Kathmandu Hope Church, July 2011

Dear friends,

This ministry is a testament to the faithfulness of God.  If you are struggling in any areas of your life; I urge you to be strong in the faith because there is no other alternative to that.

When me and my wife came to Kathmandu in 1993, we had no doubt for what God had brought us there.  But because we knew nothing about life in that city, and had no way of making a living, we decided to work for another church run by an American missionary.  Within six months of our appointment, the Lord showed us that we had made a terrible mistake.  We should have trusted the Lord and begun the pioneering work, but instead we opted for what seemed to be a secure pastoral ministry; and ended up into one of the greatest relational disasters of our lives as a family and ministry.

We could not last there even until the summer of that year and moved out.  But moving out did not leave us in peace.  That dear missionary made sure that we were attacked by every other Nepali Christian that knew us (During the colonial era, western culture replaced the Bible and missionary replaced God, thus our Nepali friends had to obey what the missionary commanded them); attacks ranged from character assassination, curses (prayer meetings were held for our destruction!) to physical threats.

But we were confident that "he is able to keep that which we have committed to him" and today, as we look back, we can see God's faithfulness in every detail of our life and ministry.  He has never abandoned us.  There were times we doubted if we could last this long, but the Lord has kept us alive and well.

The reason we were persecuted by the missionaries and their handymen was our boldness to become Nepali Christians with self-respect and dignity.  We refused to sell our dignity for dollars and that determination was labeled as rebellion against the authority.

Today, Hope Church is grateful to God for those days of persecution because it has taught us the value of self-respect and human dignity.  More than that, we have been able to read the Bible as it is, free from the western stereotype and there is no missionary to cloud our vision of God.  We know his word and we have heard his voice.

I urge you to read the Bible as it is and look to God and not to any man; victory will be yours!