The team of Gospel for Asia Bible college students and staff was on evangelistic outreach when the trouble came. People opposed to the Gospel approached them, grabbed one of the GFA staff members and locked him in a room for three hours. There, they forced him to pronounce names of their gods. After torturing him, they released him.
On another occasion, anti-Christian elements disrupted a prayer meeting, beating pastors and believers very severely. And in another recent incident, stones were pelted at a GFA Believers Church leader and others.
Also recently, a local government official contacted area Christian leaders for information about the work of missionaries under them. And, as a GFA leader reports, anti-Christian groups are paying some of their people to report back to them with such information as well. Their intent is to create problems for the work of the Gospel.
Such opposition in this area is part of a rising tide of persecution in India's central region. A GFA leader there writes that "our people [in this area] are facing considerable pressure and difficulties in the ministry."
"Our prayer is that the Lord may give grace and power to them to stand firm in the faith," he adds. "For as Paul said in Romans 8:35, 37, 'Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.'"
Please pray for GFA missionaries and Believers Church congregations in this area. Many have come to Christ through their witness. Let us pray that even more will—especially their persecutors! These missionaries are prepared to endure such opposition for the sake of Christ and reaching the lost He died to save. But as they face it, they draw strength and comfort from the Lord through your prayers for them.
Courtesy: GFA
