Mongolia - from darkness to light in our generation

Mongolian man sitting in gher

"And I tell you that you are Peter, 

and on this rock I will build My church, 

and the gates of Hades will not overcome it."

Matthew 16:18

When I was born in 1970, Mongolia was a dark country, completely closed to the Gospel behind the Iron Curtain of communism, with no known Christian believers. Today, it sends out more Christian missionaries, per number of Christians, than any other nation in the world.

How did this nation move from darkness to light in less than 40 years? Brian Hogan, part of a Youth With a Mission church planting team working in Mongolia, tells the story in There's a Sheep in my Bathtub: Birth of a Mongolian Church Planting Movement. 

"In the 13th century, the Mongol tribes, united under Genghis Khan, thundered across the steppes of Central Asia and terrorized the known world. In a short time, these fierce horsemen had carved out an empire dwarfing those of Cyrus and Caesar combined.

The Mongol empire was not to endure for long. The Mongols embraced Tibetan Buddhism and became a backward hinterland ruled by a succession of Chinese dynasties. In 1921, a Communist revolution turned Mongolia into the first “independent” Soviet satellite. All missionaries were expelled before any church had been planted, and the darkness of Communism settled over this “closed” country. 

Mongolia was one of the very few countries on earth with no church and no known national believers.

After 70 years of being sealed off from the outside world, Mongolia gained freedom and independence along with other Soviet Bloc nations in early 1990, and Satan’s defenses against the gospel came crashing down. Creative strategies sparked the beginnings. 

A team of Native American believers entered Mongolia as tourists in 1990. Their visit generated a great deal of interest among Mongols and even hit the national press. By the end of their second visit in 1991, they had publicly baptized 36 new Mongol believers. The spiritual landscape of Mongolia would never be the same. 

A young Swedish couple, Magnus and Maria, came to Mongolia intending to plant churches. As they began to learn the language in the capital, Ulaan Baatar, friendships developed with the new and very young Mongolian believers in that city’s growing churches.

Maria and Magnus made several forays up to Erdenet, Mongolia’s third largest city, with short-term Mongolian evangelism teams from a church in the capital city of Ulaan Baatar. These trips bore fruit in the form of 14 teenage girls who responded to the teaching on faith and repentance. Magnus baptized these first disciples in January 1993, the beginnings of the church in Erdenet.

Fourteen young girls—not a very auspicious beginning. The new fellowship needed on-site help if it was to grow into anything more. In February, the young couple moved up to Erdenet accompanied by one of the best students in their English classes, a 19-year-old female Mongolian believer named Bayaraa.

As Magnus and Maria ministered with and discipled Bayaraa, their relationship served as an effective bi-cultural bridge. Magnus and Maria gained important insights into Mongolian culture that guided their ministry. Bayaraa was a natural evangelist. What she learned about Jesus and the Bible from Magnus and Maria, she put to immediate use leading many to the Lord.

The disciples were quickly organized into three groups that met in homes. They gathered for prayer, fellowship and teaching in an atmosphere of support and accountability. From the very beginning they were taught to obey the simple commands of the Lord Jesus Christ. They learned to love God and each other, to pray, give generously, repent and believe, baptize, celebrate the Lord’s Supper and to teach others to love and obey Jesus. 

As the girls led their friends to Christ, the groups multiplied. Magnus couldn’t lead the expanding number of groups, so active and faithful believers were equipped and released into leadership. After some time, they began a larger gathering, the “Celebration Service,” on a monthly basis to bring the house groups together for corporate worship and fellowship. After one year, the number of baptized Christ followers had grown to 120—almost all teenage girls! This was not the multi-generational church of entire families the church planters were dreaming of - it was half a youth group.

After a year of language study in Ulaan Baatar, my wife Louise, our three daughters and I moved to Erdenet joining Magnus, Maria and Bayaraa. A year later, others from Russia, America and Sweden joined our team’s ranks. Apart from three members of the Peace Corps, our team was Erdenet’s sole foreign presence —we were utterly different. We tried to work from behind the scenes so the movement would have visible Mongolian leadership.

We realized that teenage girls were not the best foundation for starting a church movement. At that time, however, youth were the only ones responding anywhere in Mongolia. So we worked with the fruit the Lord provided and prayed for a breakthrough to begin reaching whole families. We established “pro- visional elders” (starting with two younger men and Bayaraa) in order to begin the process of allowing a Mongolian style of church leadership to develop.

There was a great divide between our youthful, urban circle of friends and the family-oriented heart of traditional Mongolian society. The three cities of Mongolia were a relatively recent and imposed urban social structure overlaid by Communism upon a nomadic tribal society—and nomadic social structure was seen by all as the more legitimate and authentic of the two. Even our early converts had the impression the gospel wasn’t relevant for “real Mongols.” 

Even though Mongolia had become a 50% urbanized society, to the Mongol understanding, “real Mongols” are horse-riding pastoralists and gher (traditional round felt tents) dwellers. An urban teen growing up in an apartment building who has never even sat on a horse is not an authentic Mongolian. The gospel would be seen as just a foreign import, like Coca Cola, if it were only embraced by city dwellers. If Jesus were going to “become a Mongolian,” He would need to enter into the lives of nomadic herders.

A visiting short-term team began to pray for the sick in some of the traditional gher suburbs on the outskirts of town. God answered prayer dramatically. A lame person, a deaf person, a mute person and a blind person were all healed, and several demons were cast out. These healings provided a seal of authenticity recognized by the older Mongols. 

The news spread like wildfire and the fellowship was flooded with growth from every age group and segment of the city. The urbanized youth were especially surprised that “real Mongols” were coming to faith. 

Soon two older traditional Mongol men joined the ranks of our provisional elders. When these men, who were respected heads of households, began leading house churches and ministries, it made a huge difference in gaining credibility for the movement in the larger culture."

This story doesn't end here...I will share more tomorrow.