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Shipment of audio Scripture players needs prayer to get through customs

200 digital Scripture players are on their way to a sensitive area where an isolated tribe has expressed eagerness to hear God's Word, reports MNN.

"God has opened up some really wonderful opportunities with a very isolated group of people who have shown tremendous interest in listening to God's Word in their own language," said Tom Dudenhofer of Audio Scripture Ministries. "God has graciously provided the opportunity to complete the recording of Scripture, and that Scripture recording has now been placed on small pocket-sized digital Scripture players."

The solar-powered Scripture players have built-in speakers and can fit into a shirt pocket. Before the units reach the people, however, they have to get through customs.

"There's a lot of unknowns that we would really like people to pray about today," Dudenhofer said. "As the players go into this particular area, it's very possible that they're going to get stopped by customs, and we have no idea what the response is going to be. We have never made shipments into this area before."

Concerns range from the possibility of demands for unethical "under-the-counter" fees, to the possibility of losing the players altogether. When customs offices impound shipments, they often charge a fee for each day of storage.

"It becomes financially impossible to redeem the players," Dudenhofer explained. "So if this is impounded, it's possible we could lose all the players and would have to start over from scratch."

If the team is able to keep possession of the players, it will continue working to deliver them to the tribe. They only have so much time, however. They're scheduled to leave the area on Friday or Saturday.

"It's a very narrow window," Dudenhofer said. "If it runs into a problem and we miss our window of transporting these units to the people, we, of course, are going to try again. And we really need God's wisdom on how to do this in a way that will please Him. We need prayer to get these Scriptures into the hands of the people who have expressed strong interest in learning about Jesus."

Dudenhofer explained that if the people become Christians, they could very well face persecution for their faith.

"This is a very unevangelized area," he said. "There are no local churches. We are not even aware of any consistent Christian testimony among the people, but there has been some interest. There have been a couple of trips made into this area by the team that we're working with, but right now this is basically brand-new territory in some very, very isolated parts of our world."

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TAGS: Asia digital Scripture players customs Audio Scripture Ministries missions evangelism

[07/23/2009]

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