{"id":282,"date":"2025-02-06T14:33:52","date_gmt":"2025-02-06T14:33:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/capstoneministries.net\/?page_id=282"},"modified":"2025-02-06T14:35:20","modified_gmt":"2025-02-06T14:35:20","slug":"leper-village","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/capstoneministries.net\/?page_id=282","title":{"rendered":"Leper Village"},"content":{"rendered":"

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WHO WE ARE<\/span> \/ LEPER VILLAGE<\/h1>\n

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A Saint in the Leper Village<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

\u00a0There may be no more pitiful people on the face of the earth than the lepers of India. India is one of five countries in the world that each have a small but significant number of people with leprosy. Sixty percent of the world\u2019s lepers reside in India. As in Biblical times the lepers are isolated and segregated from the general population-confined to live in their own villages throughout the country. It is a life of loneliness, persecution and physical disability.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Fate has caused one such village in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh near the state capital of Raipur, to cross paths with Capstone Ministries. Biskot Sika was in his last year of a Baptist bible college when he began to pray for God\u2019s leading as to how he could serve Him.<\/p>\n

\u00a0He was led to share the Gospel message of God\u2019s love as an evangelist on the streets of Raipur. It was there he met the lepers begging on the streets. For the last eight years he has ministered to them three days each week in between his evangelist calling. He is only supported by his wife -a housekeeper in the city hospital.<\/p>\n

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Beginnings<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

The seed for Capstone Bible Institute, (CBI) came to Dr. Bob Fehr’s mind after going on different Bible teaching trips to India several years ago. When on these trips, he had been allowed to freely teach any Biblical study and the students\u2014poor lay pastors\u2014 were eager to learn. However, he realized that there was no systematic way of teaching doctrine and discipleship to the students he encountered and there was no follow-up with them.<\/p>\n

Here was certainly a challenge. These pastors had no access to Biblical training but were on fire to serve God and educate their flocks. Language was also a problem. How to go about teaching them in their own language?<\/p>\n

Dr. Fehr started working with some members of his Capstone Ministries’ Board to develop a basic study of the great truths of the Bible with in depth discipleship training. From Bob’s initial desire to see a need fulfilled, came the Capstone Bible Institute.<\/p>\n

How You Can Help<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Capstone expects much growth in the Capstone Bible Institute. Our goal is to train 10,000 pastors through this program. We are near completion of the translation of all the online material (http:\/\/cbiin.org\/<\/a>) in the following languages: Hindi, Telugu, Kannada, Tamil, Oriya, and English. This will language allow access to most Christians in India.<\/p>\n

While Capstone Ministries provides the materials for the seminary study to lay-pastors at no charge, this multi-level course costs us about $80 per student to produce.<\/p>\n

In India, CBI has an ever-growing number of students and training centers across the country. This growth can be monitored on the CBI website. Most of these students are poor lay pastors who would not have access to any Biblical instruction without our program.\u00a0 This is one of the largest Bible teaching programs in this country of 1.2 billion.<\/p>\n

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This man was abandoned by his family when he contracted Leprosy as a child. He is now a Christian.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Leprosy is caused by a very slow growing intracellular bacterium called Mycobacterium leprae which divides every two weeks. Treatment is effective but must extend from six to twelve months with daily antibiotics. Symptoms usually take three to five years to develop after exposure and are irreversible. It still exists in India due to limited access to medical care among the poor.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The bacteria invades the skin cells causing disfigurement-often on the face; and it invades the peripheral nerve cells causing loss of sensation and muscle weakness. The sensory loss makes them prone to injuries such as lacerations,fractures, burns and infections of the extremities any of which commonly lead to amputation. The weakness often leaves their hands and feet with a claw-like deformity. The bacterium may also affect the cornea of the eye causing pain and visual loss.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Throughout history mankind has dreaded the devastating consequences of leprosy. They feared that it was highly contagious, which it is not, and have established elaborate barriers to protect themselves from contact with a leper. One must have prolonged and close contact with a leper to become infected.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The 120 lepers (forty of which are children) in the village can only survive by begging on the streets. The deformities of their hands and feet preclude any manual work. All have now been medically treated but it was too late to prevent the irreversible complications. They will walk or bike, as able, the three to six miles to the surrounding villages or to Raipur to beg for a rupee (about two cents) or a small portion of rice. Some will stay home to care for the totally disabled or young children. All are illiterate. Seventy have become Christians under Sika\u2019s discipleship.<\/p>\n

\u00a0With the recent COVID epidemic and a national home quarantine, their livelihood was suspended. Confined to their homes they could no longer beg for food or money. They were at risk of starving. God provided for their dire need through connecting Sika with Capstone Ministries-thereby supplying funds for food and basic necessities during the lock-down.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Prayer needs:<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
    \n
  1. \n
      \n
    1. Funds to build a church for the leper village Christians.<\/li>\n
    2. Safety for India as the COVID pandemic overwhelmed the medical services for the poor.<\/li>\n
    3. Thanksgiving for expansion of Capstone Bible Institute to Sierra Leone and now over 1100 pastors and evangelists are being trained world wide-850 in India.<\/li>\n
    4. For the Capstone sponsored Jesus movie to be shown in churches in India in their native languages and offered to the public.<\/li>\n
    5. Love, strength and courage for believers suffering from the widespread and aggressive persecution of Christians by the radical Hindus.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

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      WHO WE ARE \/ LEPER VILLAGEA Saint in the Leper Village \u00a0There may be no more pitiful people on the face of the earth than the lepers of India. India is one of five countries in the world that each have a small but significant number of people with leprosy. Sixty percent of the world\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-282","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/capstoneministries.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/282","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/capstoneministries.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/capstoneministries.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capstoneministries.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capstoneministries.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=282"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/capstoneministries.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/282\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/capstoneministries.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}