Follow-up Shepherding: Khariar Road

In 2014, through a phone call from a brother, who enjoyed the ministry books distributed by Rhema and who later received the New Testament, Recovery Version, and called for the Holy Bible, Recovery Version, we visited him. Since then, the Lord has been faithfully supplying a group of brothers with the life supply through the ministry of the word. And it was this group of brothers who also left the denomination that we went to visit for a follow up shepherding.

We were welcomed and received by our brothers. Here, the burden was simply to fellowship and encourage them to go on until the time is ripe to fully establish the church. In fact, they have been practising the church life, though few in numbers, and with some brothers whose wives still need to be fully recovered. In our fellowship, we touched various practical points of life and truth. The daily and regular pursuit of the Lord in prayer, the word of God and the ministry, personally and corporately; the fellowship, blending and building up among themselves in oneness; and the functioning of all the members to shepherd the new ones as well as one another. We practically enjoyed the church life with the saints during our visit. 

We also spent time with two new ones: a Christian worker and a new believer's family. With the Christian worker, the Lord led us to share strongly on being poor in spirit and pure in heart.

Matthew 5:3Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of the heavens.
Matthew 5:8Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

For reason best known to God and to our new ones, the ministry of the word was very strong. We renounced all impure motives in the name of serving the Lord, of dreams and visions mixed with self seeking ambition and interest. We also ministered strongly on the need to be stripped off of all religious and spiritual baggages; be poor in spirit, leaving everything behind and stretching forward to the things before in pursuit of Christ and the Church; and the need to be pure in heart, and single heartedly seeking nothing but God Himself alone and His economy. After such a ministry we prayed, hoping that our Christian brother would be helped to be poor in spirit and pure in heart, and be simply a brother to blend with the saints in Khariar Road. 

The other family was a new believer's family, who were not yet baptised. To them we shared the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ with an emphasis on the regeneration and growth in life. In time, the whole family will be baptised. We leave that to the local brothers' discernment and decision. 

We also spent time with another brother who has an end time ministry background. To him, our speaking was frank and direct, charging him to drop all kind of teachings and focus only on the most important item of God’s economy: the building up of the Body of Christ until we all arrive at the oneness God so desired. 

Ephesians 4:13Until we all arrive at the oneness of the faith and of the full knowledge of the Son of God, at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

After such a strong word was ministered, he happily acknowledged the truth and accepted our nourishing shepherding. Though he is much elder to us in age and in experience, he has the heart to receive our fellowship. May the Lord blend him fully with the saints for His testimony in that locality.

As we all prayed together a strong prayer for the full recovery of the church in Khariar Road, the new ones and new localities we visited, and also for Chhattisgarh and Odisha, we also had some practical fellowship with the brothers for their weekly coming together for prayer, corporate truth pursuing with their wives, and the brothers fellowship, besides the Lord's day meeting. And having thus released our burden, we all headed back for our own localities.

Praise the Lord for the recovery of the church in Khariar Road!