An Alliance staff writer recently interviewed Matt* and Sally, who oversee Alliance ministries in gospel-resistant north and central Asia (NCA) which includes several creative-access countries. The couple discussed topics ranging from ministering to immigrants in America to ways the U.S. Alliance family can help fulfill the Great Commission in NCA—one of the last missions frontiers.
The Alliance (A): Dr. Tim Crouch, our U.S. Alliance vice president for International Ministries, has recently talked about how God is on the move in our world, making a way for all people to come to Him (see Luke 3:4–6). How do you see God doing this on behalf of those from NCA?
Matt (M): One component I see working today to advance the gospel is the diaspora (the dispersion of people from their original homeland). We have so many peoples on the move from one country to another; they are much more open to the gospel when they’re outside of their own nations. The Alliance is focusing its efforts to reach these people.
In one country we have four teams dedicated to working with NCA migrants. We’re putting many resources to bear in that effort. The challenge of course is that we don’t know how long we’ll be working with them. It could be a week, a month, maybe a year or two. But we just never know whether they’ll be kicked out or return to take care of family back home.
Our hope, the goal we’re working toward, is that they will take the gospel to their home countries after they leave and begin communities of faith at some point.
The diaspora is huge. These people groups are all coming to America, so it would be great if more U.S. churches could adopt a missions perspective about reaching them. There is no lack of opportunity to reach people from every country in the world—right here!
A: In recent years, terrorist attacks around the world and the flood of refugees pouring out of the Middle East have dominated news headlines. Many in the United States have voiced fears about the terrorism threat these immigrant families, these “diaspora peoples,” pose to our country. What are your thoughts on this perceived danger?
M: Tim Crouch also speaks to how much we are influenced by the nightly news—which tends to warp our understanding of people made in God’s image—as opposed to the good news. As a result, I’m concerned that many Americans, maybe even Alliance people, look at these migrants as the enemy.
We need a complete rethink: They’re made in God’s image, and they need to be redeemed.
God is calling us to minister to these brothers and sisters (a majority of whom are born into their religion) so that they can enjoy the fruits of the gospel as we do. These are people made in God’s image just as we are. Jesus died for them, just as He did for us.
Sally (S): Meanwhile, we live in a world where nowhere is safe. The apostle Paul lived a courageous life, and it wasn’t safe back then either (laughs). None of us have recently been beaten up and dropped over the ledge of a city wall.
A: In your experience, what is one of the biggest obstacles for peoples in NCA to come to faith in Christ once they hear the good news?
S: One of the really hard things is that their religion is where they get their identity; this is their community. So when we ask people to deny their religion, it’s a very big thing we’re asking of them; it can affect their family’s position. It’s not just them; it’s their whole family, their whole culture. And family is so important in those cultures. So your decision is never just your own.
M: I think it’s hard for Americans to understand this because we’ve grown up in an individualistic society; we make decisions based on what’s good for ourselves. But many parts of the world are collective. So you don’t make a decision based on what’s good for you individually; it’s what’s good for your family or even a wider unit—your community. That’s hard to understand.
But one of the strengths of the collective community is its strong ties and allegiances. So you don’t want “leaven” to come in and disrupt the community or extended family. But once you present the gospel and the gospel gets in, it’s in for good.
When we’re presenting the gospel, we have to be very aware of how important family—the extended family—and community are in these cultures. We have to recognize that we can’t pick one person or two people; we need to have strategies that are about “how do we reach this entire family, this entire community, for Christ?” The challenge is making that kind of strategy work. It’s very difficult to do.
S: This is why we need people praying. When you pray, a movement like the one in Kosovo is possible.
And as people become aware of how terrorism is staining their religion, they begin thinking: There has to be a better way. And the gospel can penetrate that shift in thought.
For the people of NCA to come to Christ, it really must be a moving of God—it’s going to take fasting and prayer.
A: How can Alliance people pray specifically?
M: Look at some of the apostle Paul’s prayers in Ephesians and Colossians. Pray those prayers, inserting NCA, or some of the countries in these regions. If we literally prayed these Scriptures over that part of the world, I think that would have as much effect—if not more—than anything else we could possibly do.
Praying the Scriptures back to God and claiming them as true and valid—right now—that would be huge. I think it’s just taking God’s Word at face value, believing it, and praying it, and trusting Him for the results—that kind of prayer would be the most important.
*Names changed
Learn More
For more about Alliance ministries to refugees and immigrants, check out the Nov/Dec 2016 issue of Alliance Life.