Countries Where We
Assist Native Ministries
Overview
Southeast Asia is home to an incredibly diverse population. The island nation of Papua New Guinea alone is home to more than 1,000 people groups who speak more than 800 languages. Christianity has taken root and continues to grow among ethnic minorities who face increasing persecution from oppressive regimes.
Islam is another challenge to native believers in Southeast Asia. Christians in Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation, face high levels of persecution from radical Muslims, who are pushing Sharia-inspired laws in more communities. Meanwhile, a growing Muslim population on the island of Mindanao in the Philippines continues to breed radicalism and hatred for Christians. In both of these countries, however, Christianity has sustained continued growth.
With the growth of Christianity in Southeast Asia comes an enormous need for trained church leaders. Thousands of rural congregations languish without adequate leadership, falling into unbiblical teaching, moral failure, and syncretism.
In addition to persecution from radical Muslims and hostile governments, native missionaries in Southeast Asia are challenged to minister to unreached people groups in regions of extreme poverty and where there is rampant drug usage. The countries of Myanmar, Laos, and Thailand comprise Southeast Asia’s Golden Triangle, one of Asia’s two main opium-producing areas. Myanmar is also the world’s largest producer of methamphetamines.
How You Can Make a Difference
Ways To Give
Evangelism & Discipleship
Through the work of one indigenous ministry in Vietnam, more than 3,000 house churches exist in the country’s Central Highlands. A ministry on the island of Mindanao in the Philippines has shared the gospel and planted churches among the island’s 13 Muslim-majority tribes through carefully trained native missionaries. Though ministry inside North Korea is impossible under the present regime, native missionaries established underground churches in six locations in northern China among North Korean women who were trafficked across the border. GIVE NOW to help evangelistic and discipleship ministries like these in Southeast Asia.
Community Engagement
In Indonesia, several Christian Aid Mission-assisted ministries are providing business training to desperately poor pastors and equipping them to start microenterprises to support their families and fledgling churches. GIVE NOW to help community engagement ministries like these in Southeast Asia.
Compassion
In Myanmar, where multitudes fall prey to drug addiction, a ministry is sharing the love of Christ through its two addiction recovery centers where addicts are cared for and discipled in God’s Word. GIVE NOW to help compassion ministries like this one in Southeast Asia.
Exclusive Stories from the Mission Field
Support Discipleship Of New Believers in Indonesia
Church planters of one ministry have shared the gospel with 21,335 people during the last six-month period, and of that number, 650 people decided to follow Christ. One new believer, a street busker who had lost all hope for his future, was baptized, and now he is discipled regularly by Christian workers.
Train Leaders For War-Torn Mission Field in Myanmar
Thousands of people have been brutally murdered in Myanmar’s ongoing civil war, and many thousands more have fled their homes. But the Holy Spirit continues to move despite the oppressive fear that hangs over the country.
Bring Eternal Life to the Lost in Cambodia
A native ministry provides accommodation for university students and others where the gospel can be shared. One impoverished young man was neither a Christian nor a student, but after coming to Christ he has moved back to his home village, where he has obtained work and eagerly shares his faith with others. Another young man from the slums was turned away from a Buddhist temple but began living at the dormitory, where he learned about Christ and changed his life course.
Help Plant Churches in Indonesia
A native ministry has 137 church planters sharing the gospel throughout the country, and over the course of six months they planted 34 house churches. Including people who heard about Christ through social media, workers shared the message of salvation with 15,800 people.
Send the Salvation Message in Burma
Sometimes relocating from one place to another to escape military and other violence, native Christian workers at one ministry shared the gospel with 4,500 people over a period of six months. Helping to meet humanitarian needs such as food and health care opened the way for many gospel discussions, and the ministry emphasizes one-on-one evangelism as most effective.
Help Workers Share the Gospel in Vietnam
As churches multiply and grow, native Christian workers are key to training pastors with an accredited program of theological education by extension. Thousands of students are enrolled in first- and second-level courses, and native missionaries are now working in 22 provinces to share the gospel, disciple new believers, and plant house churches.