GFA Founder Calls for Prayer and Fasting for Believers in Gujarat, India
by Allie Martin
February 7, 2006
(AgapePress) - - The founder of Gospel for Asia is asking Christians worldwide to pray and fast for believers in India who are facing increased persecution. Tensions between Christians and Hindus in the Indian State of Gujarat have increased in the past few weeks as a major gathering of Hindu extremist groups is imminent. Christians in Gujarat's Dang District are considering whether to evacuate before an upcoming Hindu festival scheduled to begin February 11. According to K.P. Yohannan, founder and president of Gospel for Asia (GFA), persecution of Christians is especially dangerous in Gujarat, and many believe the danger is likely to be heightened at festival time.
Gujarat has a history of mass murder, Yohannan notes, and this includes the killing of women and children. He says the upcoming festival, which may attract as many as a half a million Hindus, could very well unleash a wave of violence against Christians in the area.
What Hindu extremists are asking people to do "is to put up a yellow flag on every house that is a Hindu home," the ministry leader explains. "People who refuse to put that flag up, they treat them as anti-Indian, anti-Hindu. The tradition of this state by Hindu radicals is to simply go out and brutally murder people that oppose them."
It is "an ethnic cleansing type of approach," Yohannan adds. He says the situation in Gujarat is urgent, and GFA is urging Christians around the world to fast and pray for the sake of the believers in the volatile Indian state.
"The answer to this kind of situation is not politics and picketing and fighting," the GFA spokesman asserts. "No, I think the main answer is crying out to God. I'm personally very much concerned that the body of Christ in a free land like we are here in the United States or European countries around the world [needs to] truly fast and pray seriously for the situation."
GFA trains native missionaries in countries all over Asia, equipping them to carry the gospel even into areas hostile to Christianity and rife with anti-Christian persecution. Yohannan says believers in other parts of the world need to pray and fast for these missionaries, and he urges them to intercede for those in Gujarat in particular, "because whatever happens here will have far-reaching consequences for the future of the church in India."
The ministry president points out that more churches have been destroyed in Gujarat than anywhere else in India. Also, he notes, in recent days GFA has received reports of native missionaries being beaten or kidnapped and church meetings attacked in other Indian states.
Unfortunately, Yohannan says, this kind of persecution and violence happens almost daily, and the pace is increasing as the fanatics grow bolder and bolder. Nevertheless, he says Christians worldwide can take action by supporting GFA and its missionaries with their prayers.
Allie Martin, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
