DISPATCH: Saturday, Jan. 21
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Worshipers gathering at the church at Dapcha.
We worshiped with the church at Dapcha and words fail to convey the Spirit-charged experiences of our team with more than 60 Nepali brothers and sisters in Christ. I was blessed to preach and shared how Jesus can not only change the life of one person and one family, in this case the rescued soul of Sumitra Pariyar, but how He can also use the healing of one to impact many around the world.
As Dave told the congregation when he spoke, in a divinely inspired offering toward the end of my message, he is here in Nepal in part because of the video he saw (Dapcha Testimony) that included Sumitra’s story. He is but one of the many who have been touched by Jesus’ healing of Sumitra.
“Jesus heals. But for Him to heal, people must know about Him,” I told the church, and then I read Romans 10:14-15.
I told Sumitra’s story to read “Healed and freed from suffering”) and how she went from a paralyzed Hindu to a glowing Christ lover. I quoted how she’d told us last year during Mission: Nepal 2011 that she was sorry she did not know Jesus earlier. “I am sorry that I did not hear about Jesus before I was sick,” she said at the time.
“This is NOT Sumitra’s fault,” I told the church. “This is my fault. It is the fault of the church.”
How could she know about Jesus without being told about Him? I urged the church to go and tell the other Sumitras in Dapcha and around Nepal about this healing Jesus. I told them that she is my Nepali inspiration.
I asked Sumitra to come forward and thanked her for her inspiring faith. I then prayed for Sumitra and her brother Prajwal, who is one of the Dapcha church leaders.
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Gary Fallesen, seated, speaking to Sumitra with her brother looking on and Pastor Tej, left, translating. (Photo by Dave Stoessel)
As if this moment wasn’t enough we were then blessed to have a woman named Prem come forward and tell Pastor Tej that she wanted to accept Christ as her Savior. This woman’s husband had been the first Dapcha Christian in 2006, but she had wanted nothing to do with Jesus. He has since died and the church has grown in this Hindu and Buddhist stronghold. Today, she joined our family of believers.
We were reminded again, as Dave had shared from Galatians 6:9 in his encouragement to the church here: “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”
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