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Christianity in Kazakhstan is still predominantly an urban phenomenon, leaving many rural areas with little access to the gospel.Hoping to remedy this, Southern Baptists are recruiting 20 individuals to plant churches in some of the country's remote villages.The United Methodist Board of Global Ministries voted earlier this year to fund a new medical missions center for Kazakhstan's rural poor.Youth are the fastest-growing segment of Kazakh evangelicals. The generation that came of age just when the Soviet Union crumbled has formed the backbone of many Kazakh churches."This age group seems to be those whom God is using right now," says Matt Anderson, an English teacher who helps one of the student-run churches in Almaty. "It's great to see the young people come to Christ and bring their family members too.""God has a special plan to be fruitful here," Sagiev says. "I believe many Kazakhs will accept Jesus as their God and Savior, and there will be many churches formed. There is a great awakening in Kazakhstan."The names of those quoted in this story have been changed because of security concerns.--Eds.

Information on the state of affairs in Kazakhstan is available from the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights. Their 1999 report on Kazakhstan details the government's transition from parliamentary republic to authoritarian presidential republic, as well as incidents of religious intolerance and restrictions on the freedom of the press. The U.S. State Department's 1999 Report on International Religious Freedom and Report on Human Rights are also available.The Washington Post has a related story on Kazakhstan's oil prospects.Visit the presidential Web site of "one of the largest countries of the world", as President Nursultan Nazarbayev puts it, and form your own impression about Kazakhstan's political scene.The anticommunist Jamestown Foundation has a history of the development of Islam in Kazakhstan on its site.

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July 10 2000, Vol. 44, No. 8