Church organized in unentered area with the help of radio
Silver Spring, Maryland, United States—Not everyone knows about Northeast India, the territory east of Bangladesh. The Indian state of Mizoram is located there, and about seven years ago, Adventist World Radio (AWR) established a production studio at the mission office in the capital city of Aizawl. The responses have been growing, with new churches and many new believers in Jesus Christ and the Adventist message.
The south part of Mizoram, an area sandwiched between Myanmar and Bangladesh, is a remote territory— undeveloped and unentered as far as evangelism is concerned.
Two pastors were recently transferred to this area as part of a plan by the Mizo Conference to begin outreach. Interestingly, both Pastor Rohlua and Pastor Sabbathanga have been speakers on the Mizo radio programs that Adventist World Radio (AWR) broadcasts to Northeast India.
Their first evangelistic effort was in the village of Bualpui—known locally as a center of business and shopping for surrounding villages. While the meetings took place, a man from the neighboring village of Kawrthindeng, who had come to shop, asked the team if they could come and conduct meetings in his village. While Pastor Rohlua continued the evangelistic meetings in Bualpui, Pastor Sabbathanga went to Kawrthindeng and launched meetings in this village of 150 families.
As the meetings began, Pastor Sabbathanga was pleasantly surprised that the people were quite receptive to the message. One day he asked them if they ever listened to the radio. They said that the radio was the only medium of communication they had in their village and that they listened to regional programs and Adventist World Radio. Then Pastor Sabbathanga told them that he was one of the speakers on the AWR program.
The people said, “That is what we thought!” They had talked among themselves about how his voice and the way he presented his messages sounded familiar.
Pastor Sabbathanga says, “I realized that right before my eyes, ‘the Word’ [the message] was becoming ‘flesh’ [personal] and ‘dwelling among us,’ and the bonding work of the Holy Spirit was taking shape, uniting these people in a relationship with God and to our church fellowship!”
The evangelistic meetings closed with 55 newly baptized members. A new church has been planted with a congregation of nearly 80 people gathering in a house church on the Sabbath where the name Seventh-day Adventist had not been heard of before. [Benjamin D. Schoun]
