BELC Ambur District Visitation
From the Field August 14, ’15
There are fourteen men preaching in this district. In eight of the villages they serve there is no other Christian church. This is important in our considerations as we want to be like Paul preaching where Christ is not known. Half of the men came out of another Lutheran church body in India. And with this we have a leg up on their background in teachings. The men serve 457 souls. The highest attendance in a VBS was 60. The oldest pastor is 58 and the longest a man has been preaching is 30 years while the shortest is four years. Several of the men were Hindu converts. Arul Das who is 43 became a Christian 18 years ago and has been preaching for the last seven years. Before that he worked in a shoe factory. Ramesh Timothy serves in a village with no other Christian church and in seven surrounding villages there is also no Christian church.
There is contact between these men and others nearby. Ambur is not far from Vellore. We held an informational meeting at Vellore for 27 different preachers. We studied: What is a Lutheran?, Baptism, Communion, The Position of Women in the Church. In addition to giving copies of these in Tamil, we handed out also in their language studies on Close Communion and Being an Evangelist.
I love to give a hand full of candies to pastors’ children as we visit. And there are the opportunities to give out to other children we meet as we walk to the pastor’s house. This is a good reminder that Christ died for all, just as candy is also given indiscriminately. It is a true joy to be out among the brothers and sisters and see and hear and learn and pray.