It was a chilly morning in the land of the “Thunder Dragon” as we got into the rented car with our now good friend,  and another young Bhutanese man who was to be our driver.

Both men were elegantly dressed in their traditional ghos, brightly colored striped, hand-woven outfits that were belted at the waist and worn to right below the knee. The gho is the mandatory dress for professional men in this tiny Buddhist country, mandated by the King himself. The outfit is worn with dark black knee high socks during the cold winter months until a specified day in the springtime when all men were required to go bare legged!

My coworker and I had just finished a three- day training of Bridges for Women with twenty-seven participants. We had been overwhelmed as we listened for a full hour and a half to the women’s moving evaluations of the training. It was hard not to cry as the women, many of whom were non-literates, began to share their hearts as they understood for the first time their own potential to be able to minister to their family and friends through their memorized Oral Bible stories.

Today’s outing was to be a much needed day of rest and a chance for us to see the country- side of Bhutan. The car was filled with contemporary Christian praise music blaring from the CD player. It was sung in English by well- known Western artists, which seemed a little surreal in such a “closed to the Gospel” country as Bhutan. Yet we realized that it only confirmed the ever noticeable growing influence of the West, even here in this last surviving Buddhist monarchy located at the foot of the Himalayas.

As we drove I asked our friend if he would tell us his story of how he became a Christian in a country where less than one half percent of the population are professing Christians. He began a lengthy story of his wife and her incurable illness that had occurred after the birth of their first son.

Our friend told us of how he had gone to Hindu holy men and had to purchase magical amulets to place around his wife’s neck in hope they would heal her sickness. He had spent most of their savings giving offerings to the Buddhist monks so they would offer prayers for her healing. Then finally in desperation he had visited an old Christian woman who lived in their village to see if perhaps her God would have the power to do something. When he asked the woman what he would need to do to obtain favor from her God she had simply said, “confess your sins.” He told us he left her home angry, indignant and unrepentant because he was a proud man who was highly respected due to his important position as the administrator of the school in the area.

Weeks later as his wife was nearing death he humbled himself and took his wife with him back to the home of the Christian woman. There they both confessed their sins and accepted Jesus as their Lord. Instantly his wife was healed!

Within a few weeks of their conversion and his wife’s miraculous healing the Buddhist villagers having found out of his conversion to Christianity had him fired from his job. Penniless and desperate they moved to anew city . A former colleague had mercy on them and offered him a job to support his family.

God began to speak to our friend that he wanted him to start a house church there in the city. In obedience to that call of God on his life many hundreds of former Bhutanese Buddhists have come to know the Lord.

After having finished his story in the car our young driver turned to him and said, ”I want to confess. I want to become a Christian!”

For the rest of the day as we drove around the winding, narrow mountain roads we listened as our young driver soaked up the words of God. The next day he was the first to come forward in the house church meeting “to confess”.

The next morning he arrived to drive us to the airport to catch our flight back to India. As we got out of the car he said to me, ”Pray for me. Next year when you return my wife and I will be strong Christians. She is ready to confess as well.”

Even now as I write this I am crying as I think of his face, radiant with the joy of the Lord. As he drove away I could hear the music from the Christian praise CD pouring from his car window. It was a gift to him from our friend. But this young man’s last words to us there at the airport were God’s precious gift to us.

“If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth. But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all wickedness.”

I John 1: 8-9 (NLT)