Greetings to you from their great capitol city. This place is taken right out of the history books of Central Asia going back 1000’s of years before Christ.
The known history began in the Bronze Age when metallurgy developed the bronze bit, enabling horse riding. Mounted tribes developed contacts between the farming south and the livestock breeding north.
An Aryan Indo-European race from the north first migrated to this land.
From 800 BC their successors, the Scythians (to the Greeks) or Saka (to the Persians) swept before them into a loose dynasty from the Ferghana Valley to the Khorezm oasis. These tent dwellers evolved during the iron age into skilled craftsmen. But the chief legacy for them would be the horseback archery. This gave them a great military advantage that set the standard for terrorism of the barbaric waves that swept through the centuries. Victories were celebrated by drinking the blood of their enemies from their skulls.
(I know, creepy!) Cyrus the Great of Persia sought to end their raids and rule over this land.
Zoroastrianism was begun here, the worship through fire offerings for their all-powerful god. The mysterious prophet Zoraster was the fabled leader of this movement that began on these desert steppes. Some believe that the three wise men who came to see Jesus were from this movement of astrologists.
In 329 BC their capitol Samarkand, fell to Alexander the Great. Then came the Parthinians, and then the Huns from Mongolia, the scourge of the Han dynasty. Slowly the fledgling Silk Road, from China to Rome, wound its way in the mountains and deserts, through the heartland of Uzbekistan. It was an incredible sunset as I walked on the Old Silk Road one week ago today.
I could imagine those camel caravans moving across the horizon.
In the early centuries after Jesus, Nestorian Christianity blossomed in this land and 100s of 1000s came to faith. While Europe struggled with a corrupt and heretical church that had succumbed to materialism, true Christianity was alive and well in Central Asia, all the way into China and India. They held sway unit the Islamic invaders came. At first they tolerated Christianity, as long as they paid the tax. But as soon as the Crusades from Europe began, the Islam horde turned on the Christians and literally wiped out all evidence of their presence here. Only lately has archeology opened our eyes to the great influence of Christianity on this land, it’s people and culture.
The Uzbek people were dominated by Islam until the 1200s AD when Genghis Khan swept down in a fury with his Mongol horde. From day after day & into the nights they would ride, sleeping in their saddles, nourished by the blood of their powerful mounts. From Germany to Japan, the greatest land dynasty in the history of the world, led a century of peace which allowed for the safe travel on the Old Silk Road for historical figures like Marco Polo. Tamerlane (Timur) was the last of the great Mongol leaders to rule the land. From Samarkand, his capital, he left his great mark on Uzbekistan and the world. He was a legendary hero of the land and still is today amongst the faithful Uzbeks. He is like George Washington to us, but combined with the minds of Benjamin Franklin & Thomas Jefferson.
The Czar of Russia came during the 19th century at the report of great gold in the land. Soon the communism of Lenin ruled in this country. It held sway until the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the USSR. As a result, Islam here is more cultural & not practiced religiously as in other Islamic cultures. I have yet to see one Mosque.
But Mother Russia has left her imprint on the land. Everywhere, you see the old cold look of the Russian sterilizm. Everything is the same, dark, grey, gloomy, box like. But now capitalism is blooming in the land & new buildings, bright and beautiful are springing up. I can see a lot of western influence (some good and some bad). Now people can own their business and land. More and more, the people are prospering. You can see the generational differences. The old timers wear the traditional Russian clothes. But the new generation is fighting against the old culture and trying to join the style of the west. Limited freedom is igniting new life and hope.
In the fall of 1991 a revolution left Uzbekistan to be its own country for the first time in history. It has a communist style government, opposed to religion. It tolerates a registered church, but controls them. The true church is underground. They are first generation Christians planted by Korean Missionaries who were deported by the turn of the century.
(These are the Koreans who founded InterCP) The Christians left behind have taken up the torch for Christ and are burning for His Glory and Kingdom.
If you don’t like history, you are probably not reading down this far. But just in case you are, I want you to know that next week I am to tell you about these incredible followers of Christ.
Love and Blessings, Pastor Mike