Oh Lord, you are the God of generations and you want each generation to tell the next generation ”the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord” (Psalm 78:4-7). My wife and I were both born and raised in India and we got married there before coming to North America where both of our children were born, our son in America and our daughter in Canada. We are so thankful to you Lord that both of them have been believers in you from their childhood and still are to this day. At the right time, they got married to believing spouses. While we rejoice in the fact of their being faithful followers of Jesus Christ, we are very conscious of the fact that their understanding of Christianity is based on Western cultural values and Christian history shaped by different events and circumstances. Therefore, it is our prayer Lord that we may be able to share with them our family’s religious legacy which may also be of value to other Christians.

As we are living in the 21st century, Lord, most Christians are very aware that even to this day there are millions upon millions of Unreached people groups in this world, people who have never heard the Good News of the Gospel so far. Such were our ancestors, both my wife’s and mine. On my father’s side they were followers of the world’s second largest religious group while on my mother’s side, they followed the tenets of the third largest religious group in the world. In my wife’s case, the situation was reversed: her mother’s side followed the faith of my father’s side and her father’s side followed the religion of my mother’s ancestors. We are so thankful to you, Lord, that you sent your servants as dedicated missionaries to our very spiritually dark sub-continent. They travelled thousands of miles across dangerous seas and against all odds ultimately reached western Indian provinces. After hearing the Gospel, our ancestors decided to follow Jesus Christ. Of course their decision meant that they had to pay a heavy price: they were ostracized and rejected by their kith and kin as well as by the larger social, cultural and religious society. They could not draw water from the one well the whole village used, and they were refused the shopping privileges at the one grocery store in the village. However, we are deeply grateful to you, Lord, that they remained faithful to you and did not deny their newfound faith.

After living in Canada for about 30 years and raising our two children, you opened the door Lord for us to move to the United States. Our hope was that both of us would find secular employment somewhere, but you O Lord had other plans for us. You had people in Columbia who were believers and as such they welcomed us and opened the door for ministry. We are so thankful to our Heavenly Father for using us to serve the church of Jesus Christ. We were able to use our religious and cultural heritage from south Asia to teach, preach and equip the body of Christ. However, over the last two decades that we have been in the U.S. we have seen a great influx of people from mostly Unreached people groups who have come to live here. We feel that it is a great opportunity for followers of Christ to reach these people even though they have come here to seek material goals. We pray O Lord that you will open new doors for us to enter so that we can equip more people to share the Gospel with these newcomers who are mostly followers of non-Christian religions. Glory be to His Name!

Recognizing one’s fate in being born in another country without the freedoms and benefits of being born in the USA, the author of this prayer expresses his gratitude for finding his way to the U.S.  More importantly, he recognizes the cultural impact of being born in a country less Christian. His mission is to try to reach those without an understanding of faith in Christ.