Focus: Northern Nigeria

Northern Nigeria is in the grip of daily killings and terror. There is an ongoing war for the complete subjugation of the country to Islamic sharia law. More than half of the over 200 million Nigerians are Muslims.

Call of Hope provides medical care for Muslim villagers. Through these deeds of care, they have new opportunities to share the Gospel.

FRONTLINE REPORT:

Our Frontline Worker reports, “The current situation in Nigeria is far from good, humanly speaking it is simply discouraging. In the 7 most affected states of Northern Nigeria, 3,944 people were killed by the Boko Haram and other Muslim terrorist groups in the period from January to June 2021 alone. 80% of the victims were Christians. This means that every day at least 32 people are killed in these states. On top of that, at least 16 people are kidnapped by these groups every day.

Unfortunately, this is the harsh reality in which we are doing our ministry with our 45 farmer evangelists. Most of the time the killers and kidnappers attack at night. That’s why some of the farmer evangelists sleep in trees at night and don’t go back home until the next morning. All these things we are reporting to you so that you can pray for us.”

FARMER EVANGELISTS:

Despite the brutal attacks against Christians, these farmer evangelists bravely continue to share the Gospel to their fellow Muslims.

One of our evangelists shared: “The Lord Almighty does not sleep and is my shepherd. He has promised to protect me.” Because of the attacks of the Boko Haram, we proposed for them to temporarily leave the area for their safety, but he refused the offer. He asked, “If I leave the village, who will take care of the former Muslims who have found faith in Jesus here in the village? Who will take care of Jesus’ local flock here?” Thus, he stays in his village. God alone is his strength.

TESTIMONY: SCHOLAR OF ISLAM

Time and again, our Frontline Worker and his co-workers are strengthened by God’s intervention. They see that even in the greatest difficulties, God has all power and leads Muslims to accept His Son Jesus Christ. They report, “During our last medical outreach in a village in the state of Katsina, where our farmer evangelist is doing his ministry, we met an Islamic preacher who was being treated and who had also attended our evangelistic film screening the night before. The name of this Islamic preacher is Abdul Jabaar. Some questions came to this teacher’s mind when we preached God’s Word after the film screening, but he didn’t ask them until he and his family approached us the following day for medical treatment.

At the beginning, he was surprised to find that we were offering medicine free of charge. Then he asked one of our staff to take him to the person who had been preaching the night before after the movie screening. That is how he got in touch with us. Abdul was against Christianity and would use his findings to attack the Christians. Yet when Abdul heard me preach, he was horrified to learn that nobody can know Jesus unless God reveals Him to them (Matthew 16:13-17). Abdul was confused.

All night long he was unable to think about anything else. Then, as we were talking the next morning, he told me that many times in the past he had heard Christians refer to Jesus as the Son of God and even as God Himself. Each time he had been wondering why they said such things. I then explained to him in detail who Jesus Christ really is.

During the following weeks, Abdul met regularly with our farmer evangelist. Abdul eventually found true faith in Jesus. One of his wives has left him because of his new faith in Jesus Christ. The villagers are now starting to persecute him. We are concerned about whether we need to remove Abdul from the village for the sake of his protection.”

Please pray for Abdul Jabaar and our Frontline Workers in the North of Nigeria.