The Global Church in Action
by John Teilhet
The Global Church—believers worldwide working as one body to glorify God and encourage one another—sounds abstract until you see it in action. How exactly can believers in our country impact those on the other side of the world, or they impact us?
In October, I had the opportunity to explore this question firsthand by traveling to Nepal with Hope Over Crisis (HOC), founded by my friend Grant Parker. Grant and his wife Megan have extensive experience working in some of the church’s most challenging environments—places that are inhospitable due to environmental extremes, political instability, cultural barriers, or religious persecution.
Their observations led to a key insight: even in crisis-stricken regions, Christ is actively working and the church remains vibrantly alive. Furthermore, crisis creates unique opportunities for the local church to demonstrate Christ’s hope to their community. This understanding became the foundation for Hope Over Crisis—an organization that strategically uses the Global Church to build and support local church networks in difficult regions like Nepal.
I’ve been involved with HOC for two years as a board advisor. While I understood their distinctive approach and had even participated in rebuilding a North Carolina church after Hurricane Helene, I’d only heard secondhand accounts of the work in Nepal and Pakistan. I knew the Nepalese team had successfully created several Crisis Response Networks—collaborative groups of small local churches that coordinate community responses after disasters. HOC had also been involved in supporting the Hope Bible Institute, developed to train Nepalese pastors.
My trip coincided with a previously planned training seminar for several of HOC’s Crisis Response Networks. However, the region’s volatility became apparent even before departure. A month prior, youth uprisings had overthrown the government in demands for better leadership—several government buildings were ransacked and the Hilton hotel was set ablaze. The instability continued: during a layover in Amsterdam, we learned of significant flooding in Kathmandu that would ultimately prevent most pastors from attending.
Despite these setbacks, the trip proved incredibly enlightening. Kathmandu sits among the Himalayan Mountain Range—in fact, many mountaineers prepare there for their Everest summit attempts. The landscape was beautiful. The people, even in the aftermath of political upheaval and the presence of armed guards, proved kind and friendly. The market was an overwhelming and rich environment I could have spent an entire day exploring.
More significantly, I observed HOC’s involvement in the local church firsthand. I met and spent time with HOC’s Nepalese staff who are responsible for finding and connecting local pastors and churches to create the Crisis Response Networks. I shared a meal with several CRN pastors and listened to their stories and gratitude for being affirmed and strengthened by HOC and each other. Most importantly, I witnessed the tangible effect of that sometimes intangible idea of the Global Church.
For more information, please visit hopeovercrisis.org.
