On 22 June, a 6.1 magnitude earthquake killed at least 1,000 people and destroyed critical infrastructure - homes, health facilities, schools, water networks - leaving thousands vulnerable to further harm. On 3 July Mohammad, who lost 18 family members, believed one body was still trapped beneath bricks and mud where his home was. Mohammad’s home is now a very basic tent sheltering his sister with a broken leg, she still hasn't had a visit from a doctor and is in a lot of pain. Very little aid is trickling through to his village, the communication is poor, there are no health facilities in surrounding areas and above all else the routes there are incredibly tough. Aid agencies haven't found a safe landing zone for helicopters and so all survivors can do is watch as vital support flies past. Bodies remain in the rubble, impossible to reach without proper help and the smell is heartbreaking because it is from dead bodies.

Only 3% of Christian missionaries focus on ‘unreached’ people groups’. Of 7.7 billion people around the world, over 3 billion are either unreached or least reached. There are 7,000 unreached people groups representing nearly 42% of the population of the world who have never heard of Jesus Christ. There are many factors why these groups are unreached, including physical, political and cultural barriers. See Some unreached people have portions of scripture translated into their language. Some people groups do not even have their language written down. Other unreached groups have no translation of the Bible available in their mother tongue. Pray for more Christian linguists to hear God’s call to study the culture and language of unreached people so that they can then train people to translate the Bible into their languages. Pray for Christian broadcasting and technological innovation to reach the unreachable in closed countries and isolated remote communities.

Sri Lanka will soon have 60% inflation. The Prime Minister said the nation is bankrupt and he does not expect a bailout from the International Monetary Fund. He believes he can turn the economy around, but 2023 will be tough with improvements in 2024. People queue for days to get fuel. Sadly a man who had lived in his car for five days queuing for gas died in his car and no one realised it. Things became this bad due to political mismanagement and corruption. As food, fuel, and medicine prices increase, people are escaping by boat to India or Australia. In India, people are kept in refugee camps. Rulers have mismanaged Sri Lanka for 10 to 15 years and borrowed money from China, but up to 30% of it never reached its purpose. People have lost faith in the government and their traditional religions. Meanwhile, Christians meet to pray for economic and spiritual revivals.

The southern African nation's 15 million people are faced with shortages, inflation and other economic woes, conjuring memories of economic chaos under Robert Mugabe's near four-decade rule of hyper-inflation. Zimbabwe will start selling gold coins from July 25th in a bid to tackle runaway inflation which has hamstrung the local currency. Gold "Mosi-oa-tunya" coins - named after Victoria Falls - will contain 31 grams of gold and can be converted into cash and traded both locally and internationally. Gold coins are used by investors globally to hedge against inflation and wars.

Over 220,000 people live in cramped subdivided flats in Hong Kong. These units are found across rooftop houses, space capsules, cubicles, and loft spaces, and are sometimes not even bigger than a single bed space. Tens of thousands of families live in the city's darkest places. There are 110,000 subdivided flats in dilapidated buildings. Most are rented by singles or couples, but occupants also include single parents and their children, and three-generation households. Housing shortage drives people into tiny spaces with as many as 40 occupants. The most notorious are ‘cage homes’, also known as ‘coffin homes’, where partitioned boxlike units are stacked from floor to ceiling, separated by thin wooden boards or wire mesh. Beijing wants the local government to rid the city of these tiny units by 2049. John Lee Ka-chiu, who has been sworn in as the city’s leader, has pledged to resolve Hong Kong’s housing woes.

Rt Revd Stephen Lake, the new Bishop of Salisbury, gave away £10,000 during his inauguration service. Each person attending the service was given an envelope containing £10. Using the parable of the ten talents he encouraged them to use their resources to be a blessing to people and for the good of the kingdom of God. Two anonymous donors gave a total of £10,000 to make the idea possible. ‘This is your talent,’ Bishop Stephen said, ‘What will you do with it? Will you bury it, save it, or make it grow so that good can come from this?’ He suggested ideas of how to use the money which included buying a meal for someone struggling, donating to the local food bank, buying tiles for a church roof or taking someone lonely for a drink. Some people have already invested their money, giving to charities that are matching funds, and therefore multiplying their talents.

Worcester College, run by David Isaac, previously the chairman of the LGBTQ charity Stonewall, apologised to students for hosting a Christian Concern training camp and cancelled a second booking after a small number of students complained. But after being warned that the move could be discriminatory, the college has backed down and issued a statement saying that it was committed ‘to the right to freedom of speech and religious belief and the dignity of all people’. The joint statement with Christian Concern confirmed that the evangelical campaign group would now be invited to speak at the college, adding, ‘In a world where differing views are strongly and sincerely held, it is important to come together and listen to each other.’

To strengthen international efforts to ensure freedom of religion or belief (FoRB), the government will host an international conference in London on 5 and 6 July. Promoting FoRB is one of the UK’s long-standing human rights priorities. The government remains deeply concerned about the severity and scale of violations and abuses in many parts of the world. Persecuting or discriminating against people for their religion or belief is often linked to other foreign and development policy challenges. The summit will gather politicians and campaigners from over 50 countries to continue to make progress on the issue. This year the organisers are being approached by diplomatic representatives from countries with historically poor records on religious freedom and who aren't part of the alliance, saying they want to come.

The Commonwealth Games start Thursday 28th July and end Monday 8th August in  Birmingham. They are known as ‘the friendly games’. As thousands of athletes and officials arrive from the 54 nations, The World Prayer Centre wants to prepare a highway of blessing and thanksgiving. The team have joined with Gas Street Church in Central Birmingham for a service that will include worship led by Tim Hughes and Gas Street music, together with prayers and messages from countries including, The Caribbean, India, Africa, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Malaysia. It’s free to attend this powerful event on Saturday 16th July 2022 for an afternoon of celebration to welcome and bless the nations and territories of The Commonwealth to the UK. Between now and 28th of July we can pray for God to watch over the police and security teams, keeping them safe and giving them wisdom as they keep our streets free from violence.

After President Zelensky told NATO he wants the war to finish ‘before winter sets in’, the UK pledged an additional £1bn of military aid to Ukraine. This brings UK military aid to £2.3bn plus £1.5bn spent in humanitarian and economic support. (Ukraine’s monthly defence cost is £4.12bn). The new £1bn comes from departmental underspends plus £95 million from Welsh and Scottish government budgets. Questions remain about whether the aid will be sufficient. Also, the Defence Secretary wants the government to increase spending on UK armed forces - to be prepared to invest more to keep people safe. Army personnel are being cut from 82,000 to 73,000 soldiers after 2021’s defence review. The new head of the armed forces said he had never known such a clear threat ‘as the brutal aggression of President Putin’. He likened the Ukraine war to the build up to World War Two.