I would like to share a few lines from a heartbreaking letter I just received from a church leader deep in the interior of the Democratic Republic of the Congo:

We would like to make you aware of the danger under which the Church of Jesus Christ among the Zandes has lived for the last several years. The danger is due to the advance and the invasion of Islam into our region by the Mbororo and the LRA, who agitate by many harmful repercussions. ...

The Mbororo are armed Muslim herdsmen who have entered into northern Congo with 200,000 head of cattle. ...

The LRA massacre, kill, rape the women, kidnap the children, burn and devastate the region. ...

You probably have not heard much about this crisis in the news, but it deserves our attention and our prayers. This is a lawless part of the Congo that is too dangerous for many reporters and relief agencies. Yet Samaritan’s Purse is working there, and as the violence and suffering escalates, we need to do more.

The Zande people are the descendants of powerful warriors who were largely unreached by the Gospel until the early 1900s. Today there are hundreds of thousands of Christians among the Zandes. Now they are being slaughtered and enslaved by two merciless factions who seize their land and hate the Name of Jesus Christ.

The LRA, a terrorist cult calling themselves the Lord’s Resistance Army, kidnaps children to become soldiers or to be sold as slaves. Driven out of Uganda, they now hide out in the equatorial forests along the Congo-Sudan border. The Mbororo are moving south out of Darfur and are taking over lands purged by the LRA. Where the LRA burns churches, the Mbororo build mosques.

On Christmas Day, the LRA massacred a Zande congregation while the people were celebrating the birth of Jesus. The pastor and many others were shot or hacked to death. Over the next two days, two more churches were attacked. According to the few survivors, close to 200 people were killed and dozens more were taken into slavery.

The rampage continued for weeks, unstopped by international peacekeepers. Tens of thousands of Zande people fled their farms and villages and now are crowded into isolated towns, where Samaritan’s Purse is helping the churches to supply them with emergency shelter, blankets, cooking supplies, and other assistance.

The roads are cut off by fighting, which means we have to move tons of supplies by small planes into places where bullets are flying. Please join me in praying for the safety of our missionary pilots. This is some of the most dangerous work we have ever undertaken, and the coming rainy season will make it even more difficult.

I’ve visited this part of the Congo several times in the past, and it’s hard to explain what is happening now except as the work of the devil. Missionary hospitals, churches, and Bible schools seem to be prime targets.

Here’s a report from a Samaritan’s Purse worker on the ground in the Congo:

On New Year’s Day, the entire congregation was surrounded. Four elders were murdered, and the remaining 36 people were taken captive. They were forced to follow LRA units through the bush, constantly moving, carrying heavy loads. Any captive who was heard to utter the Name of Jesus was immediately killed in horrible ways. ...

At dawn on March 15, the mission hospital at Banda was attacked by 150 heavily armed warriors of the LRA. Immediately they began torturing, raping, and killing indiscriminately. They rounded up some 300 young people to be used as child soldiers and slaves. ...

Our Christian brothers and sisters in the Congo are crying out for help. Their churches are overwhelmed by the multitudes of displaced families who are desperate for food, shelter, medicine, and other basics. Please lift them up in prayer.

Thank you for supporting the ministry of Samaritan’s Purse to those who are persecuted and suffering for the sake of Christ in the Congo and around the world. May God bless you.

Sincerely,

President
Samaritan's Purse

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