Plant New Churches

Church planting is the only way to establish the Kingdom of God in a new place. We believe that new souls can be saved when a church is planted in completely unreached areas. God has been gracious to us and opens many doors for us to start new churches where hundreds of souls can be saved and take the water of baptism and Life. For now, we have 30 full-time church missionaries working to plant churches in India and Nepal where we have already planted more than 40 churches, saving thousands of lost souls.

a. India

India is a land of rich diversity with many languages, cultures, and people groups. However, with this diversity comes a huge challenge for mission workers, such as people from north east India who are not accepted in Western India due to differences in physical appearances, languages, and other reasons. Thus, within India itself, we experience the challenges and blessings of working as a cross-cultural mission.

India has a huge population as well, and every sixth person is believed to be Indian on the face of the Earth. There are provinces like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, and West Bengal, all which have equal populations to the US. But sadly North Indian regions are the most unreached areas of India. Religiously, 80% of India’s population is believed to be Hindu, 13 % Muslim, and only 2 % Christian. Therefore, Ray of Hope wants to focus more in Northern, Western, and Central India.

Despite some provinces of India being the most difficult places to spread the Gospel, due to God’s grace and direction, the mission has successfully planted 20 new churches in six provinces of India. Moreover, the mission has 15 full time missionaries in India supported by the generous tithes and offerings of small newly planted local churches and some of our generous friends. But if we obtain more partnerships with other churches, mission agencies, or individuals, then we can plant thousands of churches and save millions of precious perishing souls. The Ray of Hope Mission is strongly committed and convinced by God’s call to different peoples to come and save the unsaved.

• Few Missionaries working in different parts of India: 

	Jigmee Sonam Bhutia Senior Pastor, Director of Ray of Hope Mission
	Raman Zayats Assistant Pastor at Ray Of Hope Mission (Temporary in the US)
	Rajesh Kalikote Pastor of Siliguri Main Church (located in West Bengal)
	Prakash Rai Pastor of Subolvitta Church (located in Naxalbari, West Bengal)
	Sabin Rai Pastor of Dalsingpara Church (located Jalpaiguri, West Bengal)
	Ps Jonathan Rai Pastor Incharge of Chongtung church (Darjeeling, West Bengal)
	Dhain Singh Pastor of Amritsar Church (located in Punjab)
	Brother Lima Samprang Missionary to Odissa (located Orissa)
	Brother Pramesh Thapa Missionary to Jungpana (located in Darjeeling)
	Brother Lal Ji Marandi Missionary to Katihar (located in Bihar)
No photo	Brother Basudev Oroan Missionary to Purnea (located in Bihar)
	Brother Ring Rang Missionary to Tura (located in Meghalaya)
No photo	Brother Kesar Rai Missionary to Jungpana (located in Darjeeling)
	Brother Atul Sarkar Missionary to Kolkatta (located in West Bengal)
No photo	Brother Manish Missionary to Delhi
	Brother Surya Sharma Missionary to Pani Tanki (located between West Bengal and the Nepal Border)
	Sister Ganga Lepcha Missionary to Siliguri (located in West Bengal)
No photo	Sister Usha Darji Missionary to Siliguri (located in West Bengal)

b. Nepal

According to the 2011 census, 81.3% of the Nepalese population was Hindu, 9.0% was Buddhist, 4.4% was Muslim, 3.0% was Kirant/Yumaist, 1.42% was Christian, and 0.9% follow other religions or no religion. At present, when the nation is drafting a new constitution, there are many Hindu radical groups who want to declare Nepal as the Hindu nation in that constitution. There are around 30 million people in Nepal. The western part of Nepal is counted as one of the more economically challenged and unreached areas. The main difficulties to reach the farthest villages is transportation; each village is not necessarily connected by roads with other villages. Due to that fact, sometimes people need to hike two to three days to reach the nearest village.

Due to God’s grace, even in Nepal, the Ray of Hope Mission has been able to plant 20 small churches, saving thousands of precious souls for God’s kingdom. There, the mission has 15 full time missionaries supported in the same way. However, the good thing is that many Nepalese are open to the Gospel, and the mission could send out more missionaries, then many souls will be added into God’s kingdom. Kathmandu is the capital city of Nepal which have more than 4 million population. We are praying to build the church there where we have more than 150 memebrs in the church

• Few Missionaries working in different parts of Nepal:

	Pastor Rudra Rai Missionary to Kathmandu, Nepal
	Pastor Kumar Tamang Missionary, Damak, Nepal
	Pastor Dik Bahadur Tamang Missionary to Kakarvitta, Jhapa, Nepal
	Brother John Tamang Missioanry to Birganj, Nepal
	Brother Sarju Malla Missionary to Kathmandu, Nepal
	Brother Dhruva Pandey Missionary to Mahakali, West Nepal
	Bina Tamang Missionary to Srijana Busty, East Nepal
No photo	Prem Kala Rai Missionary to Burunga, East Nepal

c. Bhutan

Approximately 70 % of the population follow either the Drukpa Lineage of the Kagyu school or the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism. The remaining 30 percent practice Hinduism or follow other schools of Buddhism or Bön. Bhutan has a monarchy system where the king is the supreme authority.

Missionary working in Bhutan: 

Pastor Michael in Thimphu, Bhutan

d. Bhutanese Refugee Camp

There was seven Bhutanese Nepali Refugees camp in eastern part of Nepal with more than one hundred and twenty thousand people. They were all nepali Bhutanese people from southern Bhutan. Due to some conflict, they all were driven out from Bhutan in overnight where they were living from generations. All of a sudden, they all came on the street. Initially when there were no camps and places for them to settle, many of them were forced to live on the bank of rivers where many of them died due to sanitation problem. Later UNHCR stepped in and organised camps and other primary needs. The life in camp was very difficult. Rations were provided in limited proportion and they were not allowed to work outside.

But we praise God that gospel were preached among them by some of the christian among themselves and also from few churches from outside. God also opened door for us on year 2007 to go and preach the gospel among them. Thousands of these brothers were converted and took baptism. Eventually Ray of Hope started five churches among five camps.

But from latter part of 2008, UNHCR together with IOM( International Organisation for Migration) started resettling them in USA, Australia, Canada, England, Denmark, New Zealand, Norway and Netherland. Many of our members from churches moved to USA, New Zealand, canada, Australia and Denmark and after reaching there they started working among their own people group who were brought in the new country. 

We still have four churches in four remaining camps back in Nepal. There are still more than 20,000 population in these camps. Few of them are yet to complete their migration process whereas few of them desires to stay back in Nepal.  

Our churches are growing among them. Every months hundreds of people are getting converted in these camps. Many church leaders have been raised among themselves and now they have started working all over Nepal. With the help of these brothers from refugee camp, many churches were established in other parts of Nepal as well. 

Missionaries working in Refugee Camp: 

	Pastor Kailash Chettri Beldangi-II refugee Camp
No photo	Pastor Markus Rai Beldangi-III Camp
	Brother Peter Tamang Beldangi-I Camp
	Brother Beeku Rai Beldangi-III Camp
	Brother Purna Rai Beldangi-III Camp
	Brother B.B. Rasaily Pathari Camp

e. USA

As I mentioned earlier thousands of our member from Nepalese Bhutanese Refugee Church were resettled in USA. We have opened our main base in Richmond Virginia naming as Ray Of Hope International. Pastor Peter Rai ( formerly a school headmaster) is the main Pastor incharge of ministry in USA. Now we have planted more than 18 churches  in different states of USA. They conduct Bible schools, couple seminar, youth retreat, women’s fellowship and many more. Apart from this, they are reaching out to many of these other Nepalese and Indian origin people settled in USA. For more information, you can visit ROH International web site

Missionaries working in USA

	Ps Peter Rai Richmond, Virginia
	Ps Parlad Gurung Westfield, Massachusett
	Ps Stephen Gurung Rochester, New York
	Ps Mon Gurung Atlanta, Georgia
	Ps Kharka Biswa Columbus, Ohio
	Ps Rajendra Neopaney Denver, Colarado
	Brother Parsu Gurung Utica, New York

Ps Raju Gurung - Atlanta, Georgia

Ps Moni Raj Gurung - Philadelphia, Pennyslavania

Ps Abhishek Khatiwada - Fargo, North Dakota

Ps Chandra Gurung - Rochester, New york

Brother Harka Gurung - Rochester, New York

Brother Rajen Tewari - Scanton, Pennyslavania

Brother Sital Ghimire - Akron, Ohio

Brother Dhan Parsai - Sacremento, California

Brother Nandu Thapa - Phoenix, Arizona

Brother Karna Rai - Austin, Texas

Brother Bhuawan Rai - Lewisville, Kentucky

Brother Kaman Singh Gurung - Grand Rapids, Michigan

f. Canada

In the same way, hundreds of our church members were also brought to this new country. Some of our youth leaders started taking initiative to organise church and now we have two churches in Canada in Ontario London and Regina Sashkatschwen. Brother Max Gurung and Brother Laxman Gurung are two brothers  looking after these churches. They are actively working their among their own people group and also looking forward to take part in mission in Asia.

Missionaries serving in Canada

	Brother Max Gurung London, Ontario
	Brother Laxman Gurung Regina, Saschachewan

g. New Zealand

One church has been started in Palmerston New Zealand as few members of our church were resettled there. The church is growing and working actively among their own people too. Brother Gyanu Rai is pastoring the church there.

Missionary serving in New Zealand

Ps Gyanu Rai Palmerston, New Zealand

Phul Maya Rai- Palmerston, New Zealand

h. Denmark

Two churches has been started in Denmark. Few brothers moved there and they started reaching out their own people moved from Camp to there. Some of people got saved and started the church there.

Missionaries working in Denmark

Brother Kham Guurng

Brother Dinesh Gurung