Story number 4 for 1 Apr 2003

(India)–Next, a serious water crisis is likely in 19 Indian states due to a lack of rainfall in the last three to four years. Living Water International’s Jonathon Wiles says the problem is worse for the national church. “We’re not just dealing with a complete lack of clean, safe drinking water, we’re dealing with unequal access to the safe drinking water that’s there. What I mean by that is, because of the social structure in most of rural India, people who become Christians are typically outcast from society.” Wiles says in areas openly hostile to the Gospel, the church has to be more careful about ministry. However, Living Water found a way to help. “We have been drilling wells in Orissa in areas where there’s not already a church in hopes of opening the doors in that area for the Gospel because the people in the area who don’t have the water want to know why people are coming in and giving them water, so that opens the doors for local believers and the people who are working with Living Water to be able to share the Gospel a little bit more openly.”