Dear friends,

We are doing great by the grace of our Savior Jesus Christ and are grateful for your prayers and support. Today we want to take you to a small village in Eastern Uttar Pradesh where one brother Salah K. have been laboring for over 10 years and has a church which meets regularly. The village which we are talking about is B* and is about * K.M.’s from the nearest city A*. Remote as its location is the village people mostly depend on agriculture for their livelihood and the people who work or study travel at least 20 to 30 KM to reach their respective work and education locations.

Brother Salah in the previous years due to regular trainings have been influenced to turn to expository preaching rather than ambiguous speeches; Healing and prosperity gospel has been replaced by sincere biblical doctrine and slowly the structure of formal membership and church discipline are coming in effect. Brother Salah has been expositing from the Gospel of Matthew and has been personally discipling men by visiting them in their homes. There are about 30 regular people and the general Sunday gathering is about 50 people which grows to 70 people on the last Sunday as it is the communion Sunday.

There is an amazing testimony of Faith, standing firm in disaster and trusting God in agony; which we want to share with you all. There is a farming family, which is a regular to the church and other than the husband and wife there are 4 sons and 1 daughter in this household. About 2 years ago, there was an earthquake in north India, and this is when this story began. Well, nothing happened on the day of the earthquake but the next day, it was windy; the family was extending the construction of their house so they have made a couple of new walls in their home before the earthquake. They were happy that the walls did not collapse as they have used heavy and strong material and thus carefree of any mishap they were about their daily chores.

The youngest son “Sameer Kumar” was on the roof of the house and once done with his work on the terrace he started climbing down the stairs. As he was about to land his last step on the ground right then because of the heavy wind one of the newly constructed small wall collapsed and it hit him on his right leg hamstrings. Sameer yelled and fell flat on his face, the wound was not bad but rather the shock of the sudden happening was the one which made him yell. Gathering himself up he was about to get up when the bigger and heavier wall fell on him and his back got crushed under the weight of red bricks. Sameer cried out of pain and distress, he was now stuck under heavy weight and could not release himself of this situation. His brothers ran to his rescue and with their quick work removed the bricks and pulled him out. Sameer couldn’t move but he was conscious, everybody realized that he has broken his back. Unable to move and get up he relied on his brothers and friend from the village to take him to the hospital. The doctors operated on his back and remarked that maybe he would never walk again- and even if he could move on his own again then it would take years.

This would be a life shattering experience for any individual especially when they are just 22 years old. Sameer could see his future draining into darkness and his life being useless and a burden on others. These mental despairs were more pressing than the physical pain he was going through. He as a believer was much involved in the church activities, a gift of good voice and boldness to lead would frequently put him up front in the church as a worship leader, but now this remarkable young man can’t even sit. Most would give up their hope, but I want to praise the Lord for being an eternal Savior of Sameer. Sameer has worked hard throughout this time and has not given up his hope. He still can’t completely be comfortable in any position other than lying down straight on the bed, but he fights his physical pain to be in the church, he has to keep on changing positions from sitting on the ground to sitting on the chair and standing to attend the service but he does it. He couldn’t complete his graduation but is hopeful that may be one day he would be able to attend college again. And this Christmas the church witnessed the goodness of our gracious God when Sameer help cook lunch for the church gathering, he made the curry all by himself. What an amazing testimony for all the people both believers and non-believers.

We thank God, that Sameer stood firm though his Agony and still relies on God for his life, please pray that God in his grace would heal his back so that he could be used much greatly for the kingdom sake.

Encouragements: The church now has a building with a proper roof to meet

There are 2 new families who are from non-Christian background who have started coming to the church.There were about 10-12 new people who have started coming to the church

Prayer Points: Pray that God would bring more and more people to Him by changing their hearts.

Pray that the Gospel work could be done without hindrance in this village.Pray that him and his family, that they would grow more in the knowledge of the Word of God.Pray for his son who is under Biblical training at the church.