Turkey (MNN) — Two thousand years ago,
as recorded in the book of Revelation, Jesus sent letters through the Apostle
John to five flourishing churches in Turkey. The center of ancient Christianity was located in modern-day Istanbul. Today, those congregations are gone, and followers
of Christ make up only 0.1 percent of the Turkish population.
These Christians often face discrimination,
violence, threats, and restrictions on evangelism holding unauthorized meetings. Converts from Islam suffer social harassment
and violence at the hands of their relatives and neighbors. For these reasons, Turkey ranks #35 on Open
Doors Ministries' World Watch List.
To support the church and the spread of
the Gospel among Turkish-speaking people, SAT-7 has launched SAT-7 TURK, a TV
channel in the Turkish language. Many Turkish
Christians are isolated from one another, and the programming is designed to
offer them teaching, training, and encouragement. It is also designed to clearly present the Christian
faith to non-believing Turks.
Currently, the channel can only afford
to broadcast four hours every day. SAT-7
would like to expand to full 24-hour coverage. To reach this goal, an anonymous foundation has generously offered
not only to match, but triple donations to the channel, up to the amount of
$350,000.
That means every $10 donation will
become $30, every $100 donation will become $300, and so forth. SAT-7 will use the donations to build
programming resources, support satellite up-link time, and expand coverage to 24
hours a day, 7 days a week. Once coverage
is fully expanded, SAT-7 will have reached its goal of reaching Arabic, Farsi
and Turkish speakers — essentially the entire Middle East — with Christian
television broadcasting. Your support
can help this vision become a reality.
