One quarter of the world now lives in East Asia. This includes people who speak Mandarin, Cantonese, Japanese, Korean and Mongolian and lesser-known languages and dialects. Oklahoma Baptists on assignment with the International Mission Board (IMB) are neither named nor numbered for security reasons.

Three fast facts: In just 26 years, Mongolia’s Christian population grew from 40 people to more than 60,000. Tokyo’s population is greater than the entire population of Canada. Seven out of 10 students from a large East Asia nation who enroll in school overseas never return to live in their homeland.

The Lord has been at work mightily among an animist people group living in the mountains of East Asia. The church has grown, and there are now hundreds of believers among this remote group. As they have grown in maturity, the local church is now working to send out missionaries to reach other unreached people groups with the Gospel. These local churches have since sent a missionary to reach an unreached people group in an area IMB missionaries can no longer access due to security restrictions.

For more than 2,000 years, there was no church among an isolated East Asian people group. That is no longer the case, thanks to the prayers of Southern Baptists, the diligent efforts of IMB workers and the power of the Holy Spirit.

In 2019, the first church was planted among this very difficult-to-reach people group. This church is one of the 426 churches that were planted in East Asia in 2019.

Eight house church leaders from one city have been trained in the use of a healthy church development strategy. They are currently applying this training to their own churches and are also training hundreds of leaders in many provinces across the country. They are asking IMB workers to train 100 more leaders in their city over the next two years.

Because of the generous giving of Oklahoma Baptists through the Cooperative Program, an amazing array of ministries are supported. This unified giving encourages fellowship with other believers all over the world. Collectively, Oklahoma Baptists are advancing the Gospel together.

East Asia peoples were featured in the 2021 Missionary Prayer Guide for Oklahoma Baptists. To see more information about the work in East Asia, visit oklahomabaptists.org/cp