Greetings from Burkina Faso! The theme of the past few weeks has been, “Wow, nice road!” (much sarcasm intended) I’ve been on a few more research trips: to the Sambla, Southern Toussian, and Turka people groups. Each one has seemed to have at least one “road” that could vie for the “worst-road-I’ve-ever-been-on award.” Again I hesitate to call these passageways “roads” because much of what we’ve been doing is typically called “off-roading.” Nonetheless, these trips have been adventurous and successful. Part of the difficulty is that we are roughly at the peak of rainy season and since the majority of roads are dirt/mud/rock/sand they are ever-changing, almost always for the worse. Then there’s the fact that we’ve had to drive up a couple small, rocky mountains. We’ve also traversed a couple problematic bridges and even had to create one bridge. All this may sound fun, hazardous, or foolish to you. Yet this just illustrates the point that there are still many places in this world that are very difficult to get to. That means there are many people in this world who are still quite isolated from the outside world. And that means there are still many souls who have not heard the “Gospel of the grace of God” (Acts 20:24), because so many have chosen to go down the easier path. If you are up for taking some tough, grueling roads for the sake of the Kingdom. We’ve got a job for you.
What has our research found? The Sambla people are only about 17,000, but most of their villages are within an hour of the big city, Bobo. Still we only found two small Sambla churches and a total of about 100 believers. The Turka number about 37,000 and are located around some of southwestern Burkina’s tourist sights. Many people, undoubtedly including many Christians, pass through Turka territory to visit these sights. Yet few have gone to take the Gospel to the Turka. We found only one Turka-speaking church and about 150 total believers. For time’s sake I will simply say that the Southern Toussian are in only slightly better condition. Unfortunately this is pretty much the norm for our findings. Will you pray? Will you send? Will you go? We’d love for you to partner with us.
Soon I will be on another research trip to the southeast of the country, this time among the Yanna. Soon after that we will welcome a team from Bartlett Baptist in Tennessee. They will be looking into partnering with us to reach one of these unreached groups such as the Vigue, Sambla, or Turka. This is an exciting possibility for our team and for the unreached peoples of Burkina Faso.
Praise God for:
*safe and successful travels despite the challenging conditions.
* churches like Bartlett Baptist that are seeking to reach the unreached in the difficult places.
Please pray for:
* God’s guidance for Bartlett Baptist concerning what they can do for His kingdom.
* God to send more workers among these unreached people groups.
As always, thanks so much for your interest in and prayers for God’s work here in West Africa. God bless!
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