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PEOPLE GROUP PROFILE

The Ossetians of Turkmenistan

The Ossetians of Turkmenistan, numbering approximately 2,600 people, are Unengaged and Unreached. They are an Eastern Iranian ethnic group indigenous to Ossetia, a homeland that is politically divided between North Ossetia-Alania in Russia and South Ossetia, a Russian-occupied territory of Georgia They are an Diaspora people, in the Persian people cluster of the Persian-Median Peoples affinity bloc. Their primary religion is Islam - Sunni. They primarily speak Ossetic.

Ossetians in Azerbaijan photo
Photo courtesy of Joshua Project. Photo Source: Bohan Shen - Flickr Bohan Shen - Flickr Licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Fast Facts:

Affinity Group: European Peoples
Country: Turkmenistan
People Cluster: Persian
Primary Language(s): Ossetic (oss)
Primary Religion(s): Islam - Sunni
Population: 2,600
Strategic Progress Index (SPI): Unengaged and Unreached
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): Less than 2% Evangelical, No Active CP Activity
People Group ID: PG024630
View on Joshua Project

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Pray for the Ossetians of Turkmenistan

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Dig Deeper (Religion):

Primary Religion: Islam - Sunni
Religious Affiliation: Islam

%
Islam - Sunni Adherents

Dig Deeper (Language):

Primary Language: Ossetic
Language Family: Indo-European

%
Ossetic Speakers

Media Resources in Ossetic:

Films:

Provided by the Jesus Film Project

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Bible Resources in Ossetic:

Provided by Faith Comes by Hearing

Or check out the Ossetic bible resources at Bible.com

Linked from YouVersion

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Next steps for the Ossetians

The Ossetians are Unengaged and Unreached, 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.

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

Next steps for the Ossetians

The Ossetians 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.

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

Next steps for the Ossetians

The Ossetians 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.

Empower local believers to begin praying for their own people
Continue gospel seed sowing and church planting among this group
Encourage local leaders to being leading church planting strategy and looking for Unreached and Unengaged groups nearby

Pray specifically for the Ossetians of Turkmenistan

The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.
readIsaiah 40:8

Pray that those who don't know Jesus will be freed from the emptiness of fading hopes and find lasting life and truth in the unchanging Word of God.

Other seeds fell on good soil and produced grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. He who has ears, let him hear.
readMatthew 13:8-9

Pray that they will have open hearts and minds to the Word of God, and that it will take root in their lives and bear fruit for His glory.

But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit.
readTitus 3:4-5

Pray that as people place their faith in Christ and might struggle with temptation to trust in their own works, they will remember that it is only because of God's mercy that they have been saved.

And he went away and began to proclaim in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him, and everyone marveled.
readMark 5:20

Pray that God will bring people who appear beyond hope to faith in Jesus and that they will then go and tell others of the marvelous things He has done.

Ossetian (ROP3 - 107699) 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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