Phillip Rice

When you think of church planters serving in the hardest-to-reach places, are you imagining Americans moving to those places, learning the local language, building relationships and planting a church? Unfortunately, in most cases that’s not a real possibility. Let’s first consider the realities of those hardest-to-reach places and how those realities affect our strategy as Americans to reach the people living there.

There certainly are several cultural barriers here in the United States, and the trends we are observing right now point towards the reality of spiritual darkness increasing and progressively getting worse, not better. That is not intended to cause us to wave a white flag of surrender but instead to understand the depth of the conflict and the need for prayer in the midst of spiritual warfare.

Have you ever considered the challenge of spreading the gospel across Europe? It's an incredibly diverse continent with 44 unique countries, each with its own language, cuisine, music, literature, and culture. It's easy to overlook the importance of understanding and respecting each country's culture when we're trying to reach out to them.

In this region, people are consumed with the prospect that their gods can give them something; perhaps money and wealth, good health or healing, a better job, or a visa to a western country. They believe that if they please their gods enough, perhaps they will be blessed with these various things.