Dea Davidson

GUAYAQUIL, Ecuador (BP)–When young people consider joining the International Mission Board’s South American Xtreme team to take the Gospel to difficult-to-access areas, they might be drawn by the “extreme” aspects of the training — learning to build rafts, cooking over a campfire and surviving in the mountains. But for Ecuadorian missionary Jose Chillambo, the team’s […]

ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia (BP)–Six days a week, two hours a day. You could say Will Everett* religiously maintains his weekly workout schedule — one he kept when he moved from Mongolia’s countryside to the capital city of Ulaanbaatar in 2005. Each day at the gym, Mongolian weight lifters and body builders waylay Everett for training advice […]

ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia (BP)–There is a bird that flies in the land of blue skies, symbolizing hope for an area of 56,000 eastern Mongolians. Locals call the nine-seater Cessna the “Jesus plane.” The Mission Aviation Fellowship flight is a blessing to Lisa Sharpe,* serving as her only option besides an 11-hour bus ride or rental car […]

ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia (BP)–Jeffrey Dawes* and a Mongolian believer hiked to a hillside village to see if there was anybody there who could help them start a church. Seemingly at random, they walked up to one of the traditional nomadic tents called gers. But God had already prepared the hearts of the family living there. They […]

ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia (BP)--In an Ulaanbaatar conference room, five Mongolian men ages 26 to 57 sit around a table, fanned out like spokes of a wheel. One is a former Buddhist artist.

ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia (BP)--Clutching X-rays and records, Dr. A.H. "Buck" Rusher cuts a path through the crowd of Mongolians to open the clinic.

ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia (BP)--It took Daniel White* and his family about a week to reach their new home in the Mongolian countryside. They traveled in a four-wheel vehicle, bypassing sheep and goat herds, to haul family possessions to this remote spot. He selected an adobe-walled plot in a small town for their home -- price tag: $500.

ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia (BP)--As the grip of communism was relaxing in Mongolia, messengers to the annual meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention in 1990 heard a 700-year-old challenge for missionaries from the reign of Kublai Khan.       The Mongol empire -- led by Genghis Khan's grandson, Kublai Khan -- once stretched from the Black Sea to the Pacific Ocean. In 1266, Kublai Khan sent a request by Marco Polo to the Christian church in Rome for 100 men to teach Christianity in his court.       But it was 28 years later before one, not 100, reached the court. By that time Khan's interest had waned. "It is too late," he said. "I have grown too old in my idolatry."       With the Iron Curtain falling in the communist country 700 years later, it was a call that couldn't be ignored again. In 1991, the first Southern Baptist workers to Mongolia moved to the capital city of Ulaanbaatar, a place once rooted in Buddhism and shamanism.       They persevered in the coldest capital city on earth, using ration cards for scarce food supplies and drawing curiosity as the only non-Russian foreigners some Mongolians had ever seen.       "Living in Mongolia has had its challenges and adventures," Lisa Sharpe* said of the 16 years she has served in Mongolia, first in Ulaanbaatar and then in the countryside. "This is a place where so many haven't heard the news of Jesus before."       The "Land of Blue Skies" has modernized since Sharpe first arrived. Today, instead of sheep, Land Cruisers populate the main road called Peace Avenue. Ulaanbaatar's approximately 1 million people -- among the more than 2.5 million in Mongolia -- now dress in Western fashions rather than the traditional dels (long, coat-like garments) worn by those in the countryside.

SAN JOSE DE QUERO, Peru (BP)--During quiet moments in his office, banker Larry Jackson would stare at the walls and say, "God, there has got to be more to life than this."

EDITOR’S NOTE: This year’s Week of Prayer for International Missions, Nov. 30-Dec. 7, focuses on missionaries who serve in South America as well as churches partnering with them, exemplifying the global outreach supported by Southern Baptists’ gifts to the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering. This year’s theme is “GO TELL the story of Jesus”; the national […]