Unknown Nations Podcast

This is the Unknown Nations podcast where we'll be sharing about reaching the nation where Jesus is unknown.

Greg Kelley:

Well, hello everyone and welcome to another episode of the Unknown Nations podcast, where we are gonna highlight again what God is doing in the most spiritually dark places in the world. My name is Greg Kelley. I have the privilege of being the CEO here at Unknown Nations, where our strategy, just to remind you, is reaching the most zero-access, barrier-ridden, spiritually antagonistic, spoken-word reliant people groups on the planet.

Ultimately, our prayerful goal is seeing the church birthed in these impossible places and just had the privilege of getting back from an amazing trip. I love it. I've been here 27 years, but a joy of mine over all these years has been traveling, spending time with our amazing network of indigenous leaders, and just got back from a trip to Bangladesh and Turkey, which we're going to be talking about a little bit. But I am not alone.

Uh, I am with a dear friend of mine and coworker, uh, who recently came on board. And if you heard the podcast recently, you would have caught Mike Grandy and myself on the streets of Istanbul, but now we both made it back okay. And we're going to talk about the entirety of our trip, including Bangladesh and Turkey, but first, I really want to do a proper introduction to Mr. Mike Grandy, who is the director of international ministries here at Unknown Nations. So, Mike, good to have you on again, buddy.

 

Mike Grandy:

Yeah, thanks for having me. It's just such an honor to be a part of what God is doing here among the least of these, you know, among the Unknown Nations here, and what a privilege to be here. Thanks.

 

Greg Kelley:

Yeah, man. But you have got a big responsibility. I can remember when we put together this job description, I’m going to, I was like, it’s going to take a special person because we’re literally taking all of the activities that go on in the field. And we have these 35 network outposts, we call them, from Senegal, 9,000 miles all the way to the Philippines and Indonesia. It’s a big responsibility, but the Lord really connected me with Mike in a really cool way about six or seven years ago. Mike, you remember kind of the whole origin of that connection?

 

Mike Grandy:

Yeah. Yeah. The Lord had been moving in my heart and just, uh, doing a work in my life. And, uh, it kind of spoken to me about missions again.

And lo and behold, a month later, after the Lord had begun the stirring, uh, you came and spoke at Resurrection Life Church of Big Rapids. Yes. And I remember sitting on the edge of my seat as you talked about the pygmies in Congo and I was like, wow, well, I’m like, Lord, send me, I want to go, you know, I was so excited just to see how God was moving across the world.

And it was shortly after that, that, uh, it was announced that our church was going to be doing a short-term mission trip with unknown nations. And I was the first person to sign up, and I was able to travel to Kenya and see. And the Lord had shown me over the years, like, I’d had the privilege of connecting with other ministries.

So I knew what unreached people groups were, but I didn’t quite understand the quantity of how many people it was. A third of the world and, you know, over 7,000 unreached tribes and, and how hard it was to get to them. And so I, being able to experience that, uh, firsthand had such a significant impact on my life.

 

Greg Kelley:

Talk about it a little bit, um, for the local church. I can remember those early meetings and just the enthusiasm. It's, it's so fulfilling and rewarding, uh, when you're able to connect the local church, the Bride of Christ, with some of these unreached fields. And so there you were kind of hearing about the Pocahontas and the Turkana and the Barana and some of these guys.

And then you went for someone who's like maybe listening today and they're like, I wonder what that experience is like. Think, think of like when you first came in and we landed in a place called Arous and you first encountered the Pocot people. Like, what was that experience like for you?

 

Mike Grandy:

Yeah, it was, it was kind of surreal, you know. You almost at times feel like you're in a National Geographic magazine, you know. It's, it's just so different.

It was so remote, but yet it was so interesting because there was cell phone reception. There's no running water, there's no electricity, uh, really no roads, but yet you saw cell phones. So that was a bit shocking.

 

Greg Kelley:

Yeah. And so we go there and the Pocot have really, they're one of the, one of our great success stories. We actually talk about the Pocot from the standpoint when we started working with them over 20 years ago, they were, they were still considered unreached. And today, praise God, they're about 25 to 30 percent Christian. They have an indigenous church planting movement. So this place that Mike's talking about, even though you go there and you would say, uh, this may not be the ends of the earth, but I can probably see it from on top of that hill.

You feel, I mean, it's so remote, yet the gospel's been there. And so when you think about like, you had the experience in a place that you saw the poverty, you saw the physical need, but yet I'm interested to know, like, as you're like kind of connecting the dots on the spiritual realities that they have, how hard is that?

To pivot off of, because I think where I'm going is that I think in mission so many times we do it from the perspective of what we see with our eyes and we assess the need based on that. Whereas Jesus would say, there's always, the poor is always going to be among you. There's always going to be people playing soccer with a wadded-up roll of duct tape and don't have shoes.

But they may be passionately in love with me (Jesus). How do you, how would you encourage someone to make that transition or have that proper perspective that would be to assess the spiritual condition? Don't get so focused on the physical. What would you say?

 

Mike Grandy:

Yeah, that's a great question. And I do remember something that you said on this trip that has stuck with me to this day. And you just said, you know, we're interested in providing bread for them. We're interested in providing water, but what we're most concerned about is the bread of life and the living water. You know, we, we, we don't want them just to be well-fed on their way to hell. And that has struck with me, you know, to this day that, um, having a heart for the lost, you know, it, it.

Jesus was moved with compassion. Paul walked, you know, we talked about this over 10,000 miles. And you think about that, they were moved by compassion, and it wasn't just to provide food. It was to provide the bread of life and living water. And so to see that firsthand, knowing that another story, we've traveled together before, and I remember we were in Pakistan and India in 2022.

And I remember, um, something else that struck with me, and we're in, we're in Bihar, India, and there's just, just crowds and crowds and crowds of people. And I remember just being struck by, like, just this thought that here's the multitudes of people and none of them have heard the name of Jesus. And just like you said, you know, every heartbeat, somebody passes away without hearing the name of Jesus.

And it just struck me, and I was moved with compassion for the people, just seeing, seeing them on the streets and, and going about their business with just no knowledge of Jesus. And so that's been a significant impact on my journey.

 

Greg Kelley:

Yeah, and when we met, you know, I, I knew that the Lord was stirring in you, Mike. I mean, I could see it in the first trip, and then you and I traveled, as you said, multiple times after that. And you had a great job. You were, uh, in a good spot, but you and your family were feeling God's kind of stirring you. And, you know, that's a scary thought for people. I think maybe when you're in your twenties and you've, you know, got life in front of you, you haven't made a lot of career choices.

Maybe your family hasn't developed, but you might feel, "Oh, it's easier." And a lot of people feel like, "Oh, I missed my moment" or whatever. You, you made a transition, you know, you're, you're still a young guy, but how hard was it for you to sort of make this change? You guys have a large family, and you're like, okay, God's calling us into full-time ministry.

I'm leaving a real stable situation—great job, they love me, I'm doing well, career path, check, family stability, check. Okay, God's telling me to sort of not, you know, basically give it up and go into ministry. What was that journey like?

 

Mike Grandy:

Yeah, that, that's a great question. And it was a process. Cause I remember, you know, back before COVID happened, like the Lord was just pulling on my heart, and all I wanted to do was respond with everything.

Like, Lord, I want to give you everything. I'm, I'm a vessel, you know, willing to do wherever, however, that was a prayer I prayed. It's like, Lord, wherever, however, whenever, use me for your glory, I'm available. And that was a prayer. And I remember talking to you cause you've, cause we've been... Yeah, it's a dangerous prayer though, because the Lord hears it, you know, and, uh, and sometimes He calls us out on it.

And so I remember talking to you, and we were so ready to go, and COVID happened, and some doors closed, and we were just not sure where to go. And, uh, I remember we've stayed in touch all these years, and, and, uh, you know, you've been a mentor in my life. And I remember you saying just, I think it was your wife, Kathy, that said, "Bloom where you're planted."

And so we just, we did, we just got super involved in the local church and served however we could until the doors opened. But you know, when, when you're submitted, when, when your heart is on fire for the Lord, and when you're submitted, there's some excitement to it, but it's, it's also like, you know... You know, Lord, we're willing to be not just hearers of the word, but doers of the word.

But it was a big change. We have six kids, and it was quite an adjustment. We went into full-time ministry, and the Lord had prepared me working in an office environment, overseeing, you know, in a management position and overseeing finance. And He'd given me a lot of this, this experience, uh, and then He called me to be a pastor, you know. So I did this for almost three years where the Lord just worked on me with people. You know, I understood processes, I have a master's degree in business administration, so I, I understand processes.

And then He brought me to a place where He showed me the importance of people. And so that was a great experience leading up to, to coming and joining Unknown Nations.

 

Greg Kelley:

I love it, buddy. Thank you for taking a step of faith like that, we are the benefactor of that. And Mike is now the director of international ministries here at Unknown Nations, and as I said, overseeing, uh, just a huge, huge responsibility, 35 networks, over 2,200 same-culture missionaries that Mike will be really leading, pastoring, shepherding that in a lot of ways, and pouring into these individuals. And he just got back from his first trip—not with me, but his first trip as the director of international ministries, and I decided, you know, I didn't want to give him too easy of a first trip. So I thought I'd take him to a place where there's a nice, healthy travel advisory, where the State Department's saying, "Don't go there."

And we were getting all kinds of counsel—hopefully Kathy's not listening to this—but anyway, we went and, um, really we had just an amazing experience in the country of Bangladesh. There are so many things about Bangladesh that draw us at Unknown Nations. And you talk about places without access to the gospel. Bangladesh has the largest single unreached people group in the world. What was that experience like for you, Mike, to be in an environment that you could argue is, you know, one of the more hostile environments to the gospel overall, yet we see a huge opportunity there? What was Bangladesh like for you?

 

Mike Grandy:

Yeah, it was, it was a great experience. You know, the Lord was with us. He gave us His grace. I mean, everything just seemed to happen exactly how it was supposed to, you know, the safest place to be is in the center of His will. And so we, we don't operate in fear. We go where the Lord is leading us, but just some observations about Bangladesh in general. You'd mentioned, you know, some instability in the government.

And one of the things that I see, and you could kind of see with our own eyes, and we heard from our partners and just different people talking, is there's a rise of Islamic fundamentalism. You see some Islamic countries where secularism is on the rise, and they're, they're mostly, you know, Islamic in name or culture. 

You know, culture, but here, you see fundamentalism on the rise. And, you know, young boys, they're part of these schools where they're being raised up in fundamentalism by a leader, and they're given clothes and they're given food. And so they have this identity in this family, and they're, they're, they're being very strategic in how they raise the next generation, and you're beginning to see the rise of this Islamic fundamentalism.

So that was kind of my first observation that I saw. And with that, you know, you see minorities begin to be more at risk. So one of the statistics that I'd heard is when they gained independence, it was something like 30 to 37 percent Hindu, and now it's like six to 7 percent Hindu. So you're seeing this extreme pressure to push them out, you know, and, and we hear the same thing, Christians, the reason we don't have that percentage with Christians, it's less than 1%, and so they sort of fall under the radar when you're hearing on the news what they're reporting on, but it's just not a real welcoming place for Christians at the moment.

 

Greg Kelley:

Mhm, one of the things that always strikes me about Bangladesh is I would use the word chaos. So when I'm trying to describe Bangladesh to people, I tell them, imagine all of your senses firing on overload without a break. What you see, what you hear, what you smell, what you taste, what you feel. I mean, it's like everything is just on overload. The horns are honking when you're in the cities. The smell is just very discernible.

I'll just say that. People are everywhere. As a matter of fact, just to give you an idea, when you say people are everywhere, Greg, what do you mean? Well, okay. Bangladesh is about the size of Iowa. So same footprint from a standpoint of square miles. Iowa has 3 million people in it. Bangladesh has 172 million people in it.

So the people are piled on top of each other, and then you throw in, as we just said, a majority Muslim environment with a few Hindus sprinkled in there, less than 1 percent Christian. And then, and then you've got this dynamic of the variety of people, of refugee activity, with the Rohingya in there.

But before we talk about the Rohingya, I want you to touch on an area they call the hill track area, Mike. It's an area kind of in the Northeast part of Bangladesh near the border with Myanmar. And you've got all of these sort of random people groups that are literally up in the hills, literally, and there's the concerted effort from a number of our partners to reach them with the gospel. But the diversity up there is very unique. Just try to describe that area and maybe the strategy that we're deploying there.

 

Mike Grandy: 

Yeah, in the Hilltracks area, it's sort of an off-limits area. Cause, like Greg said, it's on the border of Myanmar, and they have some conflicts between, you know, Bangladesh and Myanmar, and people are crossing the border, and they kind of have it just like cordoned off where nobody's allowed in or out, and they have checkpoints and things like that.

But, um, there are a number of people groups that are up in this area that we're working in. And one of our partners, when he goes there, he has to go through a police checkpoint, and they just say, well, you know, come back in an hour, and, you know, he kind of laughs. Cause he's just, it's like, how, you know, are they going to come? They're not going to go get them, you know? So as long as he gets past the checkpoint, he's good. And we got a report from him just about a week before we left that he baptized 22 people. And one of the strategies that they're using in this area is they actually do preschools. They'll do schooling to bring the children in, and they'll teach them Bible stories. They'll teach them Bible songs. 

And these kids will be exposed to the gospel, and the parents then will see the love of Christ through the school. They'll see it through the kids. They'll see that education is important, and out of those 22 people, there were actually five pairs of parents. So 10 of the parents were actually baptized in that, which is significant. You know, baptism is a big deal in the Islamic culture. It means that I'm no longer Islamic; I'm now a Christian. And so that's some of the strategies that they're using up in the Hilltracks.

 

Greg Kelley:

Yeah, it's amazing. And some of our partners who are working in that area, because of the diversity, you literally go from one of these—there's about 12 different tribes basically—and they all literally speak a different language. So you might go up there, and English is going to do you no good. Bengali, maybe half of the people would understand, but then you've got these different tribes, and each one of them has their own dialect, which makes the treasure an amazing tool because we can load it into all these different languages. So the Hilltrack area is pretty special, which leads me to the next sort of subset, if you will, of Bangladesh, which is these refugee camps.

So we've visited the refugee camp of the Rohingya. Now, the interesting thing about Bangladesh is where it's positioned. So you've got this almost exclusive Muslim country, Bangladesh. I already said there's over 170 million people there, and it's two main borders. India covers probably 80 percent of the border, wrapping all the way around the northern parts and the Bay of Bengal. So it's water, but then on the far western edge of it, India sort of catches it and goes all the way over the northern edge of it, even down a little bit on the far eastern side of it. So, which is the most populated Hindu country in the world. And then you've got the other neighbor, which Mike mentioned, which is Myanmar, one of the most populated Buddhist countries in the world.

So you've got Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, all converging in the same sort of geographic area—Bangladesh, right in the middle of it. That feels like a recipe for disaster, right? I mean, so, and so the tension with Myanmar, like, what did you pick up on that? As you were kind of exposed to that, because it was pretty devastating. I mean, what happened to the Rohingya people? Did you pick up on that at all? I mean, as far as the Myanmar, you know, sort of influence on Bangladesh?

 

Mike Grandy:

Yeah. It seemed like, even though the Rohingya are a Muslim minority in Myanmar, they're a Muslim group that's come into Bangladesh. Into Bangladesh, they're not welcome. I mean, so they flee the country because their citizenship is stripped, and they're experiencing their villages being burned and just a total genocide, you know, documented genocide. And you come into a country that's Muslim, you would think they'd be accepted, but they're not given citizenship.

They're, you know, one of the things you pick up on is it's like, "Oh yeah, you can tell they're Rohingya just by the way they dress, the way they talk." You know, they're just separate. They're separate people, and they're in 38 countries. Camps right there on the border, and they can't go anywhere. There's police checkpoints all along the road, and they're kind of stuck there. There's not a whole lot of hope, you know, for education. They can't work. They're just stuck.

 

Greg Kelley:

Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's really devastating from the standpoint of you see these camps, and when we say 38, they're 38 distinctive camps, and they're surrounded by barbed wire. I mean, it is, it is pretty rough looking.

I mean, these, these are, they almost look like, you know, P.O.W. camps. But yet you see kids on the other side walking, and they're walking through sewage and just junk everywhere. I mean, it's just... it's just... you wouldn't want your animal inside of these camps. One of the stories, Mike, that I remember, we met with one of our leaders, all of the work there.

\Even though these people were very persecuted from their Buddhist oppressors in Myanmar, pushed them across in 2017-2018, most of them came across to the tune of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya that are now making up the largest refugee camps in the world. They still, as Muslims, are absolutely radically against Christianity.

And so proselytizing is just not tolerated at all. So if you are a Christian leader inside these Rohingya camps, you are targeted. I mean, there's literally like an X on your back, and we heard multiple stories of assassination attempts. And, and unfortunately, some have been killed. But one of the leaders that we met with in one of these camps, he himself had—there had been six different attempts on his life.

Now, the UN—it's not good PR for the UN—and when Mike and I were hearing this, it became very evident that the UN is going to do what they can to protect these individuals. And there's a million people. I mean, they can't—like, it's, that's a big ask for them when they have multiple people who are being threatened like that.

Well, inevitably, there was this individual, a very influential leader. And he, as I said, had six attempts on his life. The UN had solid intelligence that another attempt was going to be made on his life, and they literally took him into custody forcefully. And there were arrangements for a country in the West to literally give him a passport, an asylum visa, a "get out of jail free" card.

Literally. He is going to be released from hell and given freedom, free passage into a Western country, and they presented him with that information. Great news, right? The only problem is this leader is so committed to the cause of Christ that he refused that opportunity. He was given, like, free passage—like, your plane ticket, we're set you up—but he refused to leave because he said to them, "You know, I need to take care of my people, these churches that he's overseeing," and furthermore, "Who is going to reach the Rohingya for Christ?" is what he was thinking. Now, that doesn't mean anything to the UN, but those are the kinds of people—when you hear those kinds of stories, Mike—that's someone who could literally get out of that carnage, and they refuse to, purely for the cause of Christ. What does that do to you?

 

Mike Grandy:  

Oh, I mean, you know, I have goosebumps all over right now. It inspires courage, you know. It just shows what we're called to be as Christians. We're called to be courageous, you know. I mean, it's, it's humbling. You know, I think of the other story. There's another leader in there whose cousin, who left in 2015, went over to India and had a free pass.

Didn't have to go into a camp, didn't have to do anything, but wanted to be a part of ministering to the Rohingya and went back voluntarily and checked himself into the camp where he is now stuck. And I think of these stories, and it's like, these are like one-way missionaries, you know, in modern day. And this is, you know, what we're called to do, is to love and to love sacrificially. And we're seeing that among these strong leaders.

 

Greg Kelley:  

Yeah. It's so inspiring. I think, I think that is the word, Mike, that I would use as well, because it's, it's humbling, it's inspiring, it's, I feel like it calls us to something even greater. And what is it really all about? And it would make you want to do anything to help these people.

And we're, we're doing everything in our power, getting them more treasures, coming alongside of them. They're doing a training and equipping, uh, because that, this guy's just in one camp. I mean, he's impacting a lot of the camps, but there are other leaders that need to be raised up to impact a million people.

So, we had an amazing time in Bangladesh. We just are just scratching the surface literally, as we're telling you, but that wasn't the end of our trip because then, uh, Mike, you know, I couldn't just like give him one, one experience. I needed to throw him into deeper water. So, I thought, let's see, where else can I take Mike? Bangladesh, okay. Largest unreached people group. I know where I'm going to take him. I'm going to take him to the country that has more refugees in it than any country in the world. And that is the country of Turkey. So, you went from Bangladesh to Turkey, Mike, and you got to experience a lot of cool things there. Was there anything specifically that sort of jumped out at you just when you think about Turkey? I mean, it's a little bit of a contrast to Bangladesh.

 

Mike Grandy: 

Yeah. Yeah. It was definitely a different vibe, different, different feel to it. Had a lot of Mediterranean and European influences, and, and, you know, it was just so clear how strategic this country is. We had the privilege of working with the underground Iranian church, and so humbling to work with, you know, just like it was inspiring to be with those leaders in the Rohingya, it was inspiring to be with these Iranians that have experienced persecution. Like we don't, we, we don't even quite comprehend it in the U.S.

 

Greg Kelley: 

Yeah. Uh, Turkey, Mike is so correct when he says strategic, because it's literally the gateway. You think of the Balkans, Bulgaria, that's the far Western edge of Turkey going into Europe. And then it's bordered, of course, by the Black Sea, and think of the Ukraine-Russian conflict right now, that's right nearby. And then the far Western border of Turkey will take you right directly into Iran and Iraq.

So, into Asia, and then the Southern part, the Mediterranean. There's a border with Syria, which is going to bring you down, you know, Middle East kind of area into North Africa. So, it literally is located in the midst of really a lot of hotspots. And the fact that there's so many different refugees, I mean, there's nearly 300,000 Afghans that are in, in Turkey—not even a direct border. I mean, it's on the other side of Iran. But yet, there's 300,000 Afghans. There's about half of that, 150,000 Iranians, which really has captured our attention. The fastest growing church in the world is really key. We'll be talking about that on some future episodes of the Unknown Nations podcast, but Mike and I just had an amazing time in Bangladesh and Turkey. Mike, buddy, I just can't say enough how excited I am to have you on board. It's going to be fun to watch the Lord move and have some more experiences like this.

 

Mike Grandy: 

Yeah. It's such, such a humbling privilege to be here, to see God moving all over the planet, throughout the 1040 window, in the unreached nations. And I'm just really excited because every day, it's such a great... I keep, I keep pinching myself. Is this real? Because every day, I hear testimonies, just book of Acts-type testimonies where God is moving, and it's so encouraging.

 

Greg Kelley:

I've been doing that for 27 years, so that'll never stop. But, well, friend, thank you for joining us on this episode of the Unknown Nations podcast. Just so thankful for you. Do us a favor and give us a favorable rating, share it with your friends and family—that would be wonderful. And make sure you visit our website, which is unknownnations.com. We have free resources there, a prayer guide that you can get on a weekly basis, and obviously this podcast, which will come to you every single week. So, we'll look forward to catching you next week on the Unknown Nations podcast!