House Church Ministry, West Bengal, seeks help.

Pastor Piyal Mondal

One of Vision for Asia’s partners and friend, Pastor Piyal Mondal, leads a ministry consisting of a team of 60 Christian workers who are serving the Lord in West Bengal, India.  They work in six of the eighteen districts of West Bengal, mostly in and around Kolkata.

Piyal was born in a small village in West Bengal.

After a difficult period in life he put his trust in the Lord Jesus.  Shortly afterwards, in 1990, he joined Operation Mobilisation.  He was with OM for four years where he worked in evangelism and literature distribution in six Indian states, and also learned to speak and read English. 

During his time with Operation Mobilisation Piyal learned what it means to live by faith.  After Operation Mobilisation he was given a place at Bible School where he studied for four years, gaining his Bachelor of Theology.

Pastor Piyal married Suparna in 1997.  They have two children, Tirsha (born 1998) and Alex (born January 2008).

Growth of a ministry

Piyal started a work with house churches with one family. He assembled a team of others who believed that God was calling them to build His Kingdom in this way and Piyal’s ministry was born.

Pastor Piyal says, “We build the Kingdom of God by seeing man and women turn to Christ and by helping believers to grow in their faith.”

Matthew 28:18 “… go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely, I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

How we do it

“Our main tool is through House Church ministry. 

In India House Churches are very effective at reaching people and making disciples.  Using the House Church model, small groups of new Christians can be baptised, nurtured and built into a church fairly quickly, and the disciple-making can begin.

The House Church Ministry is proving culturally appropriate, affordable, biblically authentic and very effective.

House Church Leaders

Most of our workers live in the villages and do typical Indian jobs, which barely covers their living expenses.  Many of them have families to support.

We are looking at providing extra support for these workers in the following areas:

1. Each leader supervises three or four House Churches. This means they have to travel vast distances to different villages and sometimes between islands.  This is can become expensive.
2. The Bengali people are highly literate, and there are a number of good books which present the gospel in a relevant way both for Hindus and for Muslims.  Our workers need Bibles and apologetics books to give or lend to enquirers.
3. Sometimes it is helpful to show the ‘Jesus film’ or other Gospel films.  We need money to hire equipment to show films.
4. Working in the villages other needs occasionally arise, from footballs for the children to roof repairs after storms; West Bengal is prone to cyclones coming in from the Bay of Bengal. 

“It is good to supply practical help for the village people, along with sharing the gospel.”

How you can get involved

Pastor Piyal is looking for partners to join with him and his House Church leaders/pastors in the work which they are doing, in the following ways:

1. Praying for the work: Piyal will send you his newsletters with up-to-date prayer information.
2. Providing financial support for the workers: Piyal is looking for support of £25 month for the various workers in the field. 
3. Pastor Piyal invites you to go to West Bengal on a Field Visit and becoming part of the team on the ground.

There is no substitute for seeing for yourself what God is doing!