This content is an interview discussing the Christian gospel's universality and the challenges and strategies involved in sharing it, particularly with individuals from diverse religious backgrounds like Hinduism, and within the context of American culture.
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Hello and welcome to Cross Talk. I'm Wes
McAdams from Baker Heights Church of
Christ. One of the most beautiful things
about the gospel, the good news of Jesus
Christ, is that it is for everyone. No
matter who you are or where you're from,
the gospel is for you. Our special guest
today is doing a marvelous work
spreading the gospel to people from all
over the world. I'll introduce him to
you in just a moment. Stay with us.
Baker Heights Church of Christ presents
Cross Talk, a biblical discussion about
Today's guest is a native of India. He
is the preacher for the Church of Christ
in Clyde, Texas, and he's doing a
fantastic work with the refugees from
Nepal who are living here in Abalene. He
has a heart for people and a heart for
the Lord. I'm so excited to visit with
him today. Welcome to Cross Talk, David Peterson.
Peterson.
Thank you, sir. It's good to have you, brother.
brother.
Great to be here.
I'm excited about our discussion. I'm
excited about hearing your thoughts and
your perspective on on teaching the
gospel and and just being a Christian
and a disciple of Jesus Christ. But
before we really get into our subject,
why don't you tell us a little bit about
yourself and living in India? How did
you end up in Clyde, Texas, being a
preacher here?
Well, it's been a long journey. Um it'll
take a long time to speak about it.
Sure. But um I come from a Hindu
background but uh on the way uh when my
grandfather was converted to Luther
Lutheranism and uh from there we
channeled from there and walked on and
got into Catholicism where I grew up in
that. I became an alter boy right there
and uh I served in the Catholic church
and also uh went to school in the
Catholic organization
and well we had all that kind of an
influence uh from Catholicism more about
Christ and uh and a little background of
Christianity but again I was always
searching I was just searching because
um then I went from there uh even to
other denominations like uh to the
Methodists and Baptists and Assemblies
of God and so on so forth but at At the
same time I also was uh looking into
Islam and uh Buddhism, Janism,
Zorastronism and so you're kind of all
all around the place and especially if
you're coming from a Hindu background
which is a very tolerant religion and uh
you pretty much accept all the
religions. So you know I was there but
at the same time I was searching deep
inside. Well, one thing led to another
and to make things short, uh, finally I
said, I wanted to study this Bible and a
Methodist man really, a gentleman with
his wife introduced me to the Bible and
started reading a little bit. That was
my first take. And slowly and behold, I
got um, a scholarship from Faith
Theological Seminary in Philadelphia for
international students. That's where I
came in. And I studied there for a
little while while and then from there
went to Sunset finished my education
there went back to came to Philadelphia
where I did Asian missions and after a
little while I went back to India by
this time I've already been converted in
'89 uh converted to Christ and uh went
back to India got married and I served
there as a full-time and from there
again the church in Philadelphia called
me and they said Dave we want you to
come and work with the Asians uh you
know the Asian background. Well, I said,
"Okay." And so I and Susan came to
Philadelphia, started working there,
been there for a long time. And uh one
fine morning, uh the church in Clyde
called me up and they said, "Dave, uh we
want you to come and uh just be our
interim because we're looking for a
minister. One of the ministers has
left." I said, "Great, I'll I'll come
and preach there." I said, "Something
interesting," I said. So I came in and I
just uh was always waiting to get back
to Philly because my heart was in doing
mission work reaching to the Asians in
Philadelphia, New York, New Jersey and Delaware.
Delaware.
I was the largest population of Indians
unreached Hindus and uh well God had
different plans in all this. God was
teaching me and uh planning his ways
step by step uh teaching me and helping
me to see the broad plan that he had and
while I was here finally the church said
well it looks like we don't have to look
further you we want you to be the
minister here and uh you know at first I
was not too ready for this and I said
Lord what are you doing here you're in
Clyde this is not my cup of tea
[clears throat] well it's interesting
the providence of God how within
probably a year or two at the church in
southern hills one of the sisters Pat
Cranfield got in touch with me and she
said Dave there's a couple of bhnes from
Nepal who are here I don't understand
them maybe you can see who these people
are and guess what the Lord opened the
mission fund right where I was ministering
ministering
and the rest is I'm here now for the
past eight years now right
that just
that's wonderful that and and many
people I'm sure that live in Abalene
don't realize ize what a mission field
Abalene is and and maybe you could tell
us a little bit about why that is the
case, but we have refugees from all over
the world living right here in Abalene.
And you you mentioned already uh that
you work a lot with the Bhanese uh
refugees. So tell us about that work and
what you're doing and and a little bit
about those those those folks that
you're working with there.
Well, we have about uh 700 uh refugees
right here in Abalene.
Wow. And uh it was a whole complex group
of people coming all the way from Bhutan
to Nepal and over here. And uh it's
interesting their language text is the
same text that we use in India. It's in
the Hindi language. Wow.
So I can read the text and I can
converse with them. I mean God had this
all laid out. Uh yet they are all Hindu
background. They all have a Hindu
background. Some of them uh also are
priests. uh there are temple priests. Wow.
Wow.
Who are among these families and they
minister to these families. So I've been
working with them and teaching them
about u Christianity going back to the
uh to Christ to God himself the Bible um
and uh so that's where we are trying to
work and plant the church uh within that
community within their own community
within that same language speaking and
that culture that's what we are doing
right now right
God is using me
so the most of us probably aren't real
familiar living in in West Texas with
Hinduism and and what the beliefs are
what the mentality ity is there. So if
you would share with us I know that
that's a broad question but if you could
just share with us some about what does
the the Hindu religion teach what do
they believe what what is their
perspective on their worldview so to speak
speak
okay well Hinduism is pretty deep it's
it's complex uh I don't think we can
just uh put a date to it because it is
so uh so ancient uh but it is uh it I
the more I studied about Hinduism is it
dates you back slowly ly towards Judaism
and goes all the way to Abraham and
Exodus and all that background uh where
where all that calf worship the cow
worship all kind of fits in. Yeah.
Yeah.
So again they are very tolerant people
uh because of the background that they
have in India uh in ancient times the
Arians came in and uh the the Persians
and the Islamic people moved in. So uh
there was an amalgamation of all these
civilizations at that time and so it is
it is pretty complex but at the same
time they're very tolerant of all other
religions. Uh they they have many gods
30 million gods. Wow.
Wow.
Uh if you look at a normal family you're
talking with someone uh this person will
have uh family will have his own god
that he worships in his house. Then you
meet this person he has a whole
different god. And so there are several
different gods, several different uh
deities and in all of that they feel
Jesus is is a western god.
Uh they feel Jesus comes from the west
and then but the teachings are so strong
about Jesus uh that they also accept him
as one of the gods. So here is Jesus and
they take him and they say okay he's one
of the many gods. So they have really no
problem with Jesus and his teaching. But
uh uh but the problem is for us is when
we say he is the one true living god
that's where everything starts changing
but very tolerant folks very religious-minded
religious-minded
very god-fearing uh they have also uh
there is the supreme god that's Brahma
then there is vishnu and shiva sometimes
you feel like there's god the father god
the son god the holy spirit
and then you have the many
manifestations of uh of the deities from
these three gods and but in all these
gods the idea behind that is uh they are
all leading us back to the same god
we are all going in the same direction
maybe you have different you're coming
from different uh backgrounds with
different cultural backgrounds maybe you
come from Christianity or Islam or
Hinduism whatever or Janism or Buddhism
we are all under that umbrella we are
under that one supreme god and we are
all edited into that direction. A lot of reincarnation.
