Bibles & Bikes

Persecution In India Is Exploding

Our colleagues at Open Doors have now ranked India as one of the top persecutors in the world! In fact, the current ruling government has overseen a doubling of the persecution of India’s Christians over the last three years.

In 2016, Jeff King testified to Congress about how India’s fundamentalists were trying to crush Christianity in India. Most people have no idea that radical Hindus believe that only Hinduism should exist in India and are willing to attack and beat Christians in pursuit of this ideal.

We see the outgrowth of this exploding hatred every week. Recently, we met with Pastor Raju (name changed for safety), a church planter in Northern India. He told us how radical Hindus attacked him after he conducted a prayer meeting in a village.

They pushed him off his bicycle as he rode along and then destroyed his bike with iron rods. After destroying his bike, they turned on him and beat him severely. They left him bloodied and broken in a ditch.

The Hidden Reality

It’s easy to respond to this type of hatred and evil with hate, but that’s not what Jesus taught us. Jesus showed us that our real fight is with Satan. Satan energizes people to attack and kill their fellow man out of fear and anxiety.

If you peel back the layers of the situation in India, you will see that Satan is under attack and is pushing back. For thousands of years, millions of people were imprisoned in false belief. In the last couple of decades, the Gospel has made tremendous strides in India, challenging Satan as well as the existing social order.

Love Is The Answer

Jesus taught us to respond in love and also that the gates of hell could not stand up to His spirit working through the Church. Satan knows that Jesus is irresistible to the spiritually thirsty.

The great masses of India have been in spiritual prison for thousands of years, but Jesus has come to rescue them. He is moving to India and has opened prison doors, freeing people from Satan’s prison of discrimination and deprivation.

How To Birth 6,000 New Churches

For years, ICC has supported and sent out evangelists in heavily persecuted areas of the world where they may be beaten or even killed. This is where we work.

In India, the pastors and evangelists we work with know that they may face violence. They are incredibly brave and devoted to their work. We love supporting them.

We mentioned Pastor Raju* above. ICC helped him with his medical expenses, replaced his bike, and gave him new Bibles to distribute during his outreach efforts. We sat with him and asked him why he would go back to this kind of work when the cost is so high.

He told us through his broken teeth that this is the cost of spreading the Gospel in India, and he is happy to pay.

These church planters are incredibly brave. They don’t lack courage, they lack wheels! These men minister on foot, walking from village to village, where they disciple and evangelize. As a result, they are limited in their effectiveness simply due to a lack of transportation.

We’ve found that if we give these men a bicycle and Bibles to distribute, their effectiveness is doubled or even tripled!

When we equip a church planter with a bike, here’s what happens:

• They’ll peddle approximately 13 miles per day
• They’ll visit up to four villages in a week
• They’ll share the Gospel with 25 people during each village visit
• 100 people will hear the Gospel each week for years to come
• On average, each evangelist will start six small churches in the coming year
• Those churches will birth other new churches in the years to come

We work with established church planters and pastors. They are already proven but are simply limited by a lack of resources.

We want to multiply their effectiveness by equipping 1,000 of them with a bike and 100 Bibles each.

Will you join us in equipping this wave of evangelists to unleash the Gospel in India?