South Asia | Healing Beyond Witchcraft
Courageous workers take perilous roads to get to unreached people groups in remote hillside villages, bringing medicine and the good news.
Most people who begin following Jesus in South Asia are first encountering him through miracles, signs, and healings.
One of Novo’s local teams in South Asia is incredibly committed and motivated to share the good news in remote mountain villages. During a strategic prayer retreat with Novo, they put together a list of 20 completely unreached villages they felt Jesus wanted them to engage. To reach these remote villages, they fit two to three people on a janky motorbike and travel through the hazards of the rainy season, over landslides and mudslides, on some of the most dangerous roads in the world. Often, they need to park the bikes and hike for multiple days (sometimes as many as nine!) on steep trails and through leech-infested areas to reach their target village. Once there, they use simple medicine as an access ministry to serve people, pray, and share about Jesus.
Similar to how countless people have been led to faith in the Middle East through dreams and visions of Jesus, most people who begin following Jesus in South Asia are first encountering him through miracles, signs, and healings. There are many stories of people coming to faith from Hindu and Buddhist backgrounds—and every decision for Jesus is connected to a miracle the person has experienced!
Devoted Hindu witchdoctor’s wife was paralyzed…until she was prayed for in Jesus name!
In one Hindu village, our team met a 60-year-old woman who had married a witch doctor at a young age. She was very devoted to the Hindu gods, visiting many Hindu temples, practicing many rituals, and helping her husband in many ways. But one day when she woke up, she discovered she could not move one of her hands and one of her legs. She did all the Hindu rituals, but nothing improved. She tried hospital treatments, and they made no difference. When the team visited her village, they prayed for her in Jesus’ name. The next day she could move her hand and leg just a bit. They prayed for her multiple times after that, and she was totally healed. She accepted Christ as a result and is now the only follower of Jesus in her village—as a witch doctor’s wife!
