Asia Harvest Latest News

This page provides you with latest news and prayer requests related to the countries we work in throughout Asia. It is updated often, so please check back regularly.

The latest Asia Harvest newsletter examines the question of Bibles in China, and looks at the conflicting information coming from the world's most populated nation which brings confusion to many Christians around the world. A must read for all those interested in the plight of the Gospel in China. Click here to read it.

From Pioneers comes the following encouraging testimony of how the Lord Jesus Christ reached a Muslim family in Central Asia....

A Christian leader told his assistant to go to an old section of the city (which is all Muslim) and preach the gospel. The very first man he spoke to got upset and ordered the evangelist to leave his house. After reporting his difficulties to the pastor, the evangelist was to go back to the same man and preach again. So he went back and began to talk to the man about Jesus. This time, the man started shouting and cursing, and threatened to beat him if he ever came back.

When the pastor heard what happened, he told the evangelist to go back to the same house one more time. The evangelist resisted, saying that the man would certainly beat him, and maybe even kill him. But the pastor encouraged him to go again. The evangelist obeyed and prayed along the way. The previous two times he had prayed for God to open the hearts of the people he met; this time he prayed for God to protect him. He was fearful for his life, but he went obediently.

When he got to the house, he saw a five-year-old girl playing at the front gate. He began to tell her about God, about creation, and about Jesus Christ being the Savior. After a while, the father discovered what was happening and came out with a large stick to beat the evangelist. As he was about to strike him, the girl shouted, "Papa, stop! Don't hit him. You must listen to what he says and start going to church from now on."

The father dropped the stick and started crying. His daughter had been deaf and mute all her life, and the Lord Jesus had miraculously healed her. The evangelist had not known her condition. He was simply being obedient to the command to preach the gospel to the lost, even if it meant that he would be beaten and possibly killed. The entire family of seven came to faith in Christ. Source: Pioneers, May 2010.

Our latest newsletter highlights the Northern Khampa Tibetans - the group in Qinghai Province who live at the epicenter of the disastrous earthquake that struck in April. Illustrated by several beautiful pictures of these precious people, our newsletter introduces the reader to this fascinating unreached people group, and provides ways we are helping those whose lives have been destroyed by the 'quake. Click here to download it.

No doubt you have heard about the huge earthquake that struck a remote area of Qinghai Province, northwest China, on Wednesday April 14.

The damage is centered on the town of Yushu, home to 85,000 people. More than 90% of the buildings in Yushu have collapsed (see before and after pictures above). The latest reports from China have the death toll at over 2,200, with many people still missing. The area has experienced more than 1,200 aftershocks in the first five days after the quake.

It is hard to imagine a more difficult and remote location for such a disaster to strike. Many of the villages that have been devastated lie at high altitude, and temperatures are below freezing at night. Some of the Chinese soldiers that were sent to help in Yushu have suffered from potentially-fatal altitude sickness. This part of China is home to the Northern Khampa Tibetan people. Most of them lead nomadic lives, herding sheep, yaks and goats on the plateau. In the past we have written about this unreached group in our prayer books. Click here to read one of our profiles on the Northern Khampa people.

Within hours of the earthquake striking, a team of Chinese and a few foreign Christians traveled to the disaster zone to help. Most of these believers were involved with the earthquake relief efforts in Sichuan Province in 2008. The combination of their loving help and bold witness for Jesus Christ saw thousands of people in Sichuan come to faith in the living God. In Yushu they have initially provided blankets and warm coats to the people, and now they have put together at least 500 emergency aid kits to help the worst-affected families. The kits include:

Each kit costs $100 for the items and delivery into the hands of the most needy families in Yushu Prefecture.

If you would like to help with the urgent need to provide emergency aid kits your donation would be greatly appreciated. You can do so either by donating by credit card to the Asia Disaster Relief fund on our secure website, via Paypal (our address is paypal@asiaharvest.org) or by sending a gift by post, with a note that it is for the Asia Disaster Relief fund, to any of the Asia Harvest addresses listed on our contacts page.

If you are familiar with our work you will know that 100% of gifts to the Asia Disaster Relief fund will go directly to the need. Not a cent will be deducted for administration or any other expense. We cover such expenses ourselves as it is the least we can do during such a time of need. All donations in the United States are tax-deductible.

If you have any questions please don't hesitate to contact us. Please feel free to notify anyone you think would be interested in praying or helping. Please pray for the Northern Khampa and all people affected by this earthquake. Pray the Lord Jesus will be lifted up in this needy area, so many people will gain help not only physically but also spiritually.

Project Update: 400 emergency kits provided. Thank you! Please continue to pray for the salvation of the Northern Khampa Tibetan people.

After more than a decade of research, we are now able to present the most comprehensive study ever conducted into the number of Christians in all 2,371 cities and counties, within all 33 provinces, municipalities, and regions of China. Estimates are provided for all believers - Protestants belonging to the registered Three-Self churches as well as house churches, and for registered and underground Catholic believers. To read the results of our survey, click here.

The first Asia Harvest newsletter of the year is our annual report covering our activities last in 2009. Take a look back at the projects and initiatives we have had the privilege of helping with throughout Asia last year. To read our 2009-10 Annual Report, click here.

On January 10, 48 Christians, including women and children, were marched from their village at gunpoint in the small Southeast Asian nation of Laos. They were abandoned on the roadside three miles from their homes, and when they attempted to return home they found the pathways blocked by armed police squads. Christian Aid Mission reports that the believers in Katin Village, Saravan Province, have faced years of cruelty at the hands of the Lao authorities before this eviction. The Christians, who are now living under temporary shelters in the jungle, had their church building confiscated in 2003. Rather than giving up meeting together, they gathered in the open-air to worship God.

Back in Katin village, the officials seized personal belongings from 11 homes and scattered them in an open field. They confiscated a pig from one believer’s home, and destroyed 6 of their 11 bamboo homes. On January 18, the Saravan provincial religious affairs’ official, Mr. Khampuey, and the Ta-Oly district official, Mr. Bounma, showed up at the site where the believers were forced to stay. Both officials ridiculed the faith of the villagers and tried to persuade them to renounce their faith saying, “Why do you believe in the Bible? It’s just a book.” The believers responded by saying it was not just a book but a gift from God. But the officials only continued with their mocking, “The other poor people from your village are receiving assistance from the Government because they do not believe in the Christian faith. But you believers – are you receiving any help?”

When one of the believers replied that he had been given new life by the Holy Spirit, the officials again derided the group with more threats: “See what happened to you because of your belief? You are left in the middle of nowhere without any home, food, or help. You should deny your Christian belief and then you will be allowed to return to your village. None of the other 56 villages in this district wants you either. They said they would rather live with lepers and the demon- possessed than to have Christians residing among them.” Source: Christian Aid Mission.

Please pray for our Christian brothers and sisters in the Communist nation of Laos. Pray they will remain strong in Christ and that God will help them maintain a strong witness in the face of such persecution.

Disillusioned with Hindu nationalists, the leader of a militant Hindu extremist group has told Christian ministry Compass that contact with Christians in prison had led him to repent of bombing a Catholic church in Nepal in May 2008.

Ram Prasad Mainali, the 37-year-old chief of the Nepal Defense Army (NDA), was arrested on Sept. 5 for exploding a bomb in the Church of Our Lady of the Assumption, in the Lalitpur area of Kathmandu on May 23. The explosion killed a teenager and a newly-married woman from India’s Bihar state and injured more than a dozen others. In Kathmandu’s jail in the Nakkhu area, Mainali told Compass he regretted bombing the church.

“I bombed the church so that I could help re-establish Nepal as a Hindu nation,” he said. “There are Catholic nations, there are Protestant nations and there are also Islamic nations, but there is no Hindu nation. But I was wrong. Creating a religious war cannot solve anything, it will only harm people.”

Mainali, who is married and has two small daughters, added that he wanted members of all religions to be friendly with one other. Asked how the change in him came about, he said he had been attending a prison fellowship since he was transferred to Nakkhu Jail from Central Jail four months ago. “I have been reading the Bible also, to know what it says,” he said. Of the 450 prisoners in the Nakkhu Jail, around 150 attend the Nakkhu Gospel Church inside the prison premises.

Mainali said he began reading the Bible after experiencing the graciousness of prison Christians. “Although I bombed the church, Christians come to meet me everyday,” he said. “No rightwing Hindu has come to meet me even once.”

Jeevan Rai Majhi, leader of the inmates of Nakkhu Jail and also a leader of the church, confirmed that Mainali had been attending the church, praying and reading the Bible regularly. Union of Catholic Asian News reported on Nov. 30 that Mainali had sent a handwritten letter to a monthly Christian newsmagazine in Nepal, Hamro Ashish (Our Blessing), saying he had repented of his deeds in the prison.

Source: Compass Direct.