New Wine Ireland in Nepal!

Those of you who attended the 2008 and 2009 Sligo Summer Conferences may remember that we took at offering for the work of the Church in Nepal; you may be wondering how that money was used? Well on the 26th September 2009 5 people from the New Wine Ireland Team started a very long journey to Nepal!

The team consisted of a variety of people who are involved with the Sligo Summer Conference - Hilary McClay who is one of the host’s and a Director of New Wine Ireland, Zara Monteith who led worship in 09, Chris Monteith who looked after all the stewards, Cherith McClay who worked with the 5 -10’s and Simon Newell who is the assistant administrator for New Wine Ireland.

New Wine Ireland had formed a link with Nepal in February 2008 when NCFN (National Christian Fellowship Nepal) had asked David McClay and a small team to visit and speak at a Leader’s conference and a youth conference that they where organising. NCFN is an umbrella organisation for many of the Christian churches in all parts of Nepal. The Christian Church in Nepal is still quite young - the first Christian mission partners were only allowed into the country in the 1950s, but today there are over 1 million Christians in a country with a total population of about 28 million. While in Nepal the team where greatly encouraged and challenged at how the Nepali churches where so eager to change lives in their country.

Nepal is among the poorest and least developed countries in the world with nearly half of its population living below the poverty line. It has a population of 28 million people, 90% of the population is Hindu and only 0.5% are Christians. Illegal trafficking is one of the biggest issues Nepal faces, with children, young people and women being smuggled into major cities in India with a promise of a better life, when in reality most are sold into slavery or prostitution.

During our 2008 conference we took an offering which would go to the work of churches in Nepal. Shortly after the conference we where approached again and asked if we would be willing to send another team in 2009 to speak at a Women’s conference and another Youth Conference. This time it was decided that Hilary would go and be the main speaker for these events; bringing Zara Monteith, the youth worker for WPCA, and Cherith McClay who is involved with youth work at Willowfield Parish Church to also speak. The conference date’s where not until Sept 09, we felt that a Women’s conference and a Youth conference where so important for the church of Nepal as women and young people are often looked over, so it was decided that we would take another offering at the 09 conference and combine it with the offering from 08 and make a large donation towards the running of these important conferences. The total money we where able to donate was a fantastic £4500! On top of this the team raised an extra £3500 to cover their flight’s and travel expenses.

We arrived in Kathmandu on Sunday night, and had Monday to see a bit of the city and recover from the journey. On Tuesday morning the Women's Conference started, with Hilary, Zara and Cherith all taking part. Women had travelled from all over the country for the conference, and they ranged from young girls to quite elderly women, with over 300 women in all. We had a great time with them, they were so hungry for more of God and very open for prayer ministry. Each day we had the opportunity to teach, to pray and to minister to them. And there were wonderful testimonies of God's healing power at work. We could see a marked contrast in the hope and joy of the Christian Nepali as opposed to the sense of hopelessness we saw elsewhere.

On the Thursday and Friday we moved to a different location for the youth conference, again attended by 300-400 people. We enjoyed great worship, Nepalese style; Zara also got a chance to lead the conference in worship, by teaching a new song. We prayed with many people, for healing, for guidance, for more of God's spirit.

Thank you to all those who prayed and supported us for this trip; we were so encouraged by all that we saw and were able to be part of.

The team and their amazing hosts; Milan and Shusma and their daughter Amishu!	The NCFN Youth Conference
The NCFN Youth Conference	The NCFN Womens Conference
The NCFN Womens Conference	The NCFN Womens Conference