The Tigray conflict that lasted from 2020 – 2022 took a high toll on the area. Even with a peace deal that was reached in 2022, tensions have remained high. Lately, conflict has increased.

Persecution or War?

Todd Nettleton with The Voice of the Martyrs USA says with such longstanding volatility, it can be challenging to discern what some of the violence means. When a group of Christians are attacked, is it part of the violence of war or is it targeted persecution?

Nettleton says, “That’s one of the things that’s happened over the past couple of years in Ethiopia, is we’ve seen these attacks. It’s like, okay, was that warfare? Was that persecution? But when you see none of the other buildings in the neighborhood got blown up, except the church, it’s like, well, wait a minute, somebody was targeting that church. That was persecution. That was a targeted attack against that church.”

(Representative image courtesy of Hervé Clootens via Pixabay)

Violence crossed the line into persecution in February. There was an attack at a market in the East Arsia Zone in the Oromia region of Ethiopia. This region is home to the Oromo ethnic group which is primarily composed of Muslims; however, it also includes a significant Orthodox Christian population.

“In this attack, twenty Orthodox Christians were killed, as well as a Muslim guard at the market. Some others are missing, so they are believed to have been kidnapped by the attackers. A priest was among those who were killed when the attackers actually entered into a church building. So again, this is not just a market. This is a church that they entered into. They were shouting religious chants as they went in,” Nettleton says. “So this does seem to be a very targeted attack.”

Stand with the Church in Ethiopia

As the Church in Ethiopia faces increased warfare and persecution, Nettleton notes that Christians need prayer. Pray for safety, but also for a heart to continue to share the Gospel.

“I think we want to pray for God’s protection over them, obviously, but also, I think just praying for a spirit of forgiveness. Praying that this won’t create bitterness and anger within the hearts of Christians as they face this kind of pressure. As they face these kinds of attacks, it would be very easy to grow weary. It would be very easy to grow bitter. And so pray that the Lord will help them to keep a soft heart towards the people around them, and even for opportunities to share the Gospel.”

If you want to help support persecuted Christians through the ministry of The Voice of the Martyrs USA, click here.

Representative header photo courtesy of Tep Ro via Pixabay.

Helen Williams with World Missionary Press recently attended Every Home For Christ’s One Africa Conference, where she connected with national directors from several countries that WMP works to provide Scripture booklets to.

In northern Nigeria, where there is open persecution, ministry work is pivoting to cities to avoid Muslim resistance in villages. But the Nigerian director said people in these villages remain unreached and without access to the Bible.

(Photo courtesy of World Missionary Press)

“He said, ‘In the cities, they’re able to openly distribute material and minister and have outreach,’” Williams says. “But his heart was for the villages, because they don’t have the Word anyway, and the resistance is so strong that it’s dangerous.”

The ministry in Nigeria is finding new ways to operate, which can involve finding hosts near villages or conducting gospel conversations under a tree.

“There’s a lot of trying to protect the believers, and yet encourage them and continue to do the work,” Williams says.

In the Goma area of the Democratic Republic of Congo, people are losing their homes and fleeing the country, but despite these challenges, the work continues.

The director in the DRC said, “This is a challenge for us, but we know that the Lord wants us to continue the work.”

Williams says, again, the work continues; it is just finding new ways to share the gospel with people.

Williams says the DRC director was very open about how the conflict is affecting them. “He said, ‘This is a challenge for us, but we know that the Lord wants us to continue the work.’”

In other countries, including Somalia, Djibouti, and Eritrea, where it is dangerous to distribute Scripture, the work continues as well.

“These are areas that they’ve not been able to come to us in the open as of late. They’ve been getting their material from Ethiopia, but they came up to us and said, ‘Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you,'” Williams says. 

Despite scary resistance, particularly in Eritrea, Scripture is still making its way into the hands of people and changing lives.

Please pray for our brothers and sisters who are experiencing persecution in Africa. Pray for wisdom and protection as they minister to their persecutors and others who do not yet know Christ.

Header Photo Provided by World Missionary Press

What’s more, a recent report from a U.S.-based analysis organization says there are grounds to believe that Ethiopian forces and allies committed genocide against Tigrayans in the war. In a report released June 3, 2024, New Lines Institute calls for Ethiopia and its allies to be held accountable for their role.

A map of Ethiopia with the Tigray region highlighted in red. (Photo courtesy of TUBS via Wikimedia Commons)

As these events unfold, we know there are deep wounds in Tigray that only God can heal. Johan Grobler with MegaVoice recently traveled to Ethiopia to bring nearly 300 audio Bibles to encourage believers in Tigray.

He said the team heard conflicting reports, even though they themselves had no incidents in traveling. “Some people would say, ‘You don’t dare to travel there, and even wider in the region for fear.’ But I think that’s often what happens, that the evil one wants to instill fear into Christians and eventually the work [is brought] to a halt or is hampered in the process.” 

Grobler and his team were able to deliver audio Bibles to a church, a special needs school and a local women’s ministry. MegaVoice estimates that every audio Bible reaches 10 people of all ages. 

“You usually wouldn’t let your children play with your phone. But you can leave the audio Bible with them and they can listen to the Bible or children’s stories,” Grobler says.

You can find your place in the story through prayer. Praise God for sending His Word to people in Tigray, and ask for peace and healing for the region. 

“People can pray for those that are persecuted to stand firm, because the evil forces want people to move out of the region because it gives them more control of the region. So we can pray that those that have left the region would be able to come back,” Grobler says.

“We can pray that the Church will grow, that the church would minister the Word wherever and whenever possible.”

Click to learn more about MegaVoice’s ministry to bring God’s Word to the world. 

Header photo of man walking by a destroyed tank in the Tigray region June 5, 2021 courtesy of Yan Boechat/VOA via Wikimedia Commons. 

For the past five plus years, drought has been an unwelcome reality in Somalia, Kenya, Ethiopia and other East African countries. Poor rainfalls have devastated the land and displaced millions in the urgent search for food and water. 

“They have experienced many crop failures because of drought. A lot of animals have died,” says World Concern’s Peter Macharia. 

Woman collects water from a protected water well.
(Photo, caption by Daryl Finley/World Concern)

In East Africa, World Concern serves as the hands and feet of Christ. They work among communities to provide water, nutrition and medicine in the face of hunger and disease. This help is critical, but today Macharia asks us to take a brief step back and consider how water points us to spiritual realities. 

“When we talk about physical drought, we should also be thinking about the spiritual drought. You know, water refreshes our weary bodies; so is the gospel. It refreshes our weary souls,” he says. 

“The Word of God in John chapter 15:3 says, ‘You already clean through the Word which I have spoken to you.’ So when you think about what water does to us physically, the gospel does the same to us spiritually.”

Macharia asks that the Church would take deliberate action to meet the practical needs of people in the Horn of Africa. 

“Think about people across the globe that are suffering without water, and find ways of how do they help? We are all living in a global village and we need to see the other person, the other country as my neighbor, because when they suffer, we all suffer,” he says.

Learn more about how you can partner with World Concern’s relief work here. 

Finally, in a world full of trouble, advocacy is another way you can stand with East Africa. 

“Prayer is able to go where we cannot go,” Macharia says. “(People) can also be participating by sharing the word and speaking about the suffering of the people wherever they are.”

Header photo of young girl in East Africa drawing water from unprotected well, courtesy of Daryl Finley/World Concern.

Then, only two years later, Eritrea fought alongside Ethiopia against a paramilitary group in Ethiopia’s Tigray region. That war ended in 2022, but in December of last year Eritrean troops were still present in Tigray. In the past two weeks, unrest has flared up again in Tigray, displacing nearly 29,000 people.

Even as concerns for the region’s long-term stability rise, an Eritrean Bible translation team is at work own people: the Kunama of Eritrea.

“They (the Kunama) have for decades experienced hardship through civil war in their country,” says Meg Hunt with Wycliffe USA. “Many of them have migrated to neighboring countries — and then actually several of them have come to North America as part of their refugee experience.” 

Population displacement due to Tigray conflict, 12 January 2021 (Photo courtesy of USAID via Wikimedia Commons)

Kunama translation teams live Ethiopia and North America. Together, they feel the effects of the regional tensions. 

“For the team that is translating the Old Testament (in Ethiopia), they are being targeted by the local government, so it’s been hard for them to continue to feel safe in that environment,” Hunt says.

“Although they have resettled into different cities (in Ethiopia), in more rural areas refugees experience fear of being relocated to refugee camps back in Northern Ethiopia where there is still unrest.”

For the North America team, who is working on the New Testament, their pressures are less dangerous but still real.

“It’s actually pretty incredible that it’s entirely volunteer-based in North America. The challenges for them are really that they’re balancing a lot. They’ve got a lot of things of care for their own families, their day jobs. But again, they’re so committed to translating God’s Word,” Hunt says. 

“One of the things that is really unique about the translation is that because they are a diaspora team, working together across multiple time zones and continents, keeping in step with one another is an opportunity and a challenge that they have.”

Meet this dedicated Bible translation team here. Several books of the Bible have already gone through community testing — one of the final steps before they go to print or audio publishing. The books are Ruth, Jonah, Haggai, Matthew and Galatians.

You can be part of this Bible translation project spanning the globe through your prayers and your partnership. Learn more and sign up for prayer updates here.

“Pray for the safety of these Kunama team members, especially those in Ethiopia. Pray for the just energy and stamina to continue this work,” Hunt says. 

Header photo of internally displaced persons in Tigray, April 2021 courtesy of Rastakwere via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

The global authority on food security levels has projected that in Somalia alone, 1.5 million children under the age of five will experience acute malnutrition between August 2023 and July 2024. 

“There are so many families that have left their homes, and now they’re scattering all over looking for any assistance that can come their way,” says Peter Macharia with World Concern.

Woman collects water from a protected water well. (Photo, caption by Daryl Finley/World Concern)

“Most of those families are dependent on rains, and they have no choices. Women have to move miles and miles to access clean water.”

World Concern seeks to serve the unique needs of the communities in which it operates. In the Horn of Africa, the food and water crisis dominates. 

“We do water trucking, finding water that is clean in a well that we have built or others have built and we truck that water to villages that have no clean water,” Macharia says. 

World Concern also provides cash vouchers for food, nutritional supplements for children and nursing women, and de-worming medicines, among other helps. 

“We have also been working on permanent solutions like digging wells, constructing water dams to harvest rainwater, and those kind of things. So our desire is not just to help (alleviate) the suffering, but also to have a permanent solution to the problems that people face,” Macharia says. 

Pray for those who are suffering deeply from the effects of drought. Ask God to bring rain. Jeremiah 14:22 says, “Are there any among the false gods of the nations that can bring rain? Or can the heavens give showers? Are you not he, O Lord our God? We set our hope on you, for you do all these things.”

“I really encourage (listeners and readers) to be prayerful, and when they see things that are happening, let them see them as as happening to their brothers and sisters,” Macharia says.

Pray that World Concern and local believers will be able to serve the physical and spiritual needs of many in the Horn of Africa. 

Header photo courtesy of Peter Caton for World Concern.

Background: the Borana

For about three and a half years, a team in Ethiopia has been translating Scripture and equipping pastors for the previously unreached group of the Borana. This sub-group of the Oromo people is a remote tribe historically unreceptive to the Gospel.

Ed Weaver with Spoken Worldwide says, “These are oral learners who are pretty much disconnected from the rest of the world. People who communicate to one another in stories, songs, and dramas – [they have] little access to technology, little access to anything written. And so really the way to reach them is to use Biblical stories.”

Armed with around 170 passages of Scripture from the Old and New Testaments as well as theological training, the hope is that local Borana people can take over ministry. They will have the tools to disciple each other and continue to grow in a self-sustaining movement.

An Encouraging Encounter

However, even with this goal the Spoken Worldwide team has seen the culmination of their work nearing faster than expected. Recently Galgalo, one of the local leaders, was heading to a celebration for the completed translations but ran into a roadblock. Bandits were blocking travel, so he stopped at a small café to wait for them to be cleared. As Galgalo sat down, he heard Bible stories over a Bluetooth speaker. They were the stories that he had helped translate!

(Image courtesy of James Chan on Pixabay)

The café was in a community that was not primarily Borana. However, their dialect was similar enough that they could understand the stories. The café owner had gotten ahold of the recordings and had been playing them for his religiously diverse clientele. Galgalo shared with the owner about the translation project. As they talked, he learned that people in the community had been recording the stories on their phones and sharing them!

Weaver says, “There were believers that were recording it and taking on so they can share with their family. And maybe some people were hearing the Gospel for the very first time. So it was one of those beautiful moments where he got to see – which we often don’t get to see – some of the fruit of our labors.”

Get Involved with the Work

In addition to this surprise encounter, the Borana team has overseen the start of more than 200 small groups that reach over 2000 people. The Word of God is truly going viral among the Borana and their neighbors.

The news is exciting and yet can feel so far away. However, Weaver encourages people to thank God for the work that is happening. He says, “No matter what amount of money you have, you always have – if you’re a believer – you have access to the God of the universe, to communicate with Him. So please be praying on our behalf because prayer can have more fruit than any creative marketing content, any great newsletter or email, or anything like that.”

If you want to join the work of Spoken Worldwide click here.

Header image courtesy of Spoken Worldwide

World Mission’s Greg Kelley shares about a recent field visit to the country.

“We’re here working with an indigenous network of Ethiopian leaders that are doing pioneer evangelism with really the ultimate goal of raising up disciples who will multiply and plant churches into these areas.” 

World Mission has worked in Ethiopia for the past eight years. Their ministries include sharing The Jesus Film and distributing solar-powered audio Bibles among people with little to no access to the good news of Christ. 

Kelley says they see God doing amazing things as the gospel is going out. 

“When you go into these villages, you meet people who for the first time are encountering Jesus.

“They’ll listen to [the audio Bible] for a few minutes, and then they’ll stop and they’ll look at you and they’ll say, ‘This is truth.’” 

(Photo courtesy of World Mission)

Many unreached people groups in Ethiopia are in remote, hard-to-reach places, some of which have Islamic influences that are tremendously hostile to Christian witness. 

“They’re difficult places to reach, too,” says Kelley.  “Some of them are highly isolated — they’re behind mountains, they’re in very rural areas, and in the case of the Muslim people groups, very hostile.”

“We heard of one missionary just recently that was beaten almost to death. His crime was sharing the gospel. It’s that kind of tenacity and boldness that we’re seeing here in Ethiopia.” 

Pray for missionaries in Ethiopia to continue to courageously take the gospel to the unreached and become a missionary-sending force to other nations in North Africa. 

Header photo courtesy of World Mission.

At 10 pounds per box this person is carrying 70 pounds on their head. It’s also 3,500 Scripture booklets that will be shared in villages in Burundi.

partnering with them long-distance.

This year the gathering invited wives of leaders and national directors to attend and be encouraged. The wives often are crucial to the work and already involved with planning, scheduling, managing paperwork, and discipleship. Many also care for the family at home while their husbands travel to places that have not yet heard the Gospel. In the past few years, Every Home For Christ has been including wives of leaders in more ways, such as praying together.

Williams says, “It was exciting, invigorating. These people are just committed. And these are the people that World Missionary Press serves. We print these booklets not to sit on our shelves and not just to dump somewhere. But because there are those waiting with plans, and energy and teams to use the literature.”

Much of the Gospel outreach focuses on children and youth because Africa has the youngest population than any other continent. In South Africa, for example, children receive a coloring book by WMP that introduces them to the Gospel. In Uganda, where 45 percent of the population is younger than 15 years old, Gospel workers are currently distributing throughout the country a shipment of Scripture booklets received earlier this year. Williams says,

“There are young people in these countries that are going to come up and be in leadership in these countries. And they need to be reached. Now.”

Brother Gerome K., a 19-year-old Muslim, testified that he received salvation through reading a Scripture portion saying that “Christ is God.”. He joined a local church after receiving Jesus’ Love.

WMP is currently preparing to send shipments of over 40 million Scripture booklets for African countries. The ministry recently completed a campaign called the Founder’s Challenge, raising over $300,000 to send Gospel literature to Africa. So far, the funds have provided for shipments to Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, and Ethiopia. Each 40-foot shipping container can hold approximately two million pieces of literature.

“We have a shipment going to Nigeria, and I was told by our coordinator, as soon as he gets it, he’s got people waiting for it,” says Williams.

She asks believers to pray for the Nigerian Christians sharing the Gospel in areas at high risk of terrorism. Pray also for the ministry to have the staff and resources needed to continue supporting Gospel workers worldwide. Williams says,

“We are so grateful for all of those who pray and all of those who give so that we can provide for those who are willing to go.”

Learn more about the work and history of WMP at the 62nd anniversary celebration hosted in Nappanee, Indiana, and via livestream on October 28.

Interested in joining WMP? The ministry has several opportunities to work or volunteer.

Photos and captions courtesy of World Missionary Press.

Invading forces used mass sexual assault against women and girls of the region as a weapon of psychological warfare. Read more coverage about this issue from MNN here.

Eric Foley of the Voice of the Martyrs Korea works with Christians in Ethiopia and neighboring Eritrea. He says even as the nation declared a three-day mourning period to honor the combatants who lost their lives during the two-year violent war that ended in November 2022, life for survivors can be difficult.

Cultural attitudes of shame in the region make these horrific assaults even worse. He tells of one woman who was sexually assaulted in a hospital. “She contracted AIDS. So she has to go to a clinic for HIV medication. But every time she goes, she wraps herself with a shawl so that our face is hidden in our identity is concealed. She hasn’t even told her daughters that she has HIV.”

Foley says if a woman admits to sexual assault, the surrounding culture considers it to be shame upon her and her family. But Christians in the region, following Jesus’ example, push against this idea.

Pray these women would find hope and freedom in Jesus and the community of His people. “The ongoing horror for this group of people is unabated. Hebrews 13:3 says, ‘Remember those in prison, as though you are with them in prison.’ And in many ways, this whole region has become like a prison.”

Soldiers from neighboring Eritrea, a notoriously difficult place for Christians, have also been active in the Tigray war. Foley says, “There are Christians who have been kidnapped from the refugee camps that were raided and sent back to Eritrea. We need to pray for those Christians who are literally in prison.”

Header image is a representative photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.