Billy Graham Center

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Christian Family Life in India

For several decades in the 20th century, the Christian Home Committee of the National Christian Council of India was devoted to strengthening the Christian ideas of family family life among believes on the subcontinent. Beginning probably in the early 1940s and influenced by a similar program in China, the committee sponsored an annual, week long Christian Home Festival. It also distributed literature that families could use for daily worship and Bible study together. The festival was intended not only to show families how to have devotions together, but to encourage them to play together, jointly plan their lives around Christian principles, and find ways to serve the church and larger community. A 1967 planning booklet listed the reasons for the festival as:

1. Focuses the attention of the congregation on the family as a unit.
2. Makes the family conscious of its life as a family rather than as individuals.
3. Awakens individuals to their responsibilities to their home.
4. Makes the family fully conscious of its house and surroundings and awakens a desire for simple improvements.
5. Helps each family become a Christian witness in its community.
6. Draws families together into the larger family of the church.

Listed below are links to several of these handbills from Collection 177 in the Archives of the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton Collection. All these items come from Folder 12 in Box 8 of that collection. None of the handbills are dated, but are probably from sometime in the 1940s-1960s. The artist is usually not identified.

Scenes from the life of Jesus Christ
	The birth of Jesus
	The birth of Jesus
	The Holy Family: Mary, Jesus, Joseph
	Mary, with Jesus on her lap and John the Baptist standing by her side
	The Crucifixion
The Christian family having devotions together
	"Our Father..." by Ismena R. Warren
	Mine Heritage (Psalm 119:111)
	Scene 1 (a photograph)
	Scene 2 (Notice Warner Sallman print hanging on wall.)
Scenes from contemporary Christian life in India by A. David
	When sweeping the floor, I pray Thee, Lord, sweep from my heart all evil and make it clean.
	When buying oil, I pray Thee, Lord, to give wisdom like the wise virgins, who had oil ready in their vessels.
	When opening the door, I pray Thee Lord, to open the door of my heart, that I may receive Thee, Lord, within.
	When drawing water, I pray thee, Lord, to give me Living Water that I may never thirst.
	I pray Thee, Lord, to send through me Thy messages of love to lonely hearts.
	When lighting the lamp, I pray Thee, Lord, let Thy true light shine within my heart and make me in all I do to be kind and good like a lamp which lightens others.