Reaching the Unreached
Revival in Cambodia!
How it began
The way the Lord called me to Cambodia was special. I had just finished my second campaign in Ethiopia as a campaign director for Christ for All Nations. After six intense months, six days a week, often 18 hours a day, I was exhausted. I was ready to go home and rest.
But on the way to the airport, a police officer randomly stopped me. For no reason. He pulled his gun and pointed it straight at my head. I was shocked but somehow stayed calm. After a little argument, he let me go.
That was the last thing I needed. I booked the next hotel I could find, just to take a shower. I was tired. But right then, something special happened. I didn't pray, I didn't worship, but the Holy Spirit's presence started to fill my room.
A Holy Spirit download
Right there in that hotel room, the Holy Spirit started to speak to me. He gave me a blueprint, a complete download of what He wanted to do in Cambodia. He showed me how to combine evangelism and Gospel Campaigns with church planting, training and multiplying local evangelists – and how to raise up a movement that would keep going without us on the ground. It was all there. For three hours straight, I felt like I was a computer, and someone was coding into my soul.
Two months later, I was in Cambodia, traveling across the whole country, trying to meet pastors, trying to find leaders. To my surprise, I met one of the national Christian leaders almost immediately. Within ten days, the doors flew wide open. They told me, “Great Harvest is welcome to come and serve Cambodia.” They said they would support us, that we have the full backing of the nationwide church. Amazing favor with men!
We started training local evangelists
Just weeks later, in February, we launched the first CfaN Jesus Camp in Siem Reap. After intense promotion and recruiting of local evangelists, we saw tens of thousands of people come to Christ.
Then we went south to Takeo Province, where we found the strongest local church support. That’s where we met Pastor Lekru Ratha. He invited us to a restaurant before he even saw us and served us very expensive lobster to welcome us. I have never seen anything like this in a third-world country! It shows their deep respect and eagerness for the Kingdom of God in their country. Today he is my dear friend. From the very beginning, he was humble, hungry and full of fire for God. As the provincial leader of Christianity in Takeo, he became our daily partner in building the movement.
77 Evangelists in the field
Then our team started arriving – CfaN-trained evangelists from all over and Cambodian Jesus Camp graduates – and soon 77 evangelists were on the ground. We started holding youth campaigns in hundreds of educational institutions. We learned how to reach whole villages. We discovered that if we reached the village chief and won his favor, he would gather the whole village to hear the Gospel. That became our strategy.
And we started to see the impossible. People hearing the name of Jesus for the very first time. Cambodians crying as they were filled with the Holy Spirit. Miracles breaking out in front of our eyes. The Gospel works in Asia just like it works in Africa and anywhere else on earth.
Reaching new villages every day
Now we were flooding unreached villages every single day. Some teams preached to the youth. Other teams preached to the villages. We were also working on the campaigns, mobilizing all 200 house churches that existed across a province of one million people.
Then we leveled up with Mini-Campaigns. I had a deep desire to raise up locals, but also to give our CfaN-trained evangelists their first chance to preach on a campaign platform. So, every two weeks, I organized a smaller campaign. I mobilized the churches of a district, trained them in follow-up, got them ready as counselors, and we bused them in. And it worked.
Whole villages came to hear the Gospel. Villages of 500 people had 1,000 in attendance each night – people flooded in from all around. These were places that had never heard the name of Jesus, not even once in their entire lives. But now there was a preacher, and they heard. The Cambodian people started to believe in the Gospel.
Planting a church in every village!
We followed up. We took their details and invited them to church that Sunday. And they came!
After every Gospel Campaign in each village, we were in a rush to finish the church building for all the new believers. And on Sunday, when we held our church opening ceremony, it was overflowing! We could have built the churches three times bigger, there were so many new believers. We opened each new church with praise, with thanksgiving, and with another Gospel message – and finished the service with mass baptisms. Some were baptized in a small tub. Others in a pond. But they all got baptized, publicly confessing their faith.
Jesus was moving in Cambodia.
1,000 saved in a village of 200
Halfway in, two young men from America, Aaron and Caleb flew in to film us. For two weeks straight, they documented everything we did. At that time, Khmer New Year was coming up on April 15 where we were planning a campaign in a small village of only 200 people. One of our Jesus Camp graduates had some land there and she wanted to plant a church. So she decided to hold a Gospel Campaign and plant the first church there with her as a pastor.
It was not easy; Cambodian New Year made it more difficult. Everyone was on vacation, celebrating with their families. No one wanted to work. But we had no choice but to do it.
Eventually, the campaign happened. Over 1,000 people came. And over 750 people got saved in a village of 200!
I barely preached. I gave it all away. I wanted the locals and our trained CfaN evangelists to experience it, because in a nation like this, multiplication is the key. The more we give away, the more the nation gains and that was our goal.
Last-minute miracle
On Wednesday night, the final night of the campaign, we told the new believers, "We are having church this Sunday." But Thursday came with a big problem. There was no church building yet. No workers. No money. Nothing to even begin with. Just three days until Sunday!
I knew – if we waited, the new believers might slip back into Buddhism. This wasn’t about a program or simply keeping our promise. This was a battle for their souls.
So we ran. We searched. We asked. Most people were celebrating. But a few men agreed to work for triple the price. Some of our evangelists from overseas were so moved and inspired by our persistence that they laid down their outreaches and started to help build the church. Money came in slowly. Even the camera guys sowed.
And guess what? One and a half hours before the service on Sunday, the cross went on the roof. The church was finished. Hallelujah! A building that should taken two weeks – we built it in three days.
And then came the shock. Out of 200 people in the village, 160 new believers showed up! The church was packed. People were standing outside. We were all stunned. Aaron and Caleb couldn’t speak. We all realized the same thing. This is possible. This is working, in Jesus' name.
You can preach the Gospel in the 10/40 window. You can build a church. You can see a whole village turn to Jesus. Dozens of generations of Buddhist religion – completely flipped upside down by one single Gospel message!
God told us to go further
We moved to the south near the communist Vietnam border, to a place called Kaoh Andeat.
This district had no Christians within a 35-minute car drive in all directions. No one who was a Christian even walked there. No churches anywhere, no Gospel ever preached anywhere close. No Christian presence or even an existing idea of what Christianity could be.
But our teams went, and for the first time ever, the Gospel was preached in Khao Andeat. This district had to wait for 2,000 years to hear the good news after Jesus died!
125 people gathered and 80 gave their lives to Jesus. We planted the very first church in Khao Andeat. It’s still there and still growing. Trained Pastors have moved there and they’re about to plant many more!
CfaN graduates flew in to preach
And then, finally, the day of our first Great Harvest Flagship Campaign came. Evangelists Nathanael Ehn, Kaisa Fischer and Clem Lo flew in – all CfaN Bootcamp Graduates. We were ready. The field was packed. Over 6,000 people gathered. Over 35,000 listened via livestream and radio. Over 2,000 radios were tuned in across the country in unreached areas. We know many heard the Gospel for the first time.
And we saw incredible miracles! A 12-year-old boy got saved, filled with the Holy Spirit, and started looking for a church and a Bible in his language. Now he’s preaching to others about Jesus. A woman was healed of nine years of shoulder pain. People who couldn’t walk, walked. Eyes opened. Legs that were injured during the genocide were healed.
We also gave out over 2,000 Bibles. And we documented 2,881 salvations. But even that isn’t the whole story.
Churches exploded!
Some churches that had 8 members for 10 years suddenly had 80. Hundreds of churches grew by over 1,000%. Revival broke out. And it hasn’t stopped. The holistic revival strategy the Lord gave me in Ethiopia brought exactly what it was supposed to bring – real, authentic revival on all levels!
Since we left Cambodia, our Jesus Camp graduates have kept running. They never stopped. They kept preaching the Gospel and kept planting new Churches. They’ve now reached over 60 unreached villages. They’ve planted over 58 new churches, completely by themselves. On average, they are planting two new churches a day where there were none before.
Local evangelists have now led more people to Christ than the campaign itself!
Cambodia is in revival. And we will go back. This is not the end. It’s just the beginning.
Our hearts are full of thanksgiving to Evangelist Daniel Kolenda and Christ for All Nations - thank you for multiplying laborers and partnering with Great Harvest Ministries to serve Cambodia. Thank you for believing in us. Thank you for standing with us.
Evangelist Dario Giustino
