Vision Network Nepal (the DNA affiliate in Nepal) and Kanchanpur Christian Community (a group of churches in Kanchanpur district of western Nepal) jointly sponsored a Vision Conference in September in Mehendranager, Western Nepal. Some 45 pastors and leaders from various churches participated.
Madan Shah, Paul Rana, and Tek Rijal facilitated the sessions, which included The Transforming Story, The Church’s Role in Society, The Irreducible Minimum, Luke 2:52, The Three Relationships of Man, The ABCs of Culture, Kingdom Math, The Kingdom of God, and Seed Projects.
Vision Conference Seed Projects
Most of the participants said they never had such training. One pastor shared, in tears, that God had changed his heart through the conference and he wants to apply these principles in his ministry.
At the end of the conference, most of the participants returned home planning to implement the seed projects they had planned.
Meanwhile, a Vision Conference held in 2007 has been bearing fruit. Several conference alums in Tansen, Western Nepal began serving and counseling needy women and children in the community. In 2009, they launched the New Hope Counseling Center. Since then, they have been actively involved in the church and community, and in the local prison. They are demonstrating God’s love by providing counseling services and vocational training, visiting prisoners, and assisting those in need of health treatment.
These efforts recently bore fruit in the form of a three-day womens’ conference in Tansen, offering training in how to be a good wife and mother, and how to walk faithfully as a believer in Christ. Around sixty women participated in the training.
During these three days they shared the Love of Christ with a number of women, and several responded by praying to receive Christ and following Him in baptism.
Dental camp participants
Tansen Church, a local congregation seeking to practice biblical wholism, has implemented other seed projects, including a dental camp in Damkada, Palpa, Nepal, for blind and disabled people in the community. After a short time of songs and Bible sharing, 27 patients were treated by Dr. Kharel and Dr. Theo. Family Health Ministry, an extension of Tansen Church, provided the dental equipment and medicine. For their part, the patients prepared and served a meal to the medical team! As a result, six of the dental patients came to know the Lord and were baptized few months ago.
Ram Khilawan in his new home
Piparkoti Church is another congregation to see recent fruit from a seed project, this one involving a neeedy individual. Ram Khilawan, a Hindu from Lucknow, India, came to Nepal 40 years ago to do business. Later he decided to live in Nepal. He adopted a Tharu orphan girl and raised her as his daughter. When she married, he was once more alone. He tried to begin again in the color-selling business he had done before, but this time it did not go well. Eventually he was evicted from his small house. Too old to work, and with no one to care for him, Ram was was reduced to sleeping in the streets, often with nothing to eat.
Meanwhile, the members of Piparkoti Church had received training on biblical wholism. Someone in the church knew about Ram, and they decided God wanted them to reach out to him in love. They helped him build a small thatched-roof hut near the church. Now he is living there and cooking for himself. The local church is taking care of his needs. Touched by the love he saw, he gave his life to Christ and now attends church every week. This fruit has encouraged other members in the church to do more seed projects in their communities.
(This story was written from reports filed by Madan Shah, Paul Rana, Pastor Durga Pahari, Bishnu Regmi, and Pastor Durga Pahari.)
Come & Listen: a chronicle of the DNA global movement 