The Bahau of Indonesia

The Bahau of Indonesia, numbering approximately 21,500 people, are No Longer Unreached. They are an ethnolinguistic community of Indonesia. They are an Indigenous people in the Borneo-Kalimantan people cluster of the Malay Peoples affinity bloc. Their primary language is Bahau and their primary religion is Animism.

Photo by Google. (2025). Image generated by Gemini 2.5 Flash: Bahau

Fast Facts:

Affinity Group: Malay Peoples
Country: Indonesia
People Cluster: Borneo-Kalimantan
Primary Language(s): Bahau (bhv)
Primary Religion(s): Animism
Population: 21,500
Strategic Progress Index (SPI): No Longer Unreached
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): 2% or Greater but Less than 5% Evangelical
People Group ID: PG022545
View on Joshua Project

Pray for the Bahau of Indonesia

Join others around the world in praying for the lost to be saved, the gospel to advance, the global Church to grow, and for laborers to be sent out and sustained in the harvest.

Dig Deeper (Religion):

Primary Religion: Animism
Religious Affiliation: Ethnoreligion

90%
%

Dig Deeper (Language):

Primary Language: Bahau
Language Family: Austronesian

100%
%

Media Resources in Bahau:

Films:

No language code (ROL) found for this post.

Bible Resources in Bahau:

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Or check out the Bahau bible at Bible.com

Linked from YouVersion

Explore Lostness and Next Steps

Unengaged and Unreached

Strategic Priority Index (SPI): Unengaged and Unreached (SPI: 2), which means there are less than 2% evangelical Christian populations among which there are no known efforts focused on establishing self-sustaining churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice.
Lostness Priority Index (LPI): Minimally Reached People Group, (LPI: 3), 2% to 3% Evangelical.
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): 2% or Greater but Less than 5% Evangelical (GSEC: 4), this people group is greater than or equal to 2% evangelical

Next steps for the Bahau:
Begin signifcant prayer and fasting for this group
Send cross-cultural teams to discover and research this people group
Begin gospel seed sowing and church planting among this group

SPI: Unreached yet Engaged

The Bahau are Engaged yet Unreached, which means there are less than 2% evangelical Christian populations but there are sustained efforts at establishing self-sustaining churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice.

Next steps for the Bahau:
Continue prayer and fasting for this group
Continue gospel seed sowing and church planting among this group
Begin training up local leaders to lead and develop strategies to reach their own people

SPI: No longer Unreached

The Bahau are No Longer Unreached, which means there are more than 2% evangelical Christian populations and there are churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice. There is still more to be done among them.

Next steps for the Bahau:
Empower local believers to begin praying for their own people
Continue gospel seed sowing and church planting
Encourage local leaders to being leading church planting strategy and looking for Unreached and Unengaged groups nearby

Pray specifically for the Bahau of Indonesia

You visit the earth and water it; you greatly enrich it; the river of God is full of water; you provide their grain, for so you have prepared it.
readPsalm 65:9

Give thanks for God's provision in nature, and pray that those who don't know Him will recognize His hand, desire to know their Creator, and hear the truth that Jesus is the solution to the world's greatest need.

And the word of God continued to increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith.
readActs 6:7

Pray that the Word of God will be increasingly available to these people in ways they will resonate with so that all may have a chance to respond to the good news of Jesus Christ.

The LORD is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.
readLamentations 3:25

Pray that as people place their faith in Christ, they will trust in the goodness of the Lord as they wait on Him to answer their cries for help.

The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him.
readJohn 1:9-10

Pray for those God might send to share the gospel here. Ask that they will grow closer to Jesus and be compelled to share His good news with people who don't know it.

Bahau Across Countries (ROP3 - 100764) reported in the following countries:

To download a comprehensive people group list in spreadsheet form, visit our Research Data page.

Peoplegroups.org relies on updates from the field and other organizations for much of our data, so if you have any updates, please contact us. We use various international naming standards. For a list of these standards and fields, visit our Definitions page.

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