Christians Urged to Pray for Political, Spiritual Leaders of 10/40 Window

Beverly Pegues’ Window International Network launches its seventh annual prayer calendar this month
It’s been nearly four years since the AD2000 and Beyond Movement disbanded, but prayer leader Beverly Pegues says the call to pray for the world’s least evangelized region is as urgent as ever.

She points to the evening news, noting that many of the current political hot spots–including Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel and Liberia–are located within an area known as the 10/40 Window, an imaginary rectangle between the 10th and 40th parallels north.

This month her Window International Network (WIN) launches its seventh Praying Through the Window prayer calendar, which focuses on the political and spiritual leaders of the 68 Window nations.

The effort is a continuation of the prayer campaign she helped coordinate as part of AD2000, an initiative that mobilized millions of Christians around the globe to pray, evangelize and plant churches among unreached people groups in the 10/40 Window.

After nearly seven years, AD2000 disbanded in 1999. “It would be difficult to say [the group’s goals] were actually accomplished,” said Luis Bush, former international director of AD2000, “but certainly there was a major advance.”

As an example he cites a June 30 Time magazine cover story that examined missionary activity in the Muslim world. The article reported that the number of missionaries to Islamic nations nearly doubled between 1982 and 2001, from 15,000 to 27,000. Bush also noted that many indigenous leaders are reaching remote people groups, such as the 25,000 missionaries from India who are evangelizing cross-culturally throughout the 10/40 Window.

But Pegues said the terrorist attack on Sept. 11, 2001, was a sign that prayer for the 10/40 Window must continue. “Either we’re going to … do everything that we need to do in the 10/40 Window, or we’re going to have things … like 9/11 … and all these different things that are happening in the world.”

Last year, WIN mobilized some 22 million Christians to pray for Window nations, Pegues told Charisma. The prayer calendar, which can be downloaded from WIN’s Web site (www.win1040.com), includes at least two nations each day, with statistical information about their populations and major religions.

Now head of The World Inquiry, an organization that assesses the ministry activity occurring inside the 10/40 Window, Bush applauds Pegues’ efforts. He said Christians must continue to find creative ways to reach Window nations with the gospel. For his part, Bush hosts regional consultations with Christian leaders from across the globe to hear “what’s on their hearts.” He said their visions are inspiring, with one Chinese believer hoping to send 100,000 missionaries to Israel.

Pegues said she has a particular burden for the women and children of the 10/40 Window, and has written a book about the prayer needs of that demographic. With illiteracy, poverty and oppression of women rampant in many Window nations, Pegues said prayer is the foundation for transformation.

“Otherwise it would be overwhelming,” she said. ” I still believe the prayer power is what is going to make all these other things happen.”

Meanwhile Peter and Doris Wagner, who headed up AD2000’s United Prayer Track in the 1990s, have shifted their focus to what they call the 40/70 Window, which spans from Iceland to northern Japan and includes the Silk Road and Europe. They said they believe reaching non-Arab Muslims along the Silk Road is a key to evangelizing the Arab world. And they hope to spark a revival in European nations that have grown cold to the gospel.

“Enormous progress was made in the 10/40 Window because God’s people targeted it,” Wagner said “The task is by no means finished, but we felt God … moved us on to a different assignment.”

Pegues said her life’s calling is to the 10/40 Window. This month she heads to Indonesia to lead a summit designed to train Asian believers in intercession for the region. She said the call to prayer rings loudly in her ears.

“Will the church wake up and take her place?” she asks. “If we don’t reach these people, how will they be reached?”
Adrienne S. Gaines