DAWN Fridayfax 1997 #15

DAWN News from Borneo, USA, Finland, Austria

Borneo: first pan-Borneo/ Kalimantan conference

At the start of April 1997, over 1,000 people attended the first meeting of pastors, evangelists and church leaders on the 'prayer mountain' in Sibu, Sarawak, East Malaysia, only hours after the construction of the prayer centre had been completed. The meeting, organised by a group including the Asian Outreach International Mission Agency, and hosted by the Sarawak Full Gospel Church, brought together people from the three nations on Borneo, the world's third largest island: Brunei, Kalimantan (Indonesia) and Sabah and Sarawak (Malaysia).
Source: Asian Outreach International, as reported by Stephen M. Spaulding, DAWN Asia.
Email: 76731.2145@compuserve.com.

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Curses and fear overcome

"Borneo's history is steeped in the curses of tribal feuds, head hunters and the side-effects of colonial rule, modernisation and ineffective attempts at solving tribal problems." Rev. Daniel Ho, a Methodist pastor in Kuala Lumpur and President of the DAWN Committee in Malaysia, challenged Christians to follow the example set by Nehemia in the Old Testament and study the history and current situation in order to act decisively. Representatives from various provinces of Sabah, Sarawak and Kalimantan bowed down on their knees to ask forgiveness for their ancestor's sins while the other attendees prayed for them and spoke out forgiveness over them. According to Ho, the conference, following the motto of the AD2000 movement "A church for every people group and the gospel for every person by the year 2000", dare not overlook the region's 200 million Moslem Malayans. He says that two things have held Christians back in the past: fear of the repercussions of their actions, and a deep historical hate of Moslems and Malayans. Christians, says Ho, have to overcome both factors if they are to achieve a breakthrough in evangelising Malayans.
Source: Asian Outreach International, as reported by Stephen M. Spaulding, DAWN Asia.
Email: 76731.2145@compuserve.com.
Web page: http://www.asiaonline.net.hk/~asianout.

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Descendants of head hunters are evangelists

Datuk Ramsey Jitam, Assistant Minister of Agriculture in Sarawak and a member of the Iban tribe, the largest in East Malaysia, spoke during the conference's opening ceremony. "My people's history as head hunters," he said, "means that we have inherited a curse. We must make particular effort to reach this tribe with the gospel. Only 180 years ago, a 21-year-old man wanting to become a warrior among the Iban had to leave his village and return with a head that he had hunted." Representatives of today's largest tribes, the Kayan, Melanau and Bidayuh, went forward and, according to a conference report "tearfully confessed past sins to each other, and broke the curse of the spirit of murder, hate and revenge over their tribes."
Source: Asian Outreach International, as reported by Stephen M. Spaulding, DAWN Asia.
Email: 76731.2145@compuserve.com.
Web page: http://www.asiaonline.net.hk/~asianout

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USA: sins of racism and greed confessed

In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, mixed-race groups of Christians have recently gone into a number of dangerous areas in the inner city and experienced how drug dealers and other people "were clearly touched by God," according to Rick Ridings. In March 1997, Ridings, an intercession leader living in Belgium, spoke at the Rob Stearn's "River Conference" in Wycoff, New Jersey. Following his address to the approximately 1,000 attendees from the New York City area, "hundreds came forward, and a large number stayed until 2am. During the conference, the participants publicly repented of the sins of greed and racism", he says.
Source: Rick Ridings

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Finland: Lutherans with a vision for church planting

At a meeting of 35 Christian leaders in Tampere, Finland, during March 1997, a new national committee was selected to coordinate a Finnish evangelisation and church-planting movement. More than half of the national DAWN committee, including Kari Tassia, leader of YWAM, Pekka Halmesmaa, Heikki Lassila, Mischa Preisfreund, Mika Piirto and Hannu Vuorinen, are members of the Lutheran church. Together with representatives of free church denominations including Hannu Lahtinen, Erkki Keski-Lusa and Ilkka Salminen, their task is to encourage church planting on a national and regional level, and to form regional DAWN groups. Ilkka Salminen, pastor of a Pentecostal church in Helsinki, says that his church is growing significantly. Planted only a few years ago, the church now has around 280 members - an astonishing growth rate for Finland.
Source: Kari Torma, e-mail: kari.torma@ymca.inet.fi

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Austria: 'Breaking down barriers' conference in May 1997

Austria's evangelical Christians plan to improve their relationships with one another. To achieve this, a national conference has been planned for 1-3 May 1997, organised by Mag. Johannes Fichtenbauer (Catholic), Dr. Erich Schindler (charismatic groups) and Fritz Boerner (Evangelical Alliance UK). London's Roger Forster and Stuart McAllister, General Secretary of the European Evangelical Alliance, will speak at the conference. Observers see this conference as a great sign of hope on the previously stony path to Christian unity in Austria.
Source: Dr. Roland Andergassen, Sandgasse 2, A-6850 Dornbirn, Tel/Fax (+43)-5572-26680

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