Exciting Word began with the single vision of “reaching the unreached, telling the untold, and touching the untouchable with the Love of God.” The Lord has enabled us to be faithful to that vision and calling. But over the years, as I meet with different people, they very often ask me the same questions: “You have a great vision of reaching the unreached people groups, but what will become of the next level of leaders? Do they have the same vision?” My answer to those questions has been “we are raising up Calebs and Joshuas by the hundreds in the younger generation, to take God’s people into the Promised Land.” Many times I found the answer was not convincing enough or too common. But last month as I attended different meetings, the Lord gave me a better answer to that question.
As we prayed and started various house church leaders training centers in the very remote villages, I saw the young men and women and their eagerness to learn God’s Word. This gave me great joy and assurance that we are training up Calebs and Joshuas. We started 21 training center in various states, with over 600 men and women signed up for the training. Every year we train between 500 and 600 men and women through our training centers in their own native languages in their own native areas. Our instructors are training each of them to be a leader who will lead an indigenous church in their own native language and impart a vision for the lost souls around them, creating a church that is growing and reproducing itself. The students are involved in reaching the unreached through our systematic practical outreach programs that take place three times a year: summer outreach, Christmas outreach and Easter outreach. The impact of these outreach programs has resulted in thousands of people coming to the Lord, and has started hundreds of house churches every year in the unreached areas.
June was a very busy month, with Vacation Bible Schools and youth meetings in different places. Our VBS was a great blessing. It began with 3 days of teacher training in the first week of June. This took place in four different places, in four different languages, and 432 young men and women from villages and tribal areas attended the training. During the next two weeks, they were able to reach over 13,400 children in the villages and slums, age 16 and under, through Bible stories. The teachers who made it possible were simple village young men and women who were touched and transformed by the message of the gospel.
Arushi, 21, was a Hindu college girl when she was transformed by the love of God a year ago. She left a life of rebellion and drug addiction, and took the initiative to conduct a VBS in several slums. She and her friends reached 700 slum children and continue to reach them.
Shanti, a mother of 3 children who lives in a slum, came to the Lord two years ago when her husband was healed. She shared the Gospel with her neighbors, and today both she and her husband are leading several house churches and prayer groups in different slums. Last week we had a baptism service and 29 people who had been addicted to idol worship and alcohol were baptized.
Nadira is a 19-year-old Muslim girl who attended a VBS 5 years ago and received the Lord as her personal savior. When people in India come to know Jesus, they are excited to tell others about the God who changed their lives. They want others to know about the freedom, joy and peace they have experienced. Nadira shared her new-found faith with her other Muslim friends, which caused lots of problems in her life. Her parents locked her in her room without food and water, to force her to renounce her faith in Jesus. But Nadira never did. Over the last four years she has suffered a lot physically and emotionally for her faith. Last year she started to attend college. There she found two other young girls who believe in Jesus, but their parents were also unhappy about it and never allowed them to meet Christian friends. All three began to enjoy their freedom in praying, worshiping, and meditating on God’s Word. Last month they secretly arranged a youth meeting where 42 people attended, and 11 of them dedicated their lives to the Lord. Nadira and her two other friends secretly took baptism.
Manu is from a Hindu high caste family. At a young age he got into a fight and stabbed another young man, ending up in prison for 7 years. When he came out of prison, his family rejected him and he got into the world and worldly habits. Around Christmas last year, our Christmas outreach team found him lying on the roadside. They took him to the hospital, paid for his medical care, and gave him a place to stay in the church. He gave his life to the Lord, and last month he brought 21 other young men to a youth meeting who are struggling in their lives and need deliverance and healing. It was such a great joy to see that our Lord is transforming lives and using them to transform others.
Last month, as I was sharing in different youth meetings, I was greatly blessed to see the vision is being carried forward by the next generation. Pastor Peter, Pastor Binny, Pastor Timothy and Pastor Abishek all are young youth pastors who conducted the youth meetings in different states. Along with them, I ministered to over 1,200 young men and women in different youth meetings. I was blessed to see their commitment to the Lord and His service, and their willingness to serve the body of Christ. They have come from Hindu, Muslim, Sikh and many other religious backgrounds, experienced the love of Christ and received deliverance, healing, and compassion. As one of them said “we are loved to love others, we are delivered to deliver others, we have been healed to heal others, we have been comforted to comfort others and we have been transformed to transform others in Jesus Name.”
Help Us Share the Gospel
The people of India are searching and open to the Gospel, despite the persecution they face. The fields are ripe unto harvest. Join us in this work with your prayers and financial support.
To find out how your support will help us, click here. To read more inspiring and exciting testimonies of what God is doing among the unreached people groups of India, click the links on the right, and keep reading!
Proclaiming the Gospel…
…until He comes,