We share multiple prayer needs in Missions for the nations of Tunisia, Nigeria, Turkey and Pakistan, from various sources.
Please take some time to pray for these troubled nations and contexts.
1. Pray for Tunisia – North Africa.
In earlier centuries, the Christian Church was widespread in Tunisia where a flourishing Church existed in Carthage, the city which was the centre of Christianity in Africa.
This key Christian city produced leaders such as Tertullian and Cyprian.
Foreign invasions and, finally, Islam brought about the Church’s demise.
Today, of a population of 12.5 million people in Tunisia, there are only about 500 committed indigenous believers!
Only one-third of those meet together regularly for worship.
Pray that a living, growing Church might become a reality again.
Read more: Tunisia. Operation World.
2. Pray for Nigeria. Pray for Victims of Violence against Christians.
Christians Appeal for Help amid Slaughters in Nigeria.
Fulani herdsmen killed six Christians in Benue state, Nigeria, after slaughtering 15 Christians in a nearby village two days prior, sources said.
In a predominantly Christian village in Logo County, the Fulani herdsmen also attacked, and victims say:
“The Fulani herdsmen keep attacking us almost on a daily basis, killing Christians at will and igniting fire on our houses and places of worship,” “Crops we planted on our farms too have been destroyed by the armed herdsmen. Hunger has become an epidemic, killing us and our children since we have nothing to eat.”
More than 400,000 members of the community have been displaced as a result of incessant attacks. Please pray for these attacks to stop and for help for the displaced.
Source: Morning Star News. Read More:
3. Pray for Turkey.
Turkey is a nation torn in different directions. It crosses two continents: 3% is Europe (Thrace), and 97% is Asia (Anatolia). It has economic links with Europe, cultural links with Central Asia, and sits near conflict areas such as Iraq/Syria, the Balkans, and the Caucasus. Turkey is a secular state, yet to be Turk is to be Muslim! The constitution, courts, and military are meant to uphold religious freedom, but even some secular Turks can be as anti-Christian (and anti-Western, anti-minority) as Islamists are.
Turkey’s strategic location has made it important throughout history.
For over 1,000 years, this region was a stronghold of Christianity.
The Christian population declined from 22% in 1900 to less than 0.2% today. Few of today’s 86 million Turkish Muslims have ever truly heard the gospel. The ancient Churches survived until the beginning of the 20th century, but massacres (Armenians), severe persecutions (Assyrians), and emigration (Greeks) removed most of them from the land. Pray for a reviving work of the Holy Spirit among the 130,000 Christians from these ancient confessions who still remain in Türkiye.
Turkey Demography
| Population: | 86 Million. | |
| Largest Religion: | Muslim | |
| Languages: | 45 | |
| Christian %: | 0.2 % | |
| Evangelical: | 0 % | |
| Largest Religion: | Muslim 96.6% | |
| People Groups: | 85 | |
Source: Operation World. Read More:
4. Pray for Pakistan – Pray against the Intimidation and persecution.
Rape, Attempted Kidnapping Drives Christian Family into Hiding
A pastor and his family have gone into hiding after a Muslim neighbor who raped his 14-year-old daughter tried to kidnap her and force her to convert to Islam and marry him, he said. The daughter of Pastor Aslam Masih of Muridke, Sheikhupura District, Punjab Province, was on her way to school on Oct. 31 when Suleman Azhar blocked her way with his motorcycle and forced her to board it, the pastor said. The panicked girl, whose name is withheld as a rape victim, freed herself and ran back home. Such occurrences are common against Christians and other minority women.
Aslam Pervez Sahotra, chairman of the Pakistan Masiha Millat Party, said her case highlighted the challenges that Christian girls and women face. Urging the Punjab chief minister and Punjab inspector general of police to take notice of the case, Sahotra said the victim was not only a daughter of the Christian community but of the country.
“We condemn the assault on our daughter as well as the threats being employed to force her to convert to Islam and marry her rapist,” Sahotra told Christian Daily International-Morning Star News. “The police’s refusal to act against the accused has exacerbated the family’s ordeal, and they are forced to live in hiding away from their home.”
The U.N.’s Human Rights Committee on Nov. 7 expressed concern about persistent reports of abduction and forced marriages of girls from minority religions in Pakistan, regardless of their age and prevailing law. Forced to convert to Islam under threat of violence, they suffer rape, trafficking and other forms of sexual and gender-based violence. The U.N. body also expressed concern about reports of the widespread impunity surrounding these cases.
Pakistan ranked seventh on Open Doors’ 2024 World Watch List of the most difficult places to be a Christian, as it was the previous year.
Read more about Pakistan’s Blasphemy law victims, abducted women and rape: Source: Morningstar News: Read More.
Thank you for praying.