Evangelising New Delhi –
two minutes at a time

After the van has drawn up and parked, the Rev Verghese Thomas, from the New Delhi Auxiliary of the Bible Society of India (BSI), says a short prayer. Laden with Bible Society material, the evangelists hop out and quickly disperse into the surrounding streets.

“Only two minutes!” he reminds them as they leave.

“Two minutes is the maximum time we can stay in this area,” he explains. “In slum areas like this, the Sangh Parivar or Bajrang Dal extremists are very powerful. In a matter of minutes they can assemble a small army.”

Unworried, the evangelists cheerfully hand out their tracts. “This is good news,” they tell the passers-by. “It tells us Jesus loves us.” A few people reject the offer but most thank them and start reading straightaway. Some stay to ask questions. The evangelists do their best to provide answers, making no attempt to conceal their enthusiasm.

Two minutes later the evangelists pile back into the van, and eagerly exchange experiences as they drive to their next stop.

Committed

A huge, bustling, cosmopolitan metropolis, New Delhi is hardly one of India’s Christian strongholds, but the Christian community here is enthusiastic and committed. Like the other Bible Society Auxiliaries in India, the New Delhi Auxiliary has ambitious Bible distribution programs, and many volunteers of all ages are prepared to share the word of God with their compatriots.

All afternoon, the vanload of singing evangelists goes from place to place around the city, visiting both middle-class housing and slum areas, its hospitals, clinics, schools and kindergartens, giving away their tracts and selling Bibles and New Testaments.

Making no distinction between rich or poor, high caste, low, or anything else, the evangelists reach out to those people who are on the margins of New Delhi society.

Making no distinction between rich or poor, high caste, low, or anything else, the evangelists reach out to those people who are on the margins of New Delhi society.

Dignity

They include, of course, people with leprosy. As the evangelists arrive at Anand Gram (the name means ‘Village of Joy’) leprosy village, they are greeted by friends. Everybody knows the Bible Society here, because it has supported the community with educational materials, Bibles and New Testaments from the beginning. It was started in the 1960s by the Christian organisation Leprosy Mission, in co-operation with the government, to give the people who have the disease the dignity of accommodation, medical care and employment.

Right from biblical times, people with leprosy have been considered ‘unclean’ and forced to live far away from ‘normal’ society. But in the neatly-swept streets of Anand Gram some children play happily, while others pump fresh water for their mothers who are busy preparing supper.

In Anand Gram, Christian and Hindu are good neighbours, and the atmosphere around the village is so pleasant that it is challenging to be reminded that people here are suffering from one of the most dreaded diseases in all of India.

For outsiders it can also be challenging to discover that the people who live here send money every month to the Bible Society, so that others may be reached by the Word of God.

New family

The Bible van’s final stop for the day is at the Victoria Girls’ Hostel. Among the residents is a pretty 11-year-old orphan called Janis. Her parents were killed in an accident, and until the hostel found room for her and her sister they were facing a life on the streets of New Delhi.