A missionary from South Asia, Intizar, recently visited ANM. South Asia regional director Thomas John, writer Sue Morris, and I had the opportunity to sit down with him and discuss his work.
Rebecca: We would like a story of someone who has been impacted by your ministry. How do you help them?
Intizar: We reach people through different ways. Our big tool is the Bible, but sometimes we use other tools like water hand pumps. Water is very important for everyone. Most of the areas in my home country in South Asia need clean water. Installing water hand pumps has become a way to enter new communities. We install them, then we meet with the leader of the community and say, “We have good news for you.” Our team members share the Word of God in the native language. That’s the way we reach the people with water hand pumps.
We reach them with Bibles too. We provide written Bibles and audio Bibles, since some people are illiterate. Bibles are very expensive. They are printed in Korea on very nice paper. We follow up when we give Bibles. We visit the person and ask questions. “What are you reading?” “What do you understand from that passage?” If they don’t understand something, they write it down, and then next time we can explain it. So after some time, maybe three months or six months, they follow Jesus Christ.
Thomas: There is a process among the dominant religious communities in South Asia. This first phase, when somebody is responding back to God and the Holy Spirit is changing his heart, is called “seeker.” We are not forcing, but the person is reading the Bible and open to learning. The follow-up team can meet the seeker, maybe in a tea shop, with other people. Then you can have fellowship of believers and mature seekers.
Intizar: Mature seekers, they are undecided and they feel safe with the follow-up team. They can exchange numbers and communicate through WhatsApp. They have to be careful around some seekers. There is danger if someone is not a genuine seeker.
There is fear because of the security agencies. Many South Asian countries are security states. The constitution may allow us to preach Christianity, but the people don’t. So there are problems. There is pressure. Some of our past partners don’t handle the pressure well. It’s a lot of pressure, especially mentally.
There is pressure on the people sharing the Gospel and on the seekers. Accepting Jesus is a big step. It’s learning something and accepting something that is against the seeker’s culture. The culture is based on shame, and honor is far more important than anything. So a family member could kill them to restore honor.
Then on the other side are the Christian people and missionaries. They have this fear in them: “Is this person a true believer? Will they accept Christ?” So this phase is hard and difficult, and both sides must move forward in faith.
God is working here, and a lot of wisdom and discernment is needed. We have follow-up meetings every month. We send out the date and the topic so people can come with questions.
This phase with seekers has a very sensitive approach, not to say anything against the dominant religion in the area. If someone comes with questions, they may be recording or making a video. [They may be] secret followers of the dominant religion, and they don’t want to change.
One mistake could destroy the whole ministry. Just two months ago, we were conducting a meeting and a person came. A university student who follows the dominant religion. We know he is not good for Christians, he is against Christians. Every time, he comes and records. We stopped him coming last time. We say we do not allow videos.
We are very careful. All it takes is one person. They will attack a whole community. They will burn down all the houses and churches.
Another problem is that the church in my home country does not accept believers who have a background in the dominant religion. They exist in their own circle or small congregation or discipleship meetings, but we can’t bring these new believers to a mainline church. The mainline church leadership will not accept them. This is something very strange and sad and we don’t have the answers for. After accepting Jesus Christ, the church does not accept them.
And Christian people in my home country ask, “Why are you giving these people Bibles? This person is from a different religion. They are against the Bible.” But not every non-believer is equal. Many people of the dominant religion are very kind and very humble to accept the Bible. Sometimes we give them a Bible and they respect it, they kiss it.
People in the Bible are in other religious books. Some people see Christ Jesus as a prophet with his New Testament. They see Moses as a prophet and he had the Torah. Psalms for David, the prophet. We connect with them, we lead them and tell them about Christ.
But you see the challenge for them if they accept. The challenge for us is to enable them to be a regular part of the community in terms of work, vocation, job, family, life. I’ve seen them struggle in my home country, and [they cannot leave]. They can’t get asylum everywhere, right? They go through a very tough life because if they’ve chosen a path of becoming a Christian, their family will not accept. If they are well off in their family, then they are cut off financially. They will go through crises because no inheritance will be there. If it’s a woman, then even more problems. So we need a lot of wisdom and prayer.
I don’t have answers. We have so much to learn, you know, how to enable them and help them feel useful. One option is helping people go into ministry. They can get a wage and become pastors. But what seminary will accept a convert from the dominant religion background? That is a challenge.
Another challenge is the new believer coming to the church. Sometimes the Christian churches in my home country use converts for their testimonies. They feel exploited at times. They’re just there for the testimony, interview, report, maybe a picture. But then when there is need to have fellowship, help for children, medical help, help for education, the church is gone.
So the convert comes to us and asks, well, “How can you help?” But we are living in a developing world too. So you see the difficulty in mission work in South Asia, especially with people from the dominant religion.
And we are not called to make converts; we are called to disciple. So we need to be able to kind of keep on that connection. No matter how poor we are, we need to be able to support them, keep on encouraging them in God’s word and see good examples that are still strong in the faith.
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Thomas: Let me explain about the church in South Asia. When you talk about a mainline church, there are established teachers, and they have property. They have a good organization structure and buildings because the British left them. Majority of them are not mission-minded churches.
Some organization partners had a burden for the lost world. They came to the field and started to work. And the new converts are coming, but carrying new converts exposes you to danger because of mob attacks. Public mobs come to collective consciousness and work together to attack you, burn down your house. They may even kill you. Something happened recently where the court said the converts from the dominant religion were innocent, but when they came out, the mob said, “We will kill you.” We said, “We know how to handle it, and we want to take the family out of the country.” So such situations like that are the worry of the mainline churches so they avoid mission activities and stay in their comfort zones.
They will listen to the testimony, but the convert can’t go in for worship because it will risk lives. The church will not take risks. It all comes down to commitment. This is what the organization struggles with.
Sue: So converts struggle with the church and with the people from the dominant religion. They’re caught in the middle.
Intizar: Yes.
Thomas: The traditional, mainline church is paralytic. Not even able to move, no feeling. On the other side are minority Christians, who may not fully belong to the mainline churches. We call them a remnant, and they are very active for the mission. Then the fringes of the dominant religious group are violent and attack them.
Intizar: You know the story of the turtle and the rabbit?
Rebecca: Yes, the tortoise and the hare.
Intizar: It is the same. You can go fast and stay in one place or you can move very, very slowly and hopefully win the race. The traditional church would rather go with the flow and be successful in a lot of different things, doing relief work and helping educate people. But that is the easy and fast option. The slow option is church planting. If you actually want to plant churches in the majority community, then your worker must be committed. He has to learn the language. He has to know the culture. He has to learn to know the pain and the problem of the people. That is very slow. You have to have a strong connection.
Believers from the dominant religious background also have problems because they aren’t used to the Christian style of worship. They don’t know songs, so how can they sing them? The way of sitting in a church service and everything. It has to be contextualized.
And in each region, it’s a different culture. Even though I am from the same country, I have to change too.
The whole country is changing. In the cities, women are now showing their faces. But in the villages it’s difficult to talk to women. They separate men and women. We need trained women for that. We don’t have many. Sometimes the wife of a pastor can go sit with the women for a while and teach them.
But we think our God is bigger than all these challenges. He’s working, and we’re here to share that something is happening. Not on the surface, but under the surface. The Holy Spirit is moving in South Asia.
The church figure is small, maybe 3%. We are not bothered by that. We are [occupied with] what God is calling us to do. He’s called us. So we’re not there to change figures and increase the number of converts and make big reports. Some people would do that, but that reality is very hard.
For example, if somebody has donated bags of food and we ask a big group of people to come and raise their hands for who wants a food bag, they will all raise their hand. It’s very easy to take a picture of that and say, they’re all wanting to be Christians. Or they will raise their hand to become a believer because they want the food bag. They will do that, they will lie, because they’re so poor. But we don’t want to do that.
Thomas: They are not counting heads.
Intizar: We are challenging Satan and His kingdom. That is where the problems arise.
Rebecca: What else do you want the American church, the Western church, to know about ministry work in South Asia?
Intizar: Every organization and every country has different challenges. If we can be in sync, then the Christian church here can help the Christian church in my home country. But the situations are changed everywhere now. Mostly churches are funding humanitarians now. If you ask them for Bibles, they may give a few times. But if you ask them for funds for a project like medical or food or toilets or water, they will give immediately. If you ask for help for mission work in 2024, it is very difficult.
Thomas: There is a tiny remnant standing for the cause of the Gospel. And we [ANM] are standing with that remnant.
Sue: That’s what we do. We have people who believe in us and believe in you, Intizar.
Intizar: The heart of the ministry is that we want God’s Word to be in the different regions of my home country in South Asia. It’s a very populous country and my generation is starting. We are plowing the ground. And that’s hard work. We don’t have the tools, we just have the will and the calling. We need to partner with like-minded people because the plowing is difficult, but maybe in the future in the 10/40 Window, maybe another generation will see the fruit. Maybe we won’t be there, but they can look back at our generation and see that somebody has done the work.
Rebecca: Thank you.
You can join with us in praying for Intizar, his home country, and ministries in South Asia. Download our free 10/40 Window Prayer Guide now. Learn more about what the 10/40 window is and why it’s important on our blog.
