By Susan Akyeampong
“The fact that so many people had never heard the name of Jesus grieved my heart deeply, and I could not help shedding tears. It brought a deep sense of urgency and responsibility — a realisation that the gospel, which transformed my own life, is still unknown to countless individuals and communities.”
Amo is an SIM mission worker from Northeast India who shared this reflection about the community where he serves.
He describes a rural part of Mongolia where Buddhism and shamanism, though common elsewhere, aren’t actively practised. There are no shamans, temples, or fortune tellers, and people generally hold private beliefs in their own personal gods without any organised worship. Christianity is also unfamiliar and sits far outside the worldview of most families. Spiritually, the atmosphere feels quite empty — shaped more by tradition and memory than by any active faith. It’s a place where generations have lived and died without ever hearing the name of Jesus.
Amo says that “many people received the Bibles with joy and gratitude.”
Amo has a real desire to see this community transformed. He wants to see God bring life to a place that feels spiritually barren and fill it with stories of Jesus at work in people’s hearts and lives.
When he first travelled there with a team from YWAM Mongolia and a short-term mission group from Indonesia, their goal was to get Bibles and Christian children’s books into people’s hands and homes. They ended up visiting more than 120 households across the region, meeting families and listening to their stories.
Amo says that “many people received the Bibles with joy and gratitude.”
What truly surprised him, however, was that during their conversations, the team asked people whether they had ever heard of Jesus Christ.
“To our astonishment, many replied that they had never heard His name before” Amo said. “Some even shared that they did not know Christianity existed.”
For Amo, that realisation was staggering. As a mission worker entering a new place, he had expected disinterest or even resistance, but not complete unfamiliarity. He says, “the thought of such spiritual isolation felt heavy, but it also filled me with compassion and a deep longing to see families restored and communities shaped by the truth of Christ.”
From his time there this year, Amo and his team have been actively serving the community: building relationships with schools and distributing clothes to students living in the dorms. They’ve taken every opportunity to get to know the children and teachers and to share the gospel with them.
Because the mission workers have served in such practical, relational ways, even local authorities have welcomed them.
The team met with government officials, including the Head of the Directives Office of the Governor and his colleagues, who expressed genuine interest in future partnerships that could bring positive development to the community.
They’ve taken every opportunity to get to know the children and teachers and to share the gospel with them.
This openness from families, schoolchildren, and even government leaders encourages us that before the gospel is even preached, God is already at work preparing hearts and creating divine appointments.
An “unreached” place like this shouldn’t make Christians feel hopeless. There is so much promise and opportunity. The population is young, with a large proportion of children and teenagers under fifteen. This creates a unique opportunity to invest in the next generation — discipling young people who can one day lead and influence their families and communities for Christ.
Amo and the team hope to use youth programmes and community service to gradually introduce the truth of the gospel in a way that meets real needs and builds lasting trust.
Please pray
- For the Lord to sustain Amo and the team through harsh conditions, give them wisdom to navigate cultural barriers, and strengthen them for faithful ministry.
- That today’s seeds would grow into a thriving church, and that God would raise up young disciples who will lead their community for Christ.
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