| Darjeeling Hills Bible School
Rev. Dr Kamal Rai reports that the Darjeeling Hills Bible School, which was begun when PresAid of the Presbyterian Church of Australia through IRFA was able to raise a substantial gift through the Christmas appeal, is being redeveloped. This enabled a library and classrooms to be built which has paved the way for others to assist with other redevelopment projects. The student body has grown a little bit, but the faithful Reformed emphasis of the Bible School has been very clearly followed. There was a time when loose evangelicalism reigned supreme, but now this school is getting a reputation for being faithfully Reformed, with strong Biblical foundations, and is resolute in its desire to uphold these standards.
Rev. Dr Rai reports in the following statement that is very encouraging:
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Nepali DHBS 2014 Students with Dr Rai (R)
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Mirik is situated only three miles inside India from the eastern border of Nepal. The original missionary body that came to Mirik was World Mission Prayer League (WMPL) and when Nepal was closed to missionary work could meet hundreds people from Nepal every day who came to Mirik bazaar for shopping. They preached them the Gospel of salvation, and gave them medicines and tracts. They became very effective witnesses for Christ there. In 1954 Rev. Roy Phillip Hagen and his wife Alma came and establish Darjeeling Hills Bible School. WMPL is a Faith Mission that does not solicit fund like other missionary organizations. It follows the pattern of Hudson Taylor of Inland China Mission. All it does is to circulate prayer letters among their like-minded friends describing the needs of its mission. Whatever amount of donation it receives by the end of the month will be shared among the workers. Hence, this organization has very simple way of ministry. Perhaps because of the lack of funds the missionaries constructed simple and temporary wooden cottages in the campus. When I [Dr Rai] came to Mirik in 1982 to serve here as DHBS Principal, there was not a single permanent building in the campus. In 1994 during its fortieth anniversary we could build a small permanent building for office purpose with the financial help of WMPL. In 1998 we received ten thousand pound from TEAR FUND, London and with that amount we could build two cottages. One to be used as Principal's quarter and the other for matron's quarter. In 2002 we received a grant of Rs. 3000,000.00 from the Dawrpui Presbyterian Church of Mizoram and Mizoram Synod Mission Board for the construction of two class-room building. With that amount we laid a very strong foundation of multi-storeyed building hoping that in future God would provide fund to build other floors. After 10 years our Faithful God provided AU$ 33,000.00 from India Reformed Fellowship of the Presbyterian Church of Australia. Now we have a 3,400 sq. ft. size building with a big hall and three class rooms of 400 sq ft. each. Its picture is given below. For finishing and laying kota stones on the staircase we gratefully received US$ 10,000.00 from WMPL.
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New Classrooms and Library Facility
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On behalf of the Board of Management of the Bible School I would like to express my sincere gratitude to IRFA and Rev. Richard Wilson for this generous grant. This is the major project in our school campus and it has solved our classrooms and Library problems. Surely in near future we shall have books collected for study and reference purposes in this hall. Further, we are grateful to Rev. Richard Wilson for discovering us in this remote corner of the Himalayan belt of North-east India and helping us in our curriculum. Whenever he visits us for over a week we arrange special lectures for him to deliver on important Christian doctrines from our Reformed perspective. Both students and teachers have been benefitted by his ministry. We sorry to miss his lectures this term because of ill health but look forward to seeing him early next year. I believe that it could be mutually beneficial if some kind to memorandum of mission partnership between IRFA and DHBS was executed in near future. The second floor of this building was constructed with the donation mentioned above by the India Reformed Fellowship of the Presbyterian Church of Australia. We are planning to have the third floor also built upon. If we can make it our plan for as passed by the Mirik Municipality will be completed. We shall still need another four rooms to conduct both the regular and Special Training Programmes from time to time. This year we have started with 14 candidates. The Lord also provided US$ 23.000.00 from the Presbyterian Church South Korea through Rev. Dr. Sang Soo Jeon for the construction of a staff quarter that was demolished by the earthquake. We could complete this project. This year the church again sent another 20,000.00 for the construction of the first floor. The work is in progress now. Dr. Jeon has also promised to send another $12,000.00 in the second instalment and we hope it will be enough to complete the second floor. We are planning to use this building for teacher's quarter and boys' dorm.
We have been praying for the following needs of the Bible School. The most urgent is the celebration for the Diamond Jubilee of the Bible School on November 27, 28 and 29, 2014. On 27th and 28th there will be a two day seminar on the Mission of the Church. Rev. Dr Jeon will conduct the seminar. The last day i.e. 29th will be the Grand Finale of the Jubilee Celebration along with the 60th Graduation Exercises of the School when 18 students will receive their certificates. For this we shall need $ 10,000.00. We have received 50% of the budgeted amount from WMPL. In near future we shall need a hostel building for 50 girls, a kitchen cum dining hall and a building for general education. For these projects we shall need US$ 400,000.00. These projects have become our concern for prayer. We would like to request our friends, mission partners and well-wishers to share this concern with us.
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