Published on Operation World (http://www.operationworld.org)
Aug 25: Mali
Mali
Republic of Mali
Africa
See Prayer Information
Geography
Area: 1,240,192 sq kmLandlocked state. Dry southern grasslands merge into the Sahara Desert. The Niger River runs through the southern part of the country.
Population: 13,323,104 Annual Growth: 2.40%
Capital: Bamako
Urbanites: 33.3%
HDI Rank: 178 of 182 (UN Human Development Reports 2009)
Peoples
Peoples: 62 (60% unreached) All peoplesUnreached Peoples Prayer Card
Official language: French. Trade languages Bambara, Fulbe, Songhai Languages: 60 All languages
Religion
Largest Religion: MuslimReligion | Pop % | Ann Gr | |
---|---|---|---|
Christians | 351,730 | 2.64 | 2.5 |
Evangelicals | 93,630 | 0.7 | 2.5 |
Muslim | 11,641,728 | 87.38 |
Challenges for Prayer
The number of Christians has not increased by enough to even keep pace with Mali’s rapid population growth – evangelicals fell from 0.91% of the population in 1990 to 0.69% in 2010. Most growth is biological, and many who make decisions for Christ return to their former religion. This could be addressed with better follow-up through evangelism activities, discipleship programmes, pastoral training and Bible schools, but lack of funds to train for and support such ventures is a real problem. There are nearly 700 evangelical congregations, but most of them are not actively engaged in evangelism and outreach, despite many in Mali being spiritually open. Pray for boldness, passion and a burden for the unsaved to awaken in the churches and for a new wave of evangelism such as happened in the 1980s.Opportunities abound for a positive impact by caring Christians. Pray for the many agencies actively involved in the following: church planting and evangelism (Avant, CAPRO, World Venture); relief; local development to conserve soil, vegetation and water (CRWM, Norwegian Lutherans); education (UWM); digging wells; and medical outreach (CMA, Allianz Mission). All of these groups minister in more than just one way, and many others work in Mali as well. The door is open to serve in Mali; ask God to send more workers for the harvest.
For an additional 7 Challenges for Prayer see Operation World book, CD-ROM, or DVD-ROM.