THE SCOPE OF MISIONS
Ed ited b y Oran 0 . Smith
Chairman, Dept, of Missions, Biola Bible College
it ittim m r it ifin
T hese are days of great thanksgiv ing among the Christian people of Madras, India. Within this past year, God has performed great won ders. Faith and prayer have been re warded and replaced by praise and gladness. One national Christian business man in India testified that he had prayed 14 years for a Bible Institute in this great metropolitan city of South India. God has an swered that prayer this year. The burden for the establishment of the Hindustan Bible Institute ori ginated in the hearts of Mr. and Mrs. Paul V. Gupta, converted high caste Hindus, and former B io l a students. For 12 years after his conversion from Hinduism, Gupta served as an evangelist throughout India. Seeing the hopelessness of the task of evan gelizing the whole of India in this generation at the present rate of progress, he and his wife looked to the Lord for guidance. It was made plain to them from the Lord that the most promising method of reach ing India with the gospel was to train the native Christians to reach
their own people. The Gupta’s saw a fourfold need for establishing the school: Religiously. With nearly 8 million professing Christians in India, there are only a fraction with a real knowl edge of Jesus Christ or of His Word. And only a few have a missionary vision. Economically. While Americans spend thousands each year to support one missionary couple abroad, hundreds of national missionaries in India could be trained in far less time for the same amount of money. Spiritually. The need today in India is for indigenous leadership in the Church of Christ. Young Christians having a call from God must be trained to fill this need. Politically. The day of foreign-domi- nated missionary enterprise in India is fast coming to an end. Nationalism is running strong, Communism holds out a materialistic Utopia to the masses, and pagan religions beckon with increasing power. India is now an independent nation, and as such
Paul V. Gupta, Hindustan Bible Institute Director and converted high caste Hindu. desires to be controlled by nationals and not by foreigners. Bearing this in mind, the workers of the Hindustan Bible Institute have committed themselves to a life of service to the young Christian na tionals.
CONVOCATION SERVICE, STUDENT BODY AND FACULTY (LEFT). REBUILT BIKE HOLDS GOSPELS FOR OPEN AIR WORK. 27 JUNE 19 S3
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