Pastor H is a disciple-maker who has identified and built many indigenous tribal leaders across India. For over 15 years now, he and his team have been working to reach an unreached tribal group in India.

This tribal group has their own customs and beliefs including child marriage, encouraging children to drink alcohol at a young age, and practicing witchcraft and other superstitions. They place little value on education and tend to keep to themselves, choosing to remain separate from the rest of society.

Despite these challenges, Pastor H and his team stayed committed to their mission of sharing the Gospel with them. However, in 2020 things took a difficult turn when persecution hit hard. During a large youth gathering with over 1,000 people, their vehicles were attacked, and Pastor H and his brother were arrested for allegedly converting others.

After their release, although the situation seemed hopeless, Pastor H received a new plan from God: this time he would focus on training local leaders. Instead of trying to visit every village himself, he began identifying leaders in more than 40 villages who could be trained to share the Gospel. He knew that raising up leaders within the tribal community would be the best way to reach them in the long term.

During this period, Pastor H encountered our ConneXions Model at a conference where our India team was sharing it. He recognized immediately that his ministry needed this training and invited us to equip his leaders in Building Healthy Leaders, Building Healthy Churches, and Building Healthy Families (among others). As our team led him and his core leaders through our models and trainings, they developed a close partnership that has continued to this day.

Alongside Pastor H and his team, around 20 of those who attended these trainings directly are tribal leaders from this unreached people group. Despite a low level of literacy, they took firm hold of the models and were eager to learn more. Since they started, they have gained confidence that they can do great things for God’s Kingdom, and have grown steadily into mature, capable leaders.

These trainings continued over the course of three years, during which Pastor H’s ministry expanded far beyond what it once was. Instead of Pastor H and his small team doing all the work, the number of local leaders stepping up to share the Gospel in their villages has grown to 45 leaders. These leaders have become trusted figures in their communities and they are boldly standing for their faith as they reach people for Christ and build leaders.

Despite facing more persecution earlier this year which forced him to move 200 kilometers away to a different village, Pastor H hasn’t given up. He’s starting fresh in this new region, identifying and training even more leaders to carry on the work. Through the support of our team and in spite of the hardships he has faced,

he continues to personally teach our leader development principles to a group of 10 key leaders every month, who then take that training to their own leaders.

Local tribal leaders are now taking responsibility for sharing the Gospel and the people are being reached in ways that were never possible before. Their relationship with God has grown ever deeper; they are now meditating regularly on God’s Word and immediately applying it to their lives. Their family relationships have also improved.

What began as a small effort has blossomed into a movement as more and more of the people are hearing about the love of Christ right in their own villages. With new leaders being trained and more churches forming, the future looks bright for this ministry as it continues to bring the Gospel to the unreached!