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Share God’s love with the people of Oman, the oldest independent state in the Arab world.  Its strategic location brings migrant workers to boost the population to around five million* who call Oman home. Wealth from the oil and gas industry has allowed a greater level of education and economic balance improving prospects. 

It is easy to engage with friendly Omanis and migrants. Philip, an expatriate believer explains: “Their faith is a part of their life through and through, so starting conversations around personal faith is not difficult – providing you speak Arabic! If you have a professional skill to share such as engineering, law or medicine, so much the better.  However, the window of opportunity is beginning to close in some areas, like teaching.” If you are up to learn Arabic, there are opportunities to do so here at universities, and study alongside others eager to find out what drives you. But it does take time to develop real friendships with mutual trust.

Sharing the love of God in Oman

Share God’s love with people through professional skills: by working and making a difference by example. You can live out love by working alongside individuals, serving communities, bringing employment opportunities that lead to safer workplaces. Or training nationals to use their own skills to benefit their nation. In Oman, there are plenty of opportunities to come alongside the local community of Jesus followers respectfully, acknowledge the variety of backgrounds and reveal the real personality of Jesus to others.

Jesus followers in Oman

Although ninety per cent of those living in Oman are Muslim, the government graciously permits the peaceful co-existence of around 100,000 expatriate believers in Jesus*, giving land for building places of worship. Numbers of Jesus followers are growing, although they are expected to be sensitive to the majority faith. Expatriate believers can encourage the national church to be available to pray with others and explore questions of faith gently. You can join prayer initiatives to support those living and working amongst the diverse population, with its extremes of wealth, need, loneliness and family networks. You can encourage hunger for relationship with the God of the universe.  You can give practical support for marginalised communities.

You can expect challenging circumstances with extremely high summer temperatures to bring weariness and demoralisation.  Yet international workers can live alongside national believers in Jesus, and those who have not yet met Him personally.  You will always work to support local partners within the country, using your professional skills and personal faith to bless and empower the people of Oman. Whether you come for a long, or short time, or whether you pray, or invest in lives through financial support, there are opportunities for you in Oman.

*figures obtained from https://joshuaproject.net/countries/MU 21.06.2022

Video: Fishermen of the Middle East