By Gustav Krös
04/09/2025
Nepal is probably best known as the home of Mount Everest, the highest mountain on Earth. In fact, with the Himalaya Mountains stretching out across Nepal, eight of the ten highest peaks in the world can be found in the country. This is not only a testimony to the Lord’s creative wonders, but it also makes the country a magnet for mountaineers, trekkers and adventure enthusiasts.
A 2013 report by the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, however, brought Nepal into the limelight for a different reason: as the country with the fastest-growing church in the world. According to their study, the country had seen an annual growth rate within the church of 10.9% since 1970.
Over the past 12 years, this scenario has changed, however, with a Global Christian Relief article from February 2025 showing that Nepal no longer falls within the top twenty countries in the world where Christianity is growing the fastest.
Today, the country has an estimated population of 31 million, with Hinduism being the largest religion, followed by 81.3% of the population. Buddhism is followed by 9%, Islam 4.4%, the indigenous Kirat faith by 3%, and, depending on the source, Christianity makes up between 1.4–1.8% of the population. If the Christian population is 1.8% of the 31 million people, the total Christian population would be 558,000 people, but a recent study has shown that the Christian population is even more than that.
From August 2020 until July 2022, the Nepal Christian Society conducted a National Christian Community Survey and registered 683,261 Christians across the country. This makes the percentage of Christians an estimated 2.2%. While this is encouraging and we celebrate the remarkable Church growth between 1970–2013, it is clear that there’s still a lot of work to be done in proclaiming the Gospel to every people group in Nepal.
With regards to this, the Joshua Project states that the country has a total of 227 people groups, of which 215 are still considered unreached. Their definition of an unreached people group reads as follows: less than or equal to 5% Christian Adherent AND less than or equal to 2% Evangelical. An unreached or least-reached people group is one among whom there is no indigenous community of believing Christians with adequate numbers and resources to evangelise this people group without outside assistance.
To help us gain a better understanding of the current state of the Church in Nepal, we received feedback from three different friends of INcontext who serve in Nepal. They report that there is still exciting Church growth taking place, but the numbers are no longer as high as in 2013 due to the anti-conversion law that was implemented in October 2017.
A Local Nepali missionary states that: “Church growth has been ongoing because new people are coming to faith in Jesus Christ, but it is growing more slowly because nowadays church people cannot share Gospel openly.” With the 2017 legislation prohibiting the conversion of people from one religion to another, and the possibility of being imprisoned if found guilty, most Christians have taken a more cautious approach to sharing the Gospel.
Even though this has had an impact on the rate at which the Church is growing, the work continues, and even with a more cautious approach there are still testimonies being shared of people coming to Christ due to miraculous healings taking place when Christians pray for unbelievers.
One of our friends shared about a business that was established by Christians for the purpose of providing work for prostitutes to give them an alternative income and help them change their lifestyle. This initiative has been so successful, that people no longer want to send their family members to work at this business, because it has become known that everyone who works there becomes Christian.
When asked about the greatest need for Christians in Nepal, all three of our friends responded with the need for discipleship. Our Nepali missionary friend said: “The greatest need is giving discipleship training to believers at church, to make them strong in faith in Jesus Christ.” Another friend stated: “The greatest need is for the Church to be properly trained. Church leaders and the Church need to be properly trained. There’s a big need for men to walk in holiness and godliness before God. Men who can handle the Word correctly. Men who don’t run alone but has a Biblical eldership, so that churches don’t split, and so that when they do church planting the people are sent out as mature believers into areas to plant churches.”
Part of the need for proper discipleship is the spread of the prosperity gospel in the country and church leaders being ill-equipped to address it and other false teachings. Together with this, poverty is a major obstacle that the Church is dealing with, that leads to different challenges. One of these challenges is the splitting of churches. Some believers see the church as an avenue to receive an income. Once they feel they have a proper understanding of the Word of God, they break away from the church and start their own congregation with the hope of making a living in this way.
Due to Nepal’s high poverty rate, many people leave the country in search of work, with an estimated 3.5 million Nepalis working outside the country. The most popular countries include India, Malaysia, Australia, the USA, the UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. This has led to churches closing due to too many people leaving. At the same time, this has caused an ‘epidemic’ of fatherlessness, with testimonies shared of villages with almost no men left. This father-vacuum leads to an imbalance in households and often to marriage problems, ultimately damaging the Christian witness of people.
Other challenges for the Church include the honour-and-shame culture, where it is not always easy for people to be open about what they are struggling with, and, as in India, there is still a big struggle in rural areas to get rid of the caste systems within the church once people have converted. Together with this, there is also the increase of persecution since the anti-conversion law was implemented, which has led to radical Hindu groups being emboldened to intimidate Christians at their homes and at their churches.
But in the midst of all these challenges, there is also breakthroughs and a lot to be thankful for. During the survey that was done by the Nepal Christian Society, it was found that there are now churches in all 77 of Nepal’s districts. Within the context of reaching the remaining 215 unreached people groups in the country, it is greatly encouraging to know that there are churches in every district of the country to take this process forward. Together with this, there are wonderful testimonies coming to the forefront of believers and congregations growing in maturity.
This is displayed by the fact that churches are no longer only concerned about gathering on Sundays, but they are getting involved in their local communities, growing a heart for the lost, and getting more actively involved in reaching the unreached.
There’s also great excitement regarding the Nepali diaspora, not only with more people coming to faith in the countries where they go to work, but also in how effective they share the Gospel within the countries and communities where they end up. We can see that even with the poverty in Nepal driving many people from their country in search for work, the Lord has also used this to send many Christian Nepalis to countries like India, Malaysia, the UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia to live out their Christian witness within these unreached areas, contributing to the harvest being brought in within these countries.
Please join us in prayer:
- For the Church in Nepal to continue to invest in discipleship training and to continue to grow in maturity.
- That the Lord will continue to grow the hearts of the believers in Nepal to reach the unreached within their country.
- That the Lord will use the Christian Nepali diaspora in a mighty way to bring in the harvest in the nations to which He has sent them.
Resources:
https://www.state.gov/reports/2023-report-on-international-religious-freedom/nepal/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_religion_in_Nepal
https://joshuaproject.net/countries/NP
https://joshuaproject.net/help/definitions#unreached
https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/countries/nepal/#people-and-society
National Christian Community Survey by the Nepal Christian Society
https://www.mideq.org/en/inequalities/inequalities-resources/nepal-brief/
