What is God Doing in Mongolia?

Mongolia        

Population: 2.7 million

Capital:    Ulan Bator

People Groups:  20

Main Religion: Buddhism 54%

All Christians:  0.7%

"Mongolia experienced a special sort of heatwave in the form of a hot Christian breakthrough this summer," says Walter Heidenreich, leader of the FCJG youth mission in Ludenscheid, Germany. Mongolia was a Buddhist nation for centuries, with 45 monasteries. The Gospel first reached the nation only 10 years ago; today, there are some 250 Christian churches. In June 2003, 116,000 people attended healing events with evangelist Charles Ndifon; over 35,000 showed a desire to follow Jesus. Thousands were healed: the blind gained sight, the deaf heard, and invalids left their wheelchairs. The Gospel became talk of the nation. In the Gobi Desert, where there were no Christians only a few weeks ago, 60 people were baptised this autumn. There's also a new world record - 1,345 people crammed into a Ger (Mongolian circular tent) to hear the Gospel.  Walter Heidenreich, FCJG in "Summer of Love", November 2003

"Peldshid, a midwife in Selenge on the Siberian border, was healed of a liver problem during the evangelistic outreach with Charles Ndifon in summer 2003," reports Ruth Bat, a pastor's wife in Mongolia. A few weeks later, a baby was delivered prematurely in her hospital. It weighed only 1.4 kg (3 pounds). The doctors thought that it would not survive, so they should just let it die. The mother was sent home, apparently normal when the baby weighs less than 2kg. Peldshid had attended a pro-life seminar, where she heard of a 500 gram (1 pound) baby which had survived. In faith, she said "This is a special child. It will survive." Together with a nurse, she cared for the baby, putting it in an incubator until it could go home to its mother after a few weeks. That astonished the doctors, including those who had previously ridiculed Peldshid for her Christian faith. The baby survived because God had touched a nurse, who could now believe that God could perform miracles for others.  Ruth Bat, Friday Fax, November 2003

A long-term missionary in Mongolia says that God is separating the chaff from the wheat and that only now is the difference between true and superficial believers being revealed. John Gibbens went to Mongolia as a student from England in 1972. He left and returned again in 1978, married a Mongolian wife, and stayed on as a resident missionary. He planted his first church in 1990. He told Christian Aid this week that recent events in Mongolia are beginning to show who the true believers really are. He said that many who a few years ago had been heralded as Christian leaders of the future are now living in the USA, working in secular jobs to make money. According to Gibbens, an American missionary confessed that perhaps just three of the people attending his church organization were genuinely interested in following Christ. Gibbens said that the true Christians are those who recognize that it's "all about a relationship with God. They confess their sins and pray for each other at a real level." Gibbens knows very few people in Mongolia who practice that. "This year has been the first time that we have seen truly genuine people come into being, people who sincerely want God, just because they want God, and for no other motive," Gibbens said. "These people have discovered there is no other way, and that nothing else will satisfy." At the same time, Gibbens said false believers also were being unveiled. He referred to an American missionary who had appointed a 62-year-old Mongolian "pastor" over his church. When two devout women entered the meeting and began to say it was not possible to mix Buddhism with Christianity, the "pastor" went to great lengths to explain that there was no difference between Mongolian traditional beliefs and the Bible. The American missionary was startled by the whole discussion. He had no idea before this that people in his group believed that way. Gibbens urged that only fervent, continual prayer on behalf of the work in Mongolia would enable the wheat to be separated from the chaff and bring forth an indigenous church of true believers.  Christian Aid, Missions Insider, September 2003

A few weeks ago, Ajurzanii Baatar told his life story to the Japan missionaries Rob and Jean Gill. Here's an extract from his report: Bataar was brough up an atheist. His father was the Chief of Police in the Mongolian Communist party. In 1991, Bataar began to be interested in Christianity. His wife had been healed of her heart problems after receiving prayer from some Christians. He found his interest embaressing, so started to read the Bible on the toilet - the only private place in a Mongolian one-room apartment. Overcome by the love, truth and power of God, he gave his life to Jesus and three months later decided to devote his life to full-time ministry. At his first evangelistic meeting in 1992, 6 people accepted Jesus as their Lord and Saviour; after 3 months, he led a church of 60 and in the three years since then, the church has grown to 250. The people come from a radius of 200 miles. Pastor Bataar's vision is to plant a church in each town and village in Mongolia in the next 10 years. In 1990, there were less than 10 known Christians in Mongolia. According to Bataar, there are today over 5,000, and their number grows daily. There are still only 21 churches in the nation, which has 2.5 million inhabitants. Only two of them have Mongolian pastors; the others are led by foreign missionaries. Bataar is one of the two Mongolian pastors. He sent the other pastor as a missionary church-planter to the Moslem Kazaks in the West of the country.   Rob Gill, December 1995