This is our contact: Uncle Achyut
When he was a child, his family belonged to the lineage of Hindu priests and one of the highest castes in Nepal. As a young adult, he was touched by the power of God and he became a believer. He moved to Haripur Village and was the only believer at the time. His wife became a believer in the process and now, they are both active leaders in the ministry.
Their story was not a fairy tale as Disney would paint it but it was a beautifully crafted story by Jesus. When Uncle?s mother needed more help with the daily tasks of taking care of the crops and the animals, she told? Uncle that he was to be married. He was still a teenager at this point and as is tradition in Nepal, there was an arranged marriage. He was married and treated Auntie as a slave, but when Jesus touched his life, he began to love his wife. It was through this change that touched her life and she became a believer several years later.
This is the church where we had Sunday services and the Home Church to many different churches that Uncle has planted around the different villages around Haripur. The congregation is not very large in numbers at this particular campus because the goal of this ministry is to bring Jesus to the villages where the people are instead of having the people come to the church. This facilitates the multiplying of disciples and ministers to reach a group of people deeply involved in their Hindu traditions.
This is Haripur Prashasna School where children who live in this village and nearby villages can come and get a solid education that they can afford. If the children are from the lower castes and cannot afford to send their children to school, the brothers partner with New Light Nepal to sponsor these children?s education. This effort is all in order to promote a new mindset and protect the children from being trafficked into slavery. These children are valued and loved here. They are taught the traditional subjects and English with hopes that one day these children will be wise leaders in their villages.
Our particular ministry was to encourage believers in the neighboring villages and to reach out to the unbelievers in some villages and sharing the love of Jesus while educating them about Human Trafficking. Many days we would leave at 10 am to a village which would often include little dirt pathways like this one and at times crossing rivers with low levels of water, as this is their dry season. The walks would range from 30 minutes to 3 hours depending on the village.
These three ladies were believers we went to encourage at a gathering. They were very hospitable and you could see the love they had for Jesus when they worshipped.
Every home we visited always had a drink and a snack for us to eat. Many times they would make us some hot chia tea with water buffalo milk and purchase some tasty biscuits for us. Here is a picture where they provided bananas, biscuits and warm fresh water buffalo milk.
On our walks we would often see some of the most beautiful and impressive sights. Like this woman who would carry the sugar cane leaves on top of her head. We tried carrying less heavy items on our heads and we did not look this graceful. The women in Nepal wore many different colors in their clothing and no two women had the same outfit. It was so impressive to see the work that they did with a saree.
Pretty much all the houses we passed had water buffalo and other cattle. This was a little baby calf that had recently been born. It was so precious to see these babies with their mama. The smell was not the most pleasant but after a while, you could not smell it as much. I had never been so close to these giant animals. I even got to milk a water buffalo and one day I even helped herd one in the right direction. (I also herded one in the wrong direction, but that is another story? hahahaha) These were great moments as before this country, I was afraid of going into the petting zoo.
This is an old lady that we passed one day who was just sitting on the floor. She looked lost and confused. So Bethany and I stopped and ministered to her. We caressed her shoulder and tried to talk to her. I was very intrigued why she was just sitting there or who she belonged to. Katie Stoddard came to stay with me as the others moved on to talk to other people and we prayed for her. She seemed so lost. We asked her what her name was and she told Uncle that she did not remember her name. So I felt led to give her a new name. A name that The Lord had put in my heart for her. Her new name was Auntie Hope because I believe that God wanted her to know that there was hope for her still.
