A new report says that Christians are being targeted by the Taliban after they seized control of Afghanistan and that local believers are fleeing to the mountains to escape certain death.
Afghan Christians are reportedly fleeing to the mountains in a desperate attempt to escape the Taliban who is going door-to-door trying to kill them.
An underground church that partners with Frontier Alliance International (FAI) has reported that the Taliban are targeting Christians for death.
Only a few hundred people out of nearly 40 million Afghans are openly known to be Christian in the nation, but the underground church has many more who are unknown.
This is what Frontier Alliance had to say:
The Taliban has a hit list of known Christians they are targeting to pursue and kill. The US Embassy is defunct and there is no longer a safe place for believers to take refuge. All borders to neighboring countries are closed and all flights to and from have been halted, with the exception of private planes. People are fleeing into the mountains looking for asylum. They are fully reliant on God, who is the only One who can and will protect them.
Frontier also notes how the Taliban is marking homes with girls over 12 years old so that militants can come and take the girls to be their "brides." Married women over age 25 are also being taken and sold into sex slavery.
In addition to this, the terrorist group is also searching people's phones to see if they have any Christian apps.
"We're hearing from reliable sources that the Taliban demand people's phones, and if they find a downloaded Bible on your device, they will kill you immediately," said Dr. Rex Rogers, who is president of the Christian nonprofit organization SAT-7 North America, according to Religion News Service. "It's incredibly dangerous right now for Afghans to have anything Christian on their phones. The Taliban have spies and informants everywhere."
This is reportedly a video from an Afghan Christian discussing the issues on the ground.
"The whole world has abandoned us... but we are not leaving the field, we will fight harder and will continue in God's work.
The end of the video points to Global Catalytic Ministries (GCM) as a charitable partner that individuals can support if they wish to help underground Christians in Afghanistan. More information about GCM can be found during an Aug. 19 livestream of the IF: Gathering here.
GCM listed these prayer requests for the Afghan Christians they are supporting:
Please pray for the Afghan Church to have strength and endurance. They continue to lead Bible studies, prayer meetings, and are proactively evangelizing during the very events you are seeing in the news. Pray for them to be hidden supernaturally by the hand of the Lord just like in John 8:59 when Jesus disappeared into the crowd.
The Afghan Church and GCM believe that the best days are before us, and we will witness the greatest movement of salvation among Muslims from the ashes of this catastrophe.
- Pray for those fleeing to the hills to be protected (Psalm 73, Psalm 91)
- Pray for miraculous protection for women and children being forcibly taken and those that have already been taken for their protection, salvation, and deliverance. (2 Thessalonians 3:1-5)
- Pray that the Afghan Church steps into her identity in Christ and walks in unity with the Holy Spirit. (Ezekiel 37, Romans 15:5-6)
