Evangelist (Meitei people), Adampur, Bangladesh

Rupchan M. is another fruit of Luckson's labors in Bangladesh. He came to faith in Christ in 2006, received Bible training in 2007-2008, and is now an evangelist in two Meitei villages in northeastern Bangladesh.

Testimony

My name is Rupchan Meitei and I'm a Bangladeshi national. I was born on 11 January 1980. Being the youngest and the only son among three of us, still I am unmarried. My father has already died and now six of us are in the family: my mother, my elder sister, her husband, along with their two lovely daughters, and me. By the grace of God, my mom and sister have come to know the Lord.

Though I was born and grew up in a Meitei Hindu family, I had never desired or thought of knowing the One and Living God in my life. Rather, I lived a worldly life. One evening, perhaps in May 2004 when my life started sinking into worldly pleasures, a servant of God named Luckson Meitei, from Manipur, India, along with one of his new converts named Sudhir Meitei, and a non-believer called Dhirto came to our village to preach the Gospel. There, in a Hindu temple around twenty persons in all were gathered and listened to the Gospel message from him. Some of us were not so thoughtful and even neglected the shared precious words and works of the Lord. Instead of acknowledging myself to be a sinner and heeding towards the love of God, I felt that those who preached the gospel are so foolish for they are used by other people just because of money, mainly by the Americans for their political gains in future. And moreover, I thought that the Americans are trying to overpower and control of the world through religion. As I have mentioned earlier, it was in that time that I started enjoying my life with the worldly pleasures like the lust of the flesh, gambling, drinking alcohol with bad company, etc.

After a couple of months, an invitation letter was given to me for a three day salvation camp called "Seeker's Conference." It was dated 2-4 November 2006, and was organized by Bro. Luckson and his friends. As I had a desire to go and see of what is going on, I attended the conference. The conference was so wonderful and so convincing. The messages shared by every speaker were so touching and challenging. Those messages are a big part of how I came to know who I am and who the Lord is. Also one of the most challenging and convincing to me was on John 14:6, shared and explained by Rev. Maria Das, one of the main speakers for the conference. It was on the 2nd day of the conference in the evening that I was really touched through the word of God. I was also again I moved deeply through a film in Hindi called Daya Sagar (the Ocean of Love). It was about how Jesus suffered for me by carrying the Cross. By hearing the message and seeing the film, I realized that Jesus is the only way to be saved and set me free from the bondage of sin. Thus, on that very night, the 3rd November 2006, I accepted Jesus as my Lord and personal Savior and committed my life to Him alone. A baptism program was also arranged on the next day and I took water baptism in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Now, by God's grace, I've found real peace and joy in my heart and have given up all the bad habits I had.

As a new baby in Christ, I started experiencing new life in Christ and could differentiate between my past life without Christ and present life with Him. Truly my new life in Christ and the Holy Spirit in me has led me to bear a big burden for the lives of people without God's Son, especially my community the Meiteis. Though I was an electrician for the last ten years, I found no satisfaction by doing it unless I speak to someone of the Lord with my little knowledge of Him. Also, I felt that the Lord was calling me to be his witness, and therefore I started asking Him if I could be equipped in His Word. It was by His grace that a door was opened to me for a short term bible training in September 2007, in Manipur, India. I sold any possible thing I could, even my cell phone to bear my journey expenses to Manipur. Thus, I have finished my one year's diploma course at Trinity Training Center, Manipur.

I'm so thankful to God, as it has been my prayer to work for the Lord in the villages as a full time native missionary and the Lord has enabled me to concentrate in two villages- Meitei Madhapur and Chitlia. Both villages are strongholds of Satan at present, but my prayer is that the Lord changes them into His strongholds through me. Also, I'm so thankful to God for HeartCry because of the financial support and earnest prayers that began in October 2008; hopefully I will be able to accomplish the burden and vision the Lord has given to me.