Churches to reach Thailand’s Issan people in the isolated northeast. The largest people group in Thailand is the Issan, who live in the northeast where vast areas have no evangelical presence. They number more than 22 million—more than a third of the population of Thailand—and only 0.3 percent are Christians. More than 400 Issan die every day without knowing the Lord.

In 1929 The Alliance sent its fi rst missionaries to Thailand. Since then we have worked almost nonstop among the Issan and maintained a Bible school among them since the 1930s. The Alliance began the fi rst Christian radio broadcast in this country in the early 1950s. A church, though small, was planted. Today, the C&MA national church, The Gospel Church of Thailand, headquartered in Khonkaen City, numbers about 3,000.

The Alliance is initiating a church-planting movement that will impact three of the northern-most provinces of the Issan region, where many struggle fi nancially. The situation is so desperate that parents are selling their children into child labor or prostitution. Issan youth are seeking work in the cities, where they are lured into drug addiction and gambling. The Alliance is asking God for one believer to pray for each of the 2,500 Issan villages. The goal is to train and equip national leaders to plant multiplying churches in northeast Thailand.

• Partner with two Alliance couples, Norm and Doris Ford and Jim and Kathy Sappia, in prayer and giving. • Provide funds for literature distribution and outreach events. • Participate in short-term missions trips.

The Fords and Sappias see doors opening for a church-planting movement among the Issan. “We believe that the heart of God is for all people to have an opportunity to respond to the love of Jesus Christ,” says Norm Ford. “The task ahead is huge. Please consider being a watchman on the wall for Issan.”