Church Blending

Last Friday, the 22nd of March, the Lord blessed the church through the visitation of a brother from the United States. Though he came mainly for the full time training classes , he could spent a night with the church in Gurugram for fellowship. His coming enabled us to arrange for a meeting for the church.

Though I was a little reluctanct about having a big meeting when a brother proposed for one, as I considered convinience rather than opportunity. My initial thought was to take this brother to one of the home meetings. But if that be the case, only those who attend that home meeting would benefit it. I thank the Lord for my brother who had the insight for the church's benefit. So, in coordination, we made some arrangment.

The meeting was well attended by mostly young people and some new families. The Lord's speaking through our brother was also very simple yet very apt. The burden was on eating the Lord as the living bread as the Lord presented Himself as such in Mathew 15:21-28. It is by eating the Lord Jesus as the Bread that we can live a normal Christian life. The best way to live a normal Christian life is by eating the Lord Jesus as the living Bread, not by religiously trying to live a Christian life. The saints were strenghtened, and much more we got the opporotunity to be blended together. This simple yet touching message was the Lord's speaking to the church. Then we all enjoyed our lovefeast together.

The meeting also coincides with seven college students visiting the city of Gurgaon, the friends of a brother in the church. It was also an opportunity for these new students to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ, perhaps, for the first time in their lives. The way to eat the Lord by calling upon His Name was just the right gospel message. Everyone calling the Name of the Lord is the best way to receive the Lord! All these new ones had the opportunity to call on the Lord's Name, the best gospel message ever, leading people to call on the Lord's Name!

Prasie the Lord for this wonderful time of church blending! More fellowship, more reality of the Body life.

Family Fellowship

Having been burdened by the Lord, I have started a regular family fellowship in different forms. One way is of coming together every morning for morning revival and every night for family night prayer. Besides, occasional face to face fellowship, as and when the need arises. Now, another way is by making use of all the latest technology for fellowship. The best tool now is WhatsApp. In fact, I created a family group called "Our Family." And gradually this group is being filled with family members, mostly Christians. The Lord also burdened me to supply life through the word of God now and then in a way of posts; posting words of love and encouragement to pursue the Lord. Sometimes, the ministry of the word, sometimes Bible verses, and sometimes words of exhortation. 

Though we have been saved from eternal perdition by faith in Christ Jesus, we must also be saved from the present evil age; from the world, religion, and other contaminating things. It is with this burden that such a family fellowship group is being created and taken care. I also apply the verse for household salvation to our family fellowship.

And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you shall be saved, you and your household. Acts 16:31 

I reckon this verse as believe on the Lord Jesus, you and your household shall be saved from religion and denominations into the church life. The same faith that I have for the salvation of my unbelieving family members is the same faith for the salvation of the saved believers too; to be built up as the Bride of Christ. May the Lord bless our family.

As the banner for the group is But as for me and my house, we will serve Jehovah. Joshua 24:15 so is my burden for the whole family that we all may serve Jehovah in whatever way we can and wherever the Lord placed us.

Lord bless our family!

Ten Years of Bliss

The 27th of February was the tenth birthday of our eldest daughter Bliss. It was hard to imagine how time flew. Ten years have elapsed since she was born! The Lord rightly gave us a name for her, Bliss. It has indeed been a decade of bliss under the grace and blessing of the Lord Jesus Christ. Frankly, I have known no burden as far as family is concerned because the Lord blessed our family to the extent that all things are taking place in its own time. I simply have trusted and still have to trust in what He has in store for us. All these years have indeed been years of blessing and blissful joy. Praise the Lord!

As a father, I wanted to dine with my family on that day, so we went out for her favorite pizza. Though it was my night of fasting and prayer, the day was a day of prayer and feasting. I would not be bound by any law. I would fast when it is needed and feast when it is needed. This way, life is really enjoyable. A life in Christ, a life led by the Spirit, a normal Christian life, is a life of bliss with joy and peace.

Besides the Lord's blessing of our family life in bliss, I and my wife have also have been enjoying a married life in ease and peace. When Bliss was born we have been married for two years already. Our marriage life is on the twelveth year. What was out of God, and is through God, will always be unto God. Time and again the Lord has proved His faithfulness in leading us in our family life. All outward situations any human being on earth needs to go through, we still go through. In the midst of it, we have been experiencing the Lord's bountiful supply of grace and blessing within and without. 

Praise the Lord for Bliss and all these years of bliss!

Church Trainings

As the church, the Lord has graced us with a time of training; a video training on the Crystallization-study of Leviticus. I am personally blessed with the training and much more, witnessing the saints entering into the Lord's speaking as we all attended the video-training gave me immense joy. I was especially joyful in seeing the new ones studying the word of God diligently. This time, the book of Leviticus is on "training." I need training, we need training, and everyone needs training. 

I appreciate this speaking of the brother Ron Kangas so much. I quoted verbatim:

The title of this message is “God Training His People to Worship and Partake of Him and to Live a Holy, Clean, and Rejoicing Life.” The title of this message is also the subject of the first banner, which reads, “Through His speaking in the Tent of Meeting, God trained His people to worship and partake of Him and to live a holy, clean, and rejoicing life.”

The first matter here is God’s training of His people. In Exodus 25:8 Jehovah said to Moses, “Let them make a sanctuary for Me that I may dwell in their midst.” God commanded that a sanctuary, the tabernacle, the Tent ofMeeting, be built on the earth according to the pattern that He would prescribe. God did this because His intention was to enter into that sanctuary and dwell in the midst of His people. God cannot deny what He is. He is holy, He is righteous, He is pure, He is light, and He is love. Now He is coming to dwell in the midst of His people, and that requires a great deal of training by God directly so that His people would know how to be with Him. 

Indeed, the Lord trains us by and through His speaking. Some twenty of us registered for the training in combination with the churches in NCR. We were about 110 in attendance. The ambiance and the aura were amazing. The Lord's speaking was so rich, I can just praise Him for all His grace and faithfulness in training us by His speaking. New lights, new revelations, not merely as teachings, but as life supply has been graced to us daily. What a blessing!

Even as we are praying and asking the Lord for His increase in us and through us, the best way He can achieve this is by His training us through His speaking again and again.We are so blessed that we are on the right track. Besides this particular speaking of the Lord in such training as this, the Lord also trains us in the basic practices of the God-ordained way. As the church, we have been pursuing the Lord in morning revival, Bible reading, prayer meetings, home meetings, group meetings, and the churches' weekly meetings. To me, these are all the processes God use to train us. By such training, the Lord may gain His heart's desire.

Saints' Perfecting

The Lord is gaining momentum in the church in our locality. Both brothers and sisters are growing in life and in function. Our burden is to perfect all the saints and make them all pillars for the Lord's testimony. So we would grasp every opportunity to learn and be perfected for the Lord's sake. Therefore, we are coordinating with the church in New Delhi for the perfecting training of the brothers.

This year, the Lord has sanctified nine brothers for the five months long perfecting training. I was especially glad for the reasons that many more young brothers are being perfected and I also got the opportunity to learn along with my fellow brothers. Besides, the young brothers are experiencing a drastic change in their lives; I believe the Lord is beginning to answer the prayers we have been offering for all the saints in the church. Things which seemed impossible few months ago are now taking shape. To cite a few of them:

The three brothers who are living with our family are functioning very well. From physical responsibility to spiritual responsibility they are growing up and picking up the burden to practice the God-ordained way of being revived through prayer and the word of God, preaching the gospel, shepherding the new ones, and functioning in the meetings. 

Another brother who stayed away from the church life for many years is beginning to experience a drastic change in his life. Once he was not even ready for any kind of fellowship, now he is coming daily for morning prayer and life-study pursuit. To help him, I also gave him some IT lessons to learn.

From the sisters' side too, they paired themselves up as prayer partners, formed sisters' group, prayed and pursued the truths together, and are actively functioning in the church's activities. In fact, in one of our gospel preachings, sisters met a Chinese businessman who was introduced to me, and who later received the Lord and got baptised!

These are still the very beginning. I better not count the chickens before it even hatched. Yet, I am being encouraged to love the Lord more; our labor in the Lord in prayer, in preaching, and in shepherding will never go in vain.

The Lord's burden in Ephesians 4:11-13 must be fulfilled, and this is our burden too. "And He Himself gave some as apostles and some as prophets and some as evangelists and some as shepherds and teachers, for the perfecting of the saints unto the work of the ministry, unto the building up of the Body of Christ, until 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."

Looking to the Lord for more perfecting.

Brothers' Visit

Last month I was especially graced with the honour of being able to fellowship with two brothers, one week after the other. Blending with the saints and enjoying mutual supply of life to one another.

The first one is from Taiwan, who used to co-worked with us here in India. As he came to take classes in the full-time training, I could fellowship with him in his free time. The most joyful part was our visit to a family. In fact, this family happened to be the family whose first contact with us in the church in Gurgaon was through this Taiwan brother who distributed tract almost a decade ago in HUDA Sector 56 market. Later that tract, The Mystery of Human Life, became the key for him to meet the saints, study the truths, and eventually come into the church life, though it took him at least two years. In this family, brother shared about his testimony of salvation from Buddhism and also a particular testimony of his wife who from her childhood had been praying for about twenty years to marry a temple's owner son with a burden to turn the idol temple into a meeting hall of the church in his locality. That girls' prayer was fulfilled as she married this brother, and later, the temple was used for church meeting hall.

Another brother was from the church in Fremont, California, USA. He was on his business tour to India, and on his flight transit, he could visit us for group meeting and fellowship. I was with him all the while and enjoyed the joy of hospitality, though I am still learning to give hospitality. This brother, though a businessman, is burdened for the gospel. When he visited us few years ago, we went preaching the gospel together one Saturday in a park where we could lead about three people to salvation. He has the heart of a serving one and the fire of the gospel too. 

The speciality about these brothers' visit was that I could take them to the families that need shepherding. Visitation from different part of the world and fellowshipping on the word of God with the same vision and burden brings about the experience of the one new man in a sweeter and practical way. This is one reason why I would catch every opportunity to fellowship with whoever the Lord would bring to our locality.

Looking forward to the Lord to send more saints to visit the local church in our locality.

Prayer and Prayer

Prayer and prayer is my burden these days. Prayer, not merely to ask God or intercede for matters, but much more to fellowship with the Lord and be one spirit with Him. Of course, there are many burdens within me that I would pour out in prayer. And for this reason, I spent time with my family morning and evening for family prayer, with the serving ones every morning before the day's office works, besides my own personal prayer. There are many things the Lord burdened me for, and most of which I can only pray for, therefore, I am burdened just to pray and pray, and I enjoyed prayer so much, especially the corporate prayer.

The Lord is faithful and merciful in that He started answering the prayers one by one. In fact, the first beneficiary is my family and myself as we have the privilege to pray. The very act of prayer is the benefit of prayer. Though we are thankful to the Lord for the answered prayers too, the best part of it is the very act of prayer. And much more, we enjoyed being man of prayer. It is even my wish and prayer for my parent and the senior saints that they would be graced to pray and pray, carrying out the most important ministry- the ministry of prayer, especially at the latter part of their lives. 

If the Lord would grace me long life, I wish that in the latter part of my life, I would fully resort to the prayer ministry of the church; praying for the Lord's move, praying for the saints, seekers, and sinners, and much more for the Lord's purpose to be fulfilled on this earth and for Him to come back soon! In fact, every night in our family prayer, this is our prayer for our parents.

O the joy of prayer! Grace me Lord, to pray and pray and pray... Not merely for answers but much more for prayer itself.