Welcome to the podcast Think Biblically, Conversations on Faith and Culture.

I'm your host Scott Ray, Dean of Faculty and Professor of Christian Ethics here

at Talbot School of Theology at Biola University.

We're here today in the offices of Open Doors, USA,

which if you're not familiar with this organization,

you should be.

It's one of the largest and most effective organizations in the world

serving the persecuted church around the world.

They have offices all over the world and operations in many parts of the world that we can't talk

about for security reasons.

So we're here in the office today with our special guest.

And for, and again, for security reasons, I can only give you his first name. You might be able to pick up by the slight accent that he has where

he comes from. His name is Rank. And Rank partners with open doors to work throughout North Africa and the Middle East.

And travels extensively throughout these regions serving the persecuted church, particularly

in those regions.

So Rink, welcome. Thank you so much for joining us on this.

Thank you very much. My pleasure to be here.

So tell us just maybe as a way to get started here, tell us a little bit about,

you just give us your assessment of the state of the church

in the parts of the Middle East and North Africa where you travel most frequently.

Yeah, so that's a that's a big question, but the church in the Middle East, let me start here.

It was born in the Middle East, right?

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