Somewhere amidst the snowy scene pictured above, lie the remains of Kharakorum (Харахорийн in Mongol). Almost nothing remains of the capital of Chinggis Khan’s Great Mongolian Empire. It almost seems impossible that the largest contiguous empire the world has ever seen could have been ruled from here. Yet in the early 13th century, this was how it was.

Naraa (one of my co-workers) and I were passing through Kharakorum yesterday, on our way from Tsetserleg in Mongolia’s Archangai Province, to Ulaanbaatar. We stopped to pray here. For me, it seemed appropriate to stand in the approximate centre of Chinggis’ empire, despite the blizzard, and to pray in a new vision of conquest. For among the emerging churches of today’s Mongolia, there is no less a vision than to conquer with the love of Christ all the places that were conquered by Chinggis Khan and his sons.

You have to look at a map of the Great Mongolian Empire at its greatest extent to see what a gigantic vision this is. Most of the lands covered are loveless places, where the Gospel of Jesus Christ is often known by its association with one ethnic group or another, or with the geo-politics of foreign powers.

Let’s ask the Lord of the Harvest to strengthen and embolden these young churches as they seek to step into a vision that is far greater than they are, in the hands of the One who is greater than all.