PASTOR JOSEPH MOSES: OMEGA FOUNDATION, INDIA

Pastor Joseph Moses, born prematurely in a city called Guntur in South India, was not expected to live through the day. His Mom was advised by some Christian believers to pray to Jesus. She prayed with blind belief and hour by hour, day by day, she noticed change in her infant son. As he survived and grew, his mother grew in her faith in the Lord and she started attending church and later got baptized. His father initially was not receptive to his mother’s belief and used to physically abuse her for being a Christian. But every day at 4 am in the morning, she would pray for her husband and children. A few years later, her husband accepted Jesus, got baptized and the entire Moses family became Christian.

Growing up, Joseph put one foot in the Lord and the other in the world. In 1990, he got into a serious motorcycle accident and while he was hospitalized, he heard a voice say to him, “Come back to my fold”. This encounter was the turning point in Joseph’s life and he decided to leave his job and serve the Lord.

In 1993, he married Annie, a theology graduate. He soon started a home church and later planted several small churches with 15 to 20 people in various villages. Three years later, the Lord spoke to Joseph and this time called him to serve the unreachable hill tribe people of South India. At first, he rejected God’s plan due to lack of funds. Later God molded his heart at a crusade meeting where he rededicated his life to do God’s work in the tribal villages and put his complete faith in Jesus to lead him in this journey. He set up small hamlet churches in the interior mountains of South India for various tribal groups and started training youth in Bible and faith, nurturing them to be tribal pastors.

What started as a home church grew to 82 congregations, 45 tribal pastors, children’s home (HIV infected children), senior citizen’s home and teams of community workers (natural disaster relief). Joseph and Annie, with their two daughters, Fannie Joy and Joanny Sama, continue to fulfill God’s call to take the good news and compassionate care to thousands in South India.