will gather Christian leaders from all around the world to exalt Jesus Christ, cultivate a spirit of reconciliation, transfer leadership to a new generation, and seek guidance from the Holy Spirit for the new century.
2860 S. Circle Dr., Ste. 2112
Colorado Springs, CO 80906
phone: 1-719-576-2000, fax: 1-719-576-2685,
www.ad2000.org
Join a Research Team to Reconnoiter India or China
opportunity
by a Caleb Project research team member
The table at which we were reclining was long and narrow, overflowing with breads,
fruits, nuts, rice dishes, savory meats and deliciously cool yogurt salads.
The aroma of spices like cumin and fennel was thick in the air. The room practically
oozed hospitality.
The rest of the family, along with several of my teammates, were reclining on pillows along the table and round the room, laughing, eating and discussing the news, when the man beside me spoke, "Brother, you must become a Muslim." Tears were streaming down the weathered face. The hand on my forearm was firm, yet gentle. The voice was tinged with both urgency and sadness. I didn't know what to think. How could this man, so sincere, so steeped in his culture, ever follow Christ?
I would never have grappled with such a question if I had not been a part
of a research expedition with Caleb Project. Our three months in India brought
me face to face with Muslims like Jalal, Ali, and Hussein. The research got
us into their lives, homes, hopes and dreams far more deeply than I could
have imagined. These people became my friends.
Would you consider being part of a Caleb Project research expedition or do you know someone who might be interested?
This winter Caleb Project is sending multiple teams to do relationship-based research on the vast Indian subcontinent. Each team will receive a month of training before conducting three months of prayer-saturated field work among major unreached people groups. They will document what they learn for intercession, strategic planning, and mobilization on behalf of these peoples.
Next summer Caleb project is also sending several teams of shorter duration to China to conduct on-site prayer and research to help open up long-term work among some strategic peoples.
Contact:
phone: 1-303-730-4170
internet: www.calebproject.org
e:mail: research@cproject.com
Pray For Muslims During the Fasting Month of Ramadan
opportunity
In The Clash of Civilizations Samuel P. Huntington writes, "The twentieth-century
conflict between liberal democracy and Marxist-Leninism is only a fleeting and
superficial historical phenomenon compared to the continuing and deeply conflictual
relation between Islam and Christianity."
Most of the military conflict in the world today is occurring within or on the borders of Muslim civilization.
This international call to thirty days of prayer for Muslims is an opportunity to appreciate, learn about, and pray for Muslims during the fasting month of Ramadan which begins this year on November 27th.
A free tri-fold prayer guide brochure is available from Operation Reveille and YWAM is offering a detailed booklet for a small price.
YWAM's booklets:
P.O. Box 9208, Colo Spgs, CO 80932
phone: 1-719-442-6409
e:mail: paulf@30days.com
Internet: www.Pray4Them.org
3969 Half Turn, Colo Spgs, CO 80917
phone: 1-719-572-5908
fax: 1-209-315-5012
e-mail: operationreveille@altavista.net
International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted
Church
12 November 2000
opportunity
This years International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church (IDOP)
is supported by multimedia materials from the music group, Jars of Clay.
In mid-2000 the group traveled with Prayer for the Persecuted Church and its partner organizations to Asia to meet with Christians there and hear their stories. The video release, The Narrow Road, takes you on a journey to meet persecuted believers in Egypt, Vietnam, and China. You can listen to their voices and watch their faces as they speak of God's faithfulness in the midst of terrible hardship. Then, most importantly, you can vicariously share in their burden through united worldwide corporate prayer on the International Day of Prayer.
A new CD-Rom release called This Road features a song of that title by Jars of Clay and an image tour of the persecuted church around the world. The song is a benediction to the global body of Christ and a story of the journey we as believers take together in a community of worship.
These resources can be ordered from IDOP:
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Praying Through Turkey:
An Intercessor's Guide to an Ancient and Needy Land
resource review
Have you ever wondered what happened to the seven Asian churches to which the
book of Revelation was written? Why did they disappear?
This guide by Andrew Jackson and George Otis, Jr. answers these questions and more.
Strategic bridge between East and West, the land of Turkey is one of the most intriguing on earth.
This guide not only surveys Turkish history and geography with a special view towards spiritual intercession, it provides invaluable advice and insight on how to pray for the right things in the right way.
Most travel guides tell you about the scenery, restaurants, and lodging, but this one can turn your travels into an adventure of faith whether you actually use it on site or from the privacy and security of your own home.
Prayer Guide Will Help You Understand Muslims During
the Fasting Month of Ramadan
resource review
This CD is a serious resource for helping us understand Muslims and function
effectively in Islamic culture. It contains the full text of over fifty books
as well as journal articles, seminary courses, photographs, maps, a bibliography,
and links to sites on the World Wide Web. The CD was produced in conjunction
with Fuller Seminary, the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization, and the
Institute for the Study of Islam and Christianity in London. What would normally
cost hundreds of dollars on paper is digitally available for $39.95.
For more info contact:
Expulsions of Missionaries from Russia Are Rising
news and needs
This article is from
Keston News Service
A significant number of foreign Christian missionaries have been expelled from
Russia, with an increased number over the past year, reveals a major investigation
by Keston News Service. Other missionaries are being obstructed in their work.
Cases documented by Keston range from the mass expulsion of seven American adults
and their eleven dependent children, through the expulsion of a German Lutheran
Pastor, to the obstruction of a public lecture on C.S. Lewis.
Several of the missionaries barred from Russia commented to Keston that they were unable to obtain an explanation for their exclusion, while the procedure followed by the authorities in reaching a decision to bar entry is unclear.
Tolerance towards foreign missionaries has been one of the touchstones of religious freedom in Russia since the lifting of Soviet-era controls. "Increasing restrictions on foreign missionaries are often an indicator of increasing restrictions on religious freedom in general," comments director of Keston Institute Lawrence Uzzell.
"Much of the hostility towards foreign missionaries comes from local officials whose job was to keep religion in check during the Soviet era," adds Keston's Moscow correspondent Geraldine Fagan. "But behind these officials often stands the FSB, the successor to the KGB, who appear to regard the foreign missionary presence in Russia as a serious threat to state security."
Russia's National Security Concept, signed by the then acting president Vladimir Putin last January, highlighted what it termed the "negative influence of foreign missionaries" in the country.
"Many missionaries just keep quiet when they are expelled," Geraldine Fagan adds, "fearing that other projects their missions are undertaking or the activity of the congregations they have been working with will be threatened."
Denied entry to Russia on three occasions last year, US Protestant missionary Dan Pollard -- who had founded and led a church in the Pacific coastal region of Khabarovsk Krai -- told Keston that he has encountered anger from local religious officials because "I have not left quietly like so many other missionaries." Pollard believes that Russia will force out all foreign missionaries within the next ten years.
Keston notes that not all missionaries are encountering problems -- some continue to engage in high-profile ministry in Russia without difficulty.
Church Planting Movements Are Running Wild!
news and needs
Condensed from David Garrison's booklet on Church Planting
Movements
viewable at www.imb.org/CPM/Preface.htm
When the vision of planting churches spreads from the missionary or cross-cultural
church planting professional to the indigenous church itself so that self governing
and self sustaining churches rapidly multiply among a particular people group,
a church planting movement has begun. Below are just a few examples of what
God is doing through church planting movements in previously unreached regions
of the world.
- In a region of China with seven million people among five different people groups the church has grown from a handful of believers in three congregations in 1993 to over 55,000 believers in 550 congregations in 1998.
- In a region of India among an ethnic group of ninety million in over 170,000 villages spread across four provinces the number of churches grew from 28 in 1989 to 2,000 in 1998.
- Protestant Christianity has been in Cambodia a long time, but it never exceeded about 5000 people. By 1990, under the cruel dictatorship of the Khmer Rouge and subsequent Vietnam-installed government, the number of Protestant believers in Cambodia had dwindled to less than 600. Today, just ten years later, there are over 60,000.
- In Ethiopia, where a missionary took thirty years to plant four churches, 65 new churches have been planted in the last nine months.
- In a North African country a Muslim cleric was heard to complain in the weekly Friday sermon that more than 10,000 of his brethren in the surrounding mountains had apostatized to Christianity.
Also universally present and healthy in movements like these are the church functions of worship, evangelistic outreach, nurturing of believers with education and discipleship, mercy ministry, and fellowship.
Rapid church growth is occurring where members are passionate about the importance of salvation and the necessity of conversion. In many cases, conversion leads to persecution and sometimes even death. Much growth is occurring in the voids left by war and disaster, or some other form of social disintegration.
In church planting movements, theological education occurs intentionally and aggressively as a kind of on the job training. New converts are not only immediately discipled, but they are expected to become witnesses and disciple others or even become church planters themselves. Foreign money and leadership is kept to a minimum so that all of the elements necessary for rapid duplication are streamlined and available locally.
Church planting movements are driven by lay leaders, who have the same level of income, education, and lifestyle as the people they are shepherding. If the people are illiterate fishermen, then the leaders are too. This facilitates acceptance and uses the largest possible pool of personnel resources for leadership.
Finally, missionaries who have been instrumental in starting or aiding church planting movements seem to suffer a disproportionate amount of calamity, illness, derision, and shame, underscoring the spiritual intensity of the struggle.
Silk Road Becomes Gospel Highway in Central Asia
news and needs
Feature Story from
www.ReligionToday.com for 5 September 2000
More than 18,000 Christians from many points along the Silk Road gathered in
Almaty, Kazakhstan, to celebrate their faith in July at the 5-day Silk Road
2000 Festival, Norm Nelson of Life At Its Best radio ministry told Religion
Today. Nelson and his wife, Cher, who were among the few Westerners to participate
in the festival, intend to encourage Christians as they share stories about
what God is doing in the region.
Christians from many countries attended, according to Assist Communications. They came from Chechnya, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kurdistan, Uzbekistan, Syria, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Turkey, and Ukraine. Others traveled from India, Pakistan, Nepal, and other parts of Asia, the Middle East, and Europe to take part.
The festival "became a kind of Central Asian Pentecost," Nelson said. It was "a supernatural bonding together of diverse national and linguistic peoples, Spirit-filled, energized, and commissioned to witness to the love and Lordship of Jesus Christ."
They gathered in Almaty's outdoor stadium to worship. People sang praise songs, waved Kazak flags, and shouted "Shine Kazakhstan," Assist said. Police and government officials were deeply affected by the display of love for the country. "Their attitude changed astonishingly when they saw we came to give life and honor to the country," Nelson said.
The event included educational seminars, mobile medical clinics, cultural events, and seminars on economic development, Assist said. A high-level government official made a public profession of faith, Nelson said. Organizers told him that the man stated that he had professed faith in Christ and was very excited, Nelson said. "He told them that the whole country needed to hear this message -- that they should get it on TV and radio."
Silk Road 2000 was "a watershed event," according to AD 2000 and Beyond's Luis Bush. "It has the potential to launch a powerful evangelistic movement all across Central Asia and into Turkey." Bush was the only Western leader to address the gathering.
Hundreds of Koreans made short-term mission trips to several countries after the festival. "It was a kind of missionary boot camp," Nelson said. They didn't go with a lot of money or resources to give away but tried to form relationships, he said, and many will go back to work as full-time missionaries.
Thousands of Christian "tentmaker missionaries" are at work in central Asia, Nelson said. They hold secular jobs and minister to people through personal relationships. Christian physicians, businessmen, travel agents, and other professionals work and minister quietly.
Korean Christians organized the festival and are sending many workers to the area. Koreans have adopted the region because they have a special ability to learn its various languages. The Korean language belongs to the Turkic family of language, as do many central Asian languages. "In typical Korean fashion, they look at [their linguistic ability] as a mandate from God to evangelize the region," Nelson said.
It is a miracle that the event took place in such a heavily Muslim region. Islam dominates central Asia, and Kazakhstan is nearly 50 percent Muslim. The Kazak government granted official permission for the event only two days before it began, Nelson said. "Humanly speaking, it probably never should have happened, but this was God's event in God's time and it was supposed to happen."
www.TheBibleSite.org
Clicking This Site Sends Scripture Portions to Persecuted Christians
web site review
Now there is a way you can help to provide Bibles to people in countries that
restrict religious freedom at no cost to you.
By visiting "The Bible Site" on the Internet you can click a button that will send a Scripture portion funded by the sponsors of the site to a persecuted Christian.
Sponsors fund the donations as part of their commitment to provide God's Word to those under oppressive governments, and to raise awareness of the plight of persecuted Christians through links and banners on the site.
The success of this campaign depends on as many Christians as possible visiting "The Bible Site" and encouraging others to do the same.
"The Bible Site" is an outreach effort of Open Doors with Brother Andrew, an international nondenominational Christian mission founded in 1955 by Dutchman Brother Andrew, best known through his best-selling autobiography "God's Smuggler."