Open Doors

Open Doors is a non-denominational Christian mission supporting what it perceives as persecuted Christian believers in more than 45 countries where they consider Christianity to be socially or legally discouraged or oppressed. They are also engaged in the distribution of Bibles and literature, audio recordings, broadcasting and training.

History
Open Doors was founded in 1955 by Andrew van der Bijl, a Dutchman more widely known as Brother Andrew, when he decided to smuggle his own brand of bibles to Christians he felt were being discriminated against in the then-Soviet Poland.

Brother Andrew continued this work in smuggling bibles to Christians in many of the Soviet countries and in 1957 was given a blue Volkswagen Beetle which he used to deliver to countries inside the Communist bloc. With this new car he was able to carry more literature. The work of Open Doors was expanding through the extension of its network throughout Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union.

In 1981, they delivered one million contraband Chinese bibles in one night to a beach in the village of Gezhou in China on a mission they named Project Pearl. In 1988, Open Doors used Glasnost as an opportunity to openly provide one million Russian Bibles to the Russian Orthodox Church, at a cost of $2.5 million. Open Doors partnered with the United Bible Societies to complete the task in just over one year.

In 2003, Christian Today reported that Open Doors have delivered 4 million Bibles and scriptural documents to persecuted Christians and trained 22,000 pastors and church leaders in that year.

As of August, 2007, Open Doors had offices in 27 countries. In 2008 Open Doors USA delivered 3.9 million pieces of literature such as Bibles and training materials to people in various countries and regions where religious persecution are said to occur. These including Central Asia, Vietnam, the Middle East, sub-Saharan Africa and Egypt.

Current work
Open Doors works in many countries around the world giving help to Christians. They are involved in :
 * Delivering Bibles and other Christian literature
 * Providing pastoral and discipleship training
 * Conducting seminars on Christian living, family life. "Standing Strong Through the Storm” is the seminar they use to teach churches on how to survive under persecution.
 * Running Bible-based literacy courses
 * Supplying equipment and vocational training to help widows, families of prisoners of conscience, the displaced, and the unemployed to earn a living
 * Providing legal aid and spiritual and emotional comfort to prisoners and their families
 * Financing and supplying equipment to pastors, churches, and Bible colleges
 * Supplying printing presses, radios, cassette players, photocopiers, and A/V and transport equipment
 * Sponsoring Bible colleges, reconciliation ministries and restoration centres for Christian refugees, widows and orphans.

World Watch List
Open Doors also work to inform and motivate the Church to assist Christians it perceives as persecuted. The organisation publishes an annual "World Watch List" that lists the countries they consider to have the strongest persecution of Christians. Currently the first 10 positions of the list are taken by the following countries:
 * 1) 🇰🇵 North Korea
 * 2) 🇮🇷 Iran
 * 3) 🇸🇦 Saudi Arabia
 * 4) 🇸🇴 Somalia
 * 5) 🇲🇻 Maldives
 * 6) 🇦🇫 Afghanistan
 * 7) 🇾🇪 Yemen
 * 8) 🇲🇷 Mauritania
 * 9) Laos
 * 10) 🇺🇿 Uzbekistan