Editor’s note: In August, I traveled with a small group of Western journalists to India to visit sites where Gospel for Asia is involved in various ministries. Except for GFA founder Dr. K.P. Yohannan, names in this article are not the persons’ actual names.

November-December 2010 – A barefoot five-year-old wanders between idling cars at a busy New Delhi intersection. Her name is Gajara; it means “garland of flowers.” Streaked with dirt, her face is empty, emotionless. Her tattered dress hangs off one shoulder. On one hip, Gajara carries her little brother, a naked two-year-old with all the marks of malnutrition.

Timidly, Gajara taps on your car window, attempts to smile and extends a tiny, cupped hand, her eyes distant and begging. Before you have time to react, your host says, “No, No! You can’t give her money.” He explains that the beggars are most often controlled by a man who takes most of what they collect.

The traffic light turns, you look away from Gajara’s downcast eyes as your driver accelerates, careening dangerously ahead into the cacophony of blaring auto horns, street construction, motor scooters, bicycles, dirty open-side taxis and foot traffic.

A tear escapes your eye and you try to forget, to concentrate on one side of the street where high rises reflect affluence, comfort, success and beauty. But you can’t forget. For across the street are crumbling tenements, dirty shops, noisy street vendors with dust-coated wares, sidewalks crowded with New Delhi’s poor and forgotten – Gajara’s world.

Plenty and poverty, face to face
These two faces of India are where Dr. Yohannan grew up and set out to tell the world about his Savior. After the opportunity to attend seminary in the U.S., he pastored a church in the States, but the needy multitudes of Asia never left his heart.

“Before I came to the U.S. in 1974,” Yohannan told AFA Journal, “I was with Operation Mobilization for eight years. We covered every part of India. We would go to a village and ask, ‘Have you heard about a man named Jesus?’

“‘No,’ was the reply we often heard. ‘There’s no one here by that name; maybe he lives in the next village.’”

Making missionaries
After living in the U.S. and seeing the limitless resources of the Western church, Yohannan began to dream again of training nationals to take Jesus to villages all over India and beyond.

India – 1.2 billion people, more than 16.7% of the world’s population … 250 million Dalits (the lowest caste, “the untouchables”) … 81% Hindu, 13% Muslin, 2% Christian … rampant persecution of Christians … 14 million bonded (parent-placed) child laborers ... 80% of wealth in the hands of 5-6% of the people.

Yohannan’s heart for his homeland gave birth to a plan to support and train nationals to pastor churches there, and toward that end, he founded Gospel for Asia in 1979. Now, he lives with one foot planted firmly in the East and one in the West, another example of that striking dichotomy – poverty and plenty face to face.

How far has GFA come in 31 years? Its impact is both immense and immeasurable – reflected in radio programs scattered all over the continent in 110 languages. Among its most effective outreaches are support for Bible colleges, Bridge of Hope children’s programs, Jesus wells and water filters, and providing practical tools for needy families. (See below.)

Sixty-seven Bible schools scattered across the subcontinent receive support from GFA. Their basic program requires three years of study. On one of those campuses in Central India, first-year students shared their testimonies with the Western media.

Prabir, age 35, was saved January 10 after years of living a sinful lifestyle and being the victim of demon possession. “But my wife and mother prayed for me for years,” he said. Soon after coming to faith, Prabir began planning to attend Bible College.

At age 18, Sunita comes from a non-Christian family. She came to faith in Christ through the witness of her older sister. “When I packed to come to Bible school, my parents told me never to come home again,” she said.

India’s young believers learn about the Bible schools by word-of-mouth, from their pastors who attended the schools, and sometimes by word passed on from village to village. One man living in a remote area heard about GFA and called the offices in New Delhi. A representative from GFA traveled over seven mountains where no roads exist to meet the man in person. The man received Christ, later attended Bible college and returned as a pastor to his village of 250 to tell them about the way of salvation and hope.

Peril of persecution
Preaching to non-Christians in South Asia has two main challenges. First of all, they have their own gods – often many gods – so the concept of one God is so foreign that it becomes an obstacle at the outset. Second, they fear that, if they become Christians, they may be expelled from the family or from society.

To follow Christ in these nations, one may well be putting his life in danger. Persecution is common. (See below.) Christian leaders said that, though not often reported by the media, waves of persecution occur frequently. In one region of the country, nine pastors were martyred over a recent three-year period.

Persecution is instigated most often not by government or the orthodox Hindu hierarchy. It comes at the hands of fringe groups or other radical religious activists. One of the persecutors’ favorite tricks is to call or visit a pastor in the middle of the night, pleading that he come to a family who needs some kind of help immediately. The pastor is then ambushed and murdered by the anti-Christian group.

When a man graduates from the Bible college, he goes to a needy area to share Christ’s love with the people there. But before he is sent out, he is clearly told, “This is a one-way ticket. Go and serve the Lord and be willing to die there if that is the price you much pay.” They base this instruction on Matthew 10 where Jesus told his disciples to be willing to die for the sake of the Gospel.

“Persecution is increasing,” Yohannan said. “It is everywhere. The irony is that we are seeing more people come to the Lord.”

Another Indian missionary on the field full-time echoed Yohannan’s assessment. “Persecution builds the church,” he said, citing Orissa, the state in which persecution may be most severe. In 2008, 50,000 people were driven from their homes, 300-500 were killed and 4,000 Christians’ homes were destroyed. But, he said, the church is growing in spite of the persecution.

Feeding families
The initial vision for GFA addressed the spiritual needs of people, but as a native son, Yohannan also understands the poverty in which multitudes live. Subsequently, meeting those needs is a perfect complement to sharing the gospel.

In its 31-year history, GFA has implemented countless projects and on-going programs to meet physical needs of families. One of the most visible is the Bridge of Hope centers, neighborhood centers that care for young students after school each day. Each center tutors students as needed, teaches hygiene, tells Bible stories and feeds them a meal at day’s end.

At one center we visited, a half-dozen non-Christian mothers came to the center to talk with media. They expressed gratitude for what the center does for their children and their families. They mentioned not only the items above, but also that their children are learning discipline and good manners. Sixty thousand children now attend 525 centers. One GFA leader said they are praying for resources to serve one million. Then he asked, “What is one million when there are some 50 million children who are living in the slums or working as child laborers in India?”

These centers for students illustrate why the government allows Christian ministries to function – because of the practical ways in which they serve India’s needy people.

A number of other practical gifts offer families the opportunity to earn a living. At village churches, members told about or demonstrated income-producing gifts that had come from GFA. For example, a widowed mother had been given an electric grinder. With it, she grinds corn, rice and garlic. She is able to earn about 1,000 rupees (about $25 US) a month to supplement her janitor’s job.

A man in the same church showed us the push cart GFA provided for him. He uses it to conduct his laundry and pressing business. Though from a Hindu background, he became a believer when he brought his mother to the Christian church for healing.

In another village, an 80-year-old man received a portable coin-operated telephone from GFA. It is the only telephone in his village, so he earns about 400 rupees a month. Isolated from his son after converting to the Christian faith, he now sleeps in the church building.

With a GFA-provided sewing machine, a lady said she can earn about 4,000 rupees a month – about double what other working women might earn in her village.

Clean water is in short supply in many villages across Asia. GFA has stepped in to build and donate BioSand water filters which often serve a whole village. The filter is a simple 18-inch square concrete column. Pour a jug of cloudy water in the top, it filters through the sand and comes out clear and clean. Where the water supply (of any quality) is inadequate, GFA drills Jesus wells.

When practical, GFA locates filters and wells near a church, thus enhancing the influence of the church and opening possibilities to present Christ as the living water.

GFA has the structure in place that would allow the ministry to move much faster to reach more people. All that is lacking is ministry partners, donors who want to have a share in reaching the lost for Christ.

Yohannan doesn’t speak harshly, but he doesn’t shy away from expressing his agony for the Western church and its materialistic focus. “We need to want the lost world to see and know Christ,” he said.

“The crisis we have in [Western] Christianity is that we do not know God. I wish the church would wake up and become like the early Church. Be lost in the wonder of Christ and who He is.”

If the church would rise to this challenge, Yohannan is confident that believers in the West, in partnership with ministries like GFA, could rescue many more Gajaras from the streets every day. Perhaps Gajara could begin going to school. Perhaps she could go to Bridge of Hope every afternoon.

But until then, she will wander the streets, begging in the shadows of high rises that speak of affluence, success and beauty.

Plenty and poverty face to face.  

GFA/AFA Christmas campaign
AFA and American Family Radio challenge readers and listeners to join us in giving to GFA to provide unique Christmas gifts to needy families in Asia. For example, a gift of $11 will provide a family with chickens, a source of eggs for nutritional meals. And when the chickens reproduce, the family can sell the new chicks for income.

One hundred percent of donations go to the mission field. GFA personnel, even in their offices and headquarters, raise their own support.

“This is a creative way we can observe the Christmas spirit,” said AFA president Tim Wildmon. “We live in such affluence, it’s hard for us to think of chickens as a Christmas gift, but for a family in poverty this can be the difference between chronic illness and good health, maybe even the difference between life and death.”

GFA-supported missionaries, usually national pastors in Asia, deliver these unique gifts and build relationships with the families. As pastors minister through these practical gifts, people want to know why the pastors bring gifts – and the door is open to share the gospel. Christmas campaign gifts include:

▶ Two chickens for a family – $11
▶ Seven Bibles – $21
▶ BioSand water filter for a village – $30
▶ Winter clothing pack for a missionary – $40
▶ Child Hope Packet for a Dalit child to go to school – $50
▶ Sewing machine for a woman to earn income – $85
▶ A pair of goats for a family – $120
▶ Bicycle rickshaw for a man to earn income – $133
▶ Water buffalo for a family – $460
▶ Jesus Well drilled in a village – $1,000

For more call toll free: 877-907-GOAT (4628)

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PERSECUTION
Is persecution of Christians really rampant in Asia? That was a burning question on the minds of the Western journalists I traveled with. And we got our answer.

A visit to www.gfa.org will reveal scores of examples of persecution – assault, murder, arson, torture, rape. Here are a few examples from one recent wave of persecution:

▶ A Gospel for Asia-related prayer house was burned in Raikia.
▶ A Gospel for Asia missionary in Raikia was severely attacked and all the houses of the people in his congregation were damaged.
▶ A Christian orphanage that houses 150 children in Baipariguda village was attacked and the missionary in charge was severely beaten.
▶ A GFA missionary and his wife from Dharmashala were kidnapped, tortured and beaten.
▶ One Christian was burned alive when his colony was set on fire in the Papadhandi village.
▶ An orphanage in Khuntipalli was ransacked and set on fire. At least 10 of the 22 orphans living there fled to the nearby forest to save their lives. The cook was burned to death inside the kitchen.
▶ Extremists in Nuagaon nabbed two Christians, outfitted them with clothing generally worn by a terrorist group and then turned them over to police.