Reach Unengaged Peoples Across Sub-Saharan Africa

Believers shared the story of Jesus calming the sea with fishermen in Madagascar. Your generosity is helping plant a church among the Sihanaka, an unreached people group.

Hear more about the Sihanaka of Madagascar.

• Pray for the church planters among the Sihanaka to persevere amid hardship and resistance to the gospel.
• Pray for new believers to boldly share their faith and the Bible stories they are learning with other Sihanaka people.
• Pray for the small churches that are forming to grow into healthy, vibrant gospel lighthouses among the Sihanaka.

God is working among the Jula of West Africa. Many say, “To be Jula is to be Muslim.” But God says, “To be Jula is to be loved by the One True God.”

Hear how the Jula were introduced to Jesus Christ!

When Togolese missionary Essenam Kolani* enters a Kotokoli village to share the gospel, he starts with the Old Testament story of how David was chosen to be king. Why? Because in this people group, everyone aspires to be chief. “The fact that I’m talking about a king, that interests them,” Kolani explained.

Kolani first works his way through stories of King David and other Old Testament characters like Moses and Abraham. By the time he gets to the New Testament, the villagers have accepted him and are willing to hear about Jesus. Through this storying ministry, Kotokoli have professed faith in Christ.

Throughout sub-Saharan Africa, local believers like Kolani are boldly evangelizing in unreached areas. They are part of the 55-in-5 project, an initiative to get the gospel to 55 of sub-Saharan Africa’s largest unengaged people groups between the years 2020 and 2025.

From the beginning, the goal of the project was to mobilize believers anywhere in the world to engage these people groups, but the assumption was most volunteers would come from the United States. “Our history has been a lot of investment from the States into the ministry here in Africa,” explained IMB missionary Brian Robinson, the 55-in-5 project coordinator. “But Covid stopped the flow of people coming on volunteer trips.”

In 2020 and 2021, Robinson and other IMB leaders leaned heavily into ensuring African Christians knew about these 55 people groups. “We challenged them to pray for them. We challenged them to consider going to them,” Robinson said. “So really, most of 55-in-5 ended up being Africans being mobilized and enlisted and sent to engage these people groups.”

In some areas, IMB missionaries trained African believers to share their faith. For instance, in a refugee camp in Sudan, Ingessana men were trained to use the “Creation to Christ” story to share the gospel with their friends and family.

In other areas, missionaries partnered with local believers to take the gospel to unreached peoples, such as the Kwangali in Namibia. On a joint outreach between IMB missionaries, believers from Botswana and Namibia, and a church from the U.S., 86 Kwangali professed faith in Christ. A Namibian pastor continues to work in the area, where he has recently planted two churches. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, missionaries worked with Congolese partners to craft Bible stories in the languages of unengaged people groups. They also hosted worship and children’s ministry workshops for churches in remote jungle villages. Now the Ngando, Salampasu, Bangobango, Ngongo, and Sonde have access to the good news.

In other places, IMB missionaries discovered local Christians were already ministering among 55-in-5 people groups. In Madagascar, for instance, they heard about a church among the Sihanaka, an animistic people group feared for their witchcraft powers. The IMB missionaries also started working with a Malagasy couple who felt led to serve as missionaries among the Sihanaka. “When the call is clear, go without hesitation,” said Narindra Rakotonirainy, the wife. “Our experience is that there are many obstacles, but if you go forward, Jesus will be with you.” Recently, her husband helped baptize eight people in a Sihanaka church plant.

Robinson’s eyes filled with tears as he reflected on how the Lord has worked in these 55 people groups over the last five years. “As much of a planner as I am, I could not have mapped out the way in which the gospel was going to get to all these places,” he said. “I had no idea who the Lord was going to use and how He was going to work to make His name known where it wasn’t being proclaimed.”

The vision statement that drives IMB work in sub-Saharan Africa is “African churches sending African missionaries to the ends of the earth.” Throughout the 55-in-5 initiative, African believers have demonstrated their heart for getting the gospel both to their neighbors and to those in other countries. But Robinson emphasized there is still work to be done. The goal now is to continue working alongside African partners toward the end vision. Along with continued evangelism in new areas, he longs to see new believers discipled and gathering in healthy churches with biblically sound leaders. “And eventually,” he concluded, “those churches [will send] their own missionaries to engage the ends of the earth.”

*Name changed

Watch how God is working in Madagascar to reach unengaged people with the gospel.

Watch video.

“We are succeeding in reaching Muslims in this area and have planted six churches in two years!” said Lucien, an African missionary working among the Peul people.

Another African partner, Alafia, shared that more than 100 villagers sat with him in front of their mosque to hear Bible stories. “If you come with a Bible, the very people that you come to serve will persecute you until death,” he said. “But because we came with stories [learned by] heart, we are making progress among the Kotokoli people.” 

In another village, a group of Muslims joined Alafia to hear Bible stories after Friday prayers at the mosque. He shared, “Many now understand that Christ is their only Savior. I want to thank all the partners who supported us through this training. I now know the Bible well and can tell the entire Bible as one story. Thank you!”  

Lucien added, “Before I learned Bible storying, sharing Scripture was a challenge. But now, by narrating stories from God’s Word, it has become much easier. We often work among Peul children who tell the stories to their parents, and parents then invite us into their homes to continue telling the stories.”

Through your gifts, we have trained local missionaries from Togo and Benin to share Bible stories in their heart language with new unreached people groups. We praise God that because of your generosity and God’s work through Lucian and Alafia, the Peul and the Kotokoli people groups are now hearing the gospel!

Lucien and Alafia are just two of many African believers who are tackling the world’s greatest problem of lostness head-on by boldly sharing the good news of Jesus Christ. Your financial gifts and prayers have trained and sent them to unreached tribes to share the hope of salvation offered through Jesus Christ. Thank you for partnering with our Reaching the Unreached People of Sub-Saharan Africa team!

Thank you for your gifts and faithful prayers. Your generosity is bringing the gospel to unreached and unengaged people groups (UUPG) across Sub-Saharan Africa as we seek to reach 55 of the largest UUPGs with the gospel by 2025.

The Ingessana of Sudan are one of the 55 who need the gospel. Numbering over 110,000, this people group practices a form of Islam mixed with traditional animistic religion. They live in rural villages and farms and have little to no access to the gospel. There are no Scripture resources, and an ongoing Bible translation project has stalled.

In late 2022, we learned that the majority of this UUPG resides in refugee camps in South Sudan. We also established contact with a believer in one of these camps. Through this contact, we learned that there were four churches in the camp and two in their home region of Sudan with about 200 believers.

In February 2023, full-time Christian workers visited this camp and trained a small group of Ingessana believers in evangelism and basic discipleship. During this trip, both Muslim and Christian Ingessana women were trained in a Bible-based Trauma Healing called “New Hope.” Through this training, 13 Ingessana women professed Christ as their Savior! Little did these women know that what started as a journey of fleeing for their physical lives would lead them to run toward eternal life in Christ Jesus.

Since this trip, many of the Ingessana have re-settled in their homeland of Sudan. This movement is taking place at the same time fresh conflicts have erupted in Sudan, leading to political instability and the threat of a new civil war. Please pray for the new Ingessana believers to be a voice of hope and healing to the lost in their war-torn homeland.

Thank you for your kindness, gifts and faithful prayers. Your sacrificial gifts and intercession are truly transforming lives as we partner together to solve the world’s greatest problem, lostness.

55 in 5. In 2020, we launched with the goal of seeing the 55 largest UUPGs in Sub-Saharan Africa engaged with the gospel by 2025. When we started this focus, we knew little about these people groups. Since then, we have learned much about their cultures and gospel entry points, and we’ve seen progress among many. Yet significant work remains to ensure all 55 have access to the gospel in a way they can understand and believe. Thank you for partnering with us through prayer and gifts to fuel the progress we have seen!

We want to celebrate the progress made among some of these people groups because of your gifts and ask you to intercede for continued gospel access. We invite you to download the “55 in 5 Prayer Cast” that highlights 10 people groups. Use this 30-minute audio prayer guide on a run or walk, during your personal devotions, or with your church small group. The prayer cast highlights the progress made and shares prayer prompts, so you can specifically pray for further gospel advancement.

Let’s go on a prayer journey together on behalf of the 55 in 5 People Groups. The “55 in 5 Prayer Cast” is available at the links below:

• Apple Podcasts:   https://bit.ly/41BBojK
• Spotify:  https://bit.ly/3W6IFqL
• Google Podcasts:  https://bit.ly/3pKOnlW
• Amazon Music/Audible:  https://bit.ly/3MnTwtg
• Soundcloud:  https://bit.ly/3W18loK

The IMB is calling on churches in the United States and around the world to pray for, and eventually to help engage, 55 people groups which are the largest unengaged and unreached in Sub-Saharan Africa, and among whom there are few or no Christians or churches.

The resources on this page will help you learn more about these people groups. Please pray for these groups using the prayer requests included on the resources, and share the prayer requests with others. There are even special resources to help children learn about, and pray for, the unreached peoples of Africa.