Pray for Kyrgyzstan--Ramadan 2024

Nooruz is the celebration of the spring equinox (March 21) and marks the beginning of a New Year in many Middle Eastern, Persian and Turkic cultures. In Kyrgyzstan, it is one of the most important holidays of the year, and this year it falls in the midst of the Muslim month of prayer and fasting. Some observing Ramadan may choose to take a day off from fasting for Nooruz and do a “make-up” day of fasting after Ramadan is over and some may opt to celebrate at sundown as they break their fast.

_{Photo: en.irna.ir}

The traditional way to celebrate this New Year is to have a sumalak-making party. Family and neighbors gather in one house around a huge pot (up to 100 liters), and first make borsok, (fried bread) and tea for everyone to enjoy as the 24 hour process of making sumalak begins. The elder ladies in the group add the ingredients (sprouted wheat, flour, oil, water, stones–so the sumalak doesn’t stick to the bottom), and as they add each ingredient they offer blessings and wishes for the new year ahead. “May this year be without hunger, May this year be full of health, May our children be prosperous this year” and the younger women take turns in groups of three stirring the sumalak with long wooden paddles and singing as they stir the pot. The older men in the community retell regional folklore, World War II stories, and the history of their people, passing on these treasures of their heritage to the children in the group who may gather around the fire to roast potatoes.

Along the way, young people play games (including Kyrygz versions of Red Rover and Duck Duck Goose) and various games with the knee-joint bones of a goat. This is a time to gather together as a family or community and relish relationships, history and hope for blessing in the year ahead. While many urban families no longer make sumalak at home, it’s still a time to get together and enjoy time with family–and eat some sumalak that someone else made!

Exalting His Name

See, I am doing a new thing!
    Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness
    and streams in the wasteland. …
to give drink to my people, my chosen,
     the people I formed for myself
    that they may proclaim my praise. (Isaiah 43:19-21, NIV)

Praying for the Harvest and the Church

• Pray for believers who are planning Nowruz-related outreaches to have open doors to share the gospel. 
• Pray that as families and communities gather today there would be opportunities for believers to share their confidence of God’s goodness in their life in the year ahead.
• Pray for elders in the community to be open to hear and retell stories from the gospels and receive these as part of their heritage from their Creator.

Worshipping and Waiting

This time can be an opportunity to simply sit still, turn on a worship song and ask the Lord if there’s anything else he’d like you to pray for today for the gospel to go forth in a special way in Kyrgyzstan on Nooruz.

Praying by Name

Pray for the Lord to do a new thing in the lives of your friends–a new openness to the gospel, a new thought, a new question, a new spiritual hunger…to make a way in the wilderness for them to proclaim his praise.

Closing Prayer

Abba, you formed the Kyrgyz people for yourself, to proclaim your praise. We pray that these Kyrgyz values of community, singing, storytelling and blessing would be both open doors and vehicles for the gospel this Nooruz. We ask for a movement of vibrant local churches that make sense culturally to Kyrgyz people. We ask that in this new year you would truly do a new thing among the Kyrgyz people and throughout Kyrgyzstan.

Unreached People Group of the Day (Visit Joshua Project for more info on Karakalpak in Kyrgyzstan)

Father, please send out laborers, open hearts and begin a movement to Christ among the Karakalpak in Kyrgyzstan.