Mongolian Musical Praise
mood: 
cheerful
cheerfulfrom: SIM International (http://www.sim.org) - Spring 2006
Mongolia's young church is praising God using authentic Mongolian
music - thanks largely to two of its earliest members. Purevdorj
and his wife Amartungalag have written 25 Christian songs, compiled
three albums of contemporary Mongolian Christian music, and will
soon release the third album of their own music. Purevdorj has
also translated more than 120 praise songs into Mongolian from
English and Korean.
All over Mongolia, in small house churches and in large city churches, believers are singing their songs. "When people use our music to worship God, that is, of course, the greatest joy,"
said Purevdorj.
But they especially want to compose songs that sound Mongolian. "We are Mongolians, so we have Mongolian melodies inside us. God created them, so he would like to hear them," said Purevdorj. Adds Amartungalag, "We want to write songs with a Mongolian harmonic."
Both of them hold music education degrees and are professors at Union Bible Training Centre in Ulaanbaatar. He teaches contextualized theology and biblical ministry, while she teaches worship and song leading. They started the Christian Songwriters Fellowship of Mongolia to encourage others working in worship ministries. They also organize annual concerts of Mongolian Christian musicians and release compact discs of the performances. Last year, they focused much of their attention on writing songs for Sunday schools, and they are working on a Mongolian songbook.
"Without becoming Christians, we wouldn't imagine our lives as happy," Purevdorj said.
A related story on how the two came to Christ:
http://www.sim.org/categorylist.asp?f
Pray that more Mongolian praise songs will be created to help
the people of Mongolia enjoy and praise God.
Source with photos:
http://www.sim.org/categorylist.asp?f
