Project Northern Lights in depth

Don Graham
International Mission Board

Jonathan Hillman needed a miracle. God sent him a porta-potty truck.

The 25-year-old from First Baptist Church of Guymon, Okla., watched as police waded through cars bottlenecked at the mouth of one of Europe’s busiest seaports.

Hillman was among a team of Southern Baptist volunteers handing out packets of Gospel materials to cars passing through the port’s gates. Most of the drivers were North African Muslims headed for countries across the Mediterranean. Backups like this were an answer to prayer because they bought volunteers time to offer the packets to every car.

Unfortunately for Hillman, the police were making headway. Traffic had started to move again, and cars were close to speeding past volunteers. He knew it might be the only chance for some to ever hear about Jesus.

That’s when Hillman says God showed His sense of humor.

Surprising answer to prayer
From nowhere, a porta-potty truck lumbered into the circle funneling cars through the port’s gates and came to a dead stop. Horns blared. Within minutes, the truck had undone more than an hour of diligent traffic direction by the police. Packets in hand, volunteers went back to work.

“Everything backed up even more, so we could continue hitting every car that went through there that day,” Hillman says. “To see God specifically answer prayer is just amazing. … It’s as if He said, ‘You can count on Me to get these packets out. You can count on Me to bring in a porta-potty truck if you need it.”

Hillman is one of hundreds of Southern Baptists who’ve taken part in Project Northern Lights. Its purpose is to spread the Word of God across North African nations where sharing the Gospel is a criminal offense.

“Very often we take for granted the availability of God’s Word in the free world,” says “Dave Webber,” the Southern Baptist worker who runs Project Northern Lights. “The Muslim world has a very high wall around it.”

Webber should know. The 39-year-old former pastor from Florida has spent several years serving in Northern Africa and the Middle East with his family. Home to the world’s second-largest desert, the Sahara, for Christians North Africa also ranks among the planet’s most spiritually barren places.

Criminal genius
“Governments across North Africa absolutely prohibit the distribution of the Bible,” Webber explains. “It is not illegal to own one, but it is illegal to give someone else one.
The sentence for a first offense [in one North African country] is five years in prison and over $300,000 in fines.”

It’s no surprise, Webber adds, that such threats make the Bible and other Gospel materials virtually impossible to find in-country. Enter the genius of Project Northern Lights’ approach.

Instead of risking life and limb to distribute God’s Word inside North Africa, volunteers focus on the more than 18 million North Africans living and working in Europe. Every summer, hundreds of thousands of these immigrants flow through southern Europe’s ports — most returning to North Africa to visit family. Ferries carry the travelers, their cars and hopefully, the Gospel, across the Mediterranean.

Thousands of New Testaments
But the project’s strategy hasn’t gone unnoticed, partly due to the sheer volume of material it distributes. More than 20,000 Gospel packets are given away at the ports every summer. Each includes a green, pocket-sized, French-Arabic New Testament, a JESUS film DVD and other evangelical literature. Distribution totals over the project’s 11-year history top 200,000 packets, making it the single largest source of New Testaments in North Africa.

“This project makes the front page of newspapers in several North African countries,” Webber says. “There is often instruction for people not to receive the packet.”

He adds with a grin, “That usually makes them want it all the more.”

Receptivity at the port ranges from 20 percent to 60 percent day to day, a difference Webber credits to spiritual warfare rather than the stereotype that Muslims are “hostile” to the Gospel.

“Americans have this perception that they’re taking their life into their own hands when they reach out to Muslims, and that underneath every one of those robes is an AK-47,” he says. “Nothing could be further from the truth.

“Typically the response at the port is far more favorable than people would imagine. … Even if they disagree with what we’re doing, they’re usually very polite.”

Success stories
One of Webber’s favorite success stories involves a North African man considered a hajj, which means he fulfilled one of Islam’s five pillars by completing a pilgrimage to Mecca. What’s more, the man had traveled to Mecca not once as required by the Quran, but four times — even bringing his wife along for the journey — a mark of esteem among Muslims.

Several years ago, this man passed through the ports and was offered a Gospel packet by a Northern Lights volunteer. He took it home where he studied the New Testament and watched the JESUS film.

“His testimony is that after two years of examining the claims of the Gospel, he prayed to receive Christ and was baptized,” Webber says.

“One of the reasons I love this project is because we see the hand of God on it. And the testimonies are in the thousands of how God specifically moved people in time and in space to get them to where they could receive the Word of God.

“When I travel across North Africa, I hear, ‘A family member was going through the port and brought me a gift. They had no idea what it really was, but they gave it to me … and I began to look into it and discovered that this is the truth of God’s love for me.’”

Kids, tears and changed lives
Angie Jackson,* 26, is an IMB journeyman from Florida who serves on the Northern Lights’ staff. She remembers offering a packet to a North African woman who surprised Jackson by telling her she was already a Christian.

It turns out the woman received a packet at the port the previous year. She didn’t pay much attention to it until one evening while cooking dinner. Her children were bored and needed something to occupy them. She remembered the DVD (the JESUS film) that came with the packet and, on a whim, decided to play it.

As the kids watched, she cooked. But they kept calling her to come watch with them. Eventually she gave in.

“It got to the part where Jesus was being beaten and was about to be crucified,” Jackson says. “Her children were weeping and screaming at the television, ‘No! Don’t hurt Him — don’t hurt Him!’

“But she kept watching and looking at her kids, back and forth. Finally, she noticed that she was crying, too.”

When the movie ended, the woman and her children prayed to receive Christ.

“It’s because of this video, because of this packet, that my [children] are believers today,” she told Jackson. Then the woman asked if she could have another packet.

“This time she was giving it to a friend,” Jackson explained.

There are even stories of North Africans being led to the Lord right in front of the port’s gates. According to Webber, team members have witnessed some 225 decisions for Christ at the port since the project began, starting with the very first person ever offered a packet.

Boldness not required
But none of this would be possible without the sacrifice of Southern Baptist volunteers.

Project Northern Lights depends on a steady stream of volunteers to drive its massive Gospel distribution effort. Teams are needed for each of the eight, 10-day sessions scheduled throughout the summer. Webber and his staff provide training.

“Before volunteers ever go out to the port they spend a day tuning up their hearts and learning how to do distribution,” Webber says. “So they’re prepared spiritually and they’re prepared in distribution techniques and strategy.

“We teach them to say four very simple phrases: ‘Hello. This is a gift for you. It’s free. It is the Gospel.’”

Boldness isn’t required, but a broken heart is.

“The most important thing for volunteers is that they’re broken to the will of Christ — to be who God wants them to be and to do what God has called them to do.

“Volunteers are what make this project go,” Webber says. “God is calling people to come. And as people are obedient to go, not only will they be blessed, but the lives of many others will be blessed as well.”

Name in quotation marks has been changed.

Act

• Go as a volunteer to be a witness to millions of North African Muslims. No language skill or prior evangelism experience required. To learn more, call (800) 999-3113.
• Pray
  • For freedom for Southern Baptist volunteers to distribute God’s Word unhindered.
  • That Muslims will receive and explore the Gospel packets.
  • That Christ’s message of love and grace will go out with great power.
• Give to the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering, which along with the Cooperative Program supports “Dave Webber” and other personnel involved in outreach around the world.