When I arrived in Turkey I was able to meet briefly with an old friend who is a hero of the faith.  We met back in the mid-90’s when he was a fairly young believer.  Unfortunately I can’t share his name or his photo because of security concerns.   At that time I provided a month of intensive church planting and strategy development training and began a mentoring process with him.  He is a Turk. 

Since that time, the Lord has used this humble servant in amazing ways both among Turks in Turkey and among the Muslim Turkic peoples scattered across Central Asia.  The old Silk Road through Central Asia is filled with a variety of extremely unreached people groups who speak Turkic languages.  Many of them are ones you will have heard of, especially after the break-up of the Soviet Union: Uyghurs, Tajiks, Kazakhs, Uzbeks, Turkmen, Azeris, and so on.  There are also many of these Muslim Turkic people groups that are smaller and you haven’t hear of unless you are extremely unusual.

This brother and his wife are training and mentoring young Turkish believers to plant churches among these people groups.  He wanted desperately to join in the meeting here in southeast Turkey, but tomorrow he has to leave to take the 25 men he is currently training to plant churches among Crimean Tatars, another exceptionally unreached Turkic people group.

This is the kind of man who would have been mentioned in Acts if he had lived in a different era.  Today I can’t share his name, but I assure you God is very aware of his ministry and is looking for others just like him.  Please pray for him and those whom he trains.  Pray the Lord will give them tremendous fruit.  Pray for others like him to be raised up from the harvest.