Unreached People Groups – Pakistanis (Video)

Pray for the Nations.

Jeri: “Hi, we’re so glad you’ve joined us. I’m Jeri.”

Craig: “I’m Craig.”

Jeri: “And today, in our short prayer video we will be highlighting the Pakistani people. Did you know that there’s about 125,000 Pakistanis living in New York Metro? The largest concentration of them live in a place called Little Pakistan in Midwood Brooklyn. They also live in Long Island, Jackson Heights, Jersey City, and Brighton Beach.”
“Pakistan is the second largest Muslim country in the world. 80 percent are Sunni and 20 percent are Shiite.”

Craig: “The first large immigration from Pakistan to New York City actually took place in the late 1960s. It was primarily young middle class and high class professionals, Urdu speakers from Karachi, Lahore, and Upper Kashmir. They were followed by their relatives and families and less urbanized people from Punjabis to Pathans, Sindhis, and Balochi.”
They became a huge thriving community here. Amongst the immigrant communities they were one of the greatest and thriving, promising communities in Metro New York City. People would come from far and wide to join themselves to little Pakistan to maybe even open up a business, get a house, be part of it somehow, because it reminded them of home and they loved it. It held much of what was dear to them.”
“That went on until 9/11. People left to go home to Pakistan, western Europe, Canada. I mean thousands of people speaking conservatively, and the kids would change their names to more American names to, dress more American, talk more American. Pakistani people who lived in New York didn’t even want to come and visit Little Pakistan for fear of getting swooped up in a dragnet or taken to detention or something and deported and so it was a hard time.”
“Eventually that all smoothed out and worked out. What does it look like now? Well, all of the professionals as at the first, they’re still with us, and they are thriving and doing well, but the people we really see visibly above ground work time- intensive, exhausting jobs such as construction, running street vending businesses, owning their own small businesses, or driving taxis, which incidentally about a sixth of all the taxis in the Metro area are driven by people from a Pakistani background.”

Pray for Pakistan.

Craig: “Oh God, Creator of heaven and earth, we pray for the Pakistani people here in Metro New York City and all those who have come to labor amongst them, those who bear your message and are seeking to bring pure word of scripture to them without any of the trappings or contaminations of the past have obscured the message from the purity of Jesus Christ and his love for the Pakistani peoples.”
“Lord God, we just pray where methods and men break down and fail and their strivings, your Holy Spirit can bring forth a move of life and bring forth breakthroughs against the strongest and most ugly darkness of evil that would come against your desire for the Pakistani peoples.”
“And we pray for the outpouring of your Holy Spirit, oh dear Lord God into the communities of the Pakistani peoples and upon the people of peace amongst them and that you would connect them Lord with the laborers that have come and are giving their lives and laying down their lives to bring the message of Jesus Christ to them.”
“We pray that they would see, Lord God, that your arms are open to them, your embrace is open to them, Lord God, and that your love is open to them, and that they would receive your messengers.
“Lord God, we pray that the laborers in these days will not fail or fall short, and we pray that you will raise up laborers amongst the Pakistanis themselves to their own peoples, Lord God, and establish your people amongst the Pakistanis peoples in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, amen.