Unless the Lord...

No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up in the last day. (John 6:44, RecVer)

Unless Jehovah builds the house, Those who build it labor in vain. Unless Jehovah keeps the city, The guard watches in vain. It is vain for you to rise up early, To stay up late, To eat the bread of toil; All the same, He gives to His beloved while they sleep. (Psalms 127:1-2, RecVer)

Unless the Lord draws men to Himself, who am I to draw man to God? Unless the Lord gains people, who am I to gain people for the Lord? I have tried a lot, I have labored a lot, but all to no vail. Now, the Lord has taught me this important lesson, I can do nothing except what the Lord does.

I have been preaching the gospel weekly. I have have shepherding a handful of new ones weekly. I have also been trying to gain them to the Lord and also for the church life. But all my efforts seem to fissle out as a punctured tyre losing it's function. The more air I tied to pump in, the stronger the pressure of the leakage. I have now come to a conclusion that if only the Lord so wills, then only all these news ones under my shepherding care would be gained by the Lord for His church. But as of now, I must do only what I can do, shepherd them. Even that shepherding is just to the extend that they are open to me. I cannot insert my zeal and burden either. I have no choice but to do only what the Lord allows me to do.

I have a list of 10 names who I have been shepherding weekly. Some face to face, some over the phone, some I visited, and some visited me. I can only shepherd them according to how much they are open to me and gave me time. I cannot do anything more than that. Even if I tried to exert some force to do beyond what I should do, it only resulted in disappointment. So I have learned my lesson to trust the Lord in shepherding and not to unnecessarily bogged down when I did not get my expected response. 

Just do what you can. After all, it is the Lord who draws man to Himself. Unless He draws, I must not. Unless He builds, I must not. O what a spiritual lesson! 

I kind of learn this the hard way after much struggle for so many years trying to gain people for the Lord and for His church. When the Lord draws people, they simply come. It does not require any of my input unless He leads me so. There are a couple of families that came to the Lord, got baptised, and are now in the church life in Gurugram in a very simple way without must effort from our side or their side. Whom the Lord draws, they just come. Yet there are also other families who have been struggling for years to come into the church life despite my "burdened" efforts to bring them in. No matter how hard I tried, they still would not come. Simply because, the Lord has not drawn them yet. Perhaps, He will draw all of them in His way and in His time. I simply must learn to cowork with God and not go beyond what He intents to do.

Recently, I tried to visit a brother's family for shepherding, but he never responded positively. He even seemed to avoid me. So, I simply prayed and prayed for his family. Then, last Lord’s day, he himself called and invited me for a dinner lovefeast at his new home in Gurugram. Then, we visited and had a wonderful time of shepherding fellowship over dinner lovefeast.

What a release to learn this lesson! What a rest not to unnecessarily struggle! Lord, unless You draw man to Yourself and to Your church, I must not.

Fear God!

And now, O Israel, what does Jehovah your God ask of you except that you fear Jehovah your God so that you would walk in all His ways and love Him and serve Jehovah your God with all your heart and with all your soul. Deuteronomy 10:12

Twenty one years ago on 1st January 2003, the Lord spoke to me using this Bible verse after a whole night of fasting and prayer and after over a month of praying concerning the Lord's perfect will for my life. It was this speaking of the Lord that directed my life to fully consecrate my whole life absolutely to the Lord to live and serve Him. The Lord has been faithful and ture to His calling. He has been preserving me till today. The ministry of the word succinctly explains what this verse means. I quote verbatim here below.

The renewed training by God was His charge to His people in nine matters:

A. We must fear the Lord; to fear the Lord is to be in fear of offending Him, of losing His pres ence, and of not receiving Him as our reward in the next age; we should be in fear of missing the Lord’s smile in this age and His reward in the next—Prov. 1:1, 7; Eph. 4:30; 2 Cor. 5:9-10.

B. We must walk in God’s ways; whatever God is, is a way to us; hence, to take what God is as our ways and walk in these ways is to live God, to live Christ; to take Christ as our way is to live Him, and to live Him is to express Him, to magnify Him—John 14:6;

Phil. 1:19-21a.

C. We must love the Lord Jesus, who is our God (John 20:28); because God loves us and has set His affection on us (Deut. 10:15; Jer. 31:3), we should love Him in return by setting our affec tion on Him (1 Cor. 2:9).

D. We must love and serve God with all our heart and all our soul; our heart is linked to our spirit, for our conscience, which is a function of our spirit (Rom. 9:1), is also a function of our heart (Heb. 10:22); thus, to love and serve God with all our heart and soul indicates that we love and serve Him also with our spirit (Rom. 1:9), which is a spirit of love (2 Tim. 1:7).

E. We must keep His commandments and statutes for our good; this means that today we need to keep Christ as the reality of God’s commandments and the riches of Christ that have been ministered to us so that we may be blessed—Deut. 10:13.

Exceprt from "Laboring on the All-inclusive Christ Typified by the Good and for the Building Up of the Church as the Body of Christ, for the Reality and the Manifestation of the Kingdom, and for the Bride to Make Herself Ready for the Lord's Coming" Message 2.

While dwelling on this verse, my focus was mostly in loving and serving Him. I did not see much on the phrase "fear Him". These days, the Lord has been speaking again and again on the spiritual significances of fearing God. To fear the Lord is to be in fear of offending Him, of losing His presence; we should be in fear of missing the Lord’s smile. In everything I do and say or even think, I must have the reverend fear of the Lord and not be loose. I dare not think, say, or do anything that would offend the Lord. I must be so exercised not to lose God’s presence and His smile. My life these days has been controlled by this "fear of God."

Last Lord's day, I recited the Bible verse Deuteronomy 10:12 and prophesied on the same with an emphasis on fear God. I released the burden for myself and also for all the saints to fear God. God sees all, knows all, and understands all. I must look to the Lord for grace that I may have the proper fear of God all the time. I shared the same to a couple whom my wife and I visited last Lord’s day night how the fear of God within me delivered me from participating in the evil intent of my teenager friends some thirty years ago. Last night, I shared the same burden to a group of believers from Madhya Pradesh in an online meeting. The Lord anointed His words and the burden was released. This was the message the Lord gave me these days.

Now therefore if I have found favor in Your sight, please let me know now Your ways, that I may know You, so that I may continue to find favor in Your sight. Consider also that this nation is Your people. And He said, My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest. And he said to Him, If Your presence does not go with us, do not bring us up from here. (Exodus 33:13-15, RecVer)

When Moses asked God His ways, God simply replied, "My presence shall go either you." The presence of God is God's way. Once we have His presence, we will walk in His ways, which is Christ as the way today. If this be the case, we will love the Lord and serve Him with all our heart and soul. Everything stem from God’s presence. God's presence means everything in my Christian life, church life, and service life.

I echo what Moses told the Lord, if Your presence does not go with me, do not take me anywhere.

Lord, preserve me in the fear of God all the days of my life. Lord, preserve me in Your sweet presence all the time. Deliver me from anything that would offend You. Lord, grace me Your presence day by day.

Fellowship: Family Bonding

God blesses me with everything I need to fulfill His purpose. The family He gave me is for Him. He is the Father of our family and we are His children. All that we are, all that we have, and all that we will be, are all for His divine purpose. 

For in Him we live and move and are, as even some poets among you have said, For we are also His race. (Acts 17:28, RecVer)

Because out from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen. (Romans 11:36, RecVer)

God's gift and blessing are what makes my family. He gave me, and I treasure it. It is now my responsibility to nurture His gift, my family. To do so, I have established a daily family prayer time. The Lord has been gracing us till today to pray as a family, daily. Though we missed sometimes due to unavoidable circumstances, but only a very few times. While at home or on the move, I do my best to pray together with my family. Over the years we have made changes as per the need. Sometimes, we just pray, sometimes with singing, and now with a reading of the Life-study portion. 

Gradually, I have been witnessing the Lord’s answering most of the prayers we have been praying. Especially, with the recovery of some of our family members who are not in fellowship in the church life. Now, whoever we have been praying for, the Lord has been gaining them one by one, even family by family.

To further strengthen our family fellowship and bond, the Lord burdened me to fellowship and pray with my niece once in a month personally. Then with my daughter once in a week, with my son daily, and with youngest daughter now and then. Of course, with my wife every now and then. With my niece, we would read a lesson from the shepherding materials, prayer read a verse or two, and fellowship on personal and practical matters. With my daughter, we would spend time to talk and fellowship about her life and studies, and then pray. With my son, a specific time of corporate prayer and fellowship, strengthening our father-son relationship. I even told my son to feel free to open up to me for any matter whatsoever. I fixed thirty minutes daily with my son, the first half we have our own personal prayer and the second half we pray together. With my youngest daughter, since she is still too young, just a time together partly prayer and partly playing. With my wife, we fellowshop and prau for all important family matters and sometimes personal ones too. In this way, the Lord has been leading me to build up the family life He blessed me with.

All this is also with the view that 's a family we can all serve the Lord, to a channel of blessing to others, and also bear the Lord’s testimony as a family. 

And if it seems wrong in your sight to serve Jehovah, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve, either the gods from across the River, whom your fathers served, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve Jehovah. (Joshua 24:15, RecVer)

Lord, thank You for my family. Continue to bless us for Your divine purpose.

Extra Oil

Last week, a brother's family invited me to visit them after a long long gap. Perhaps, over two/three years. Since there are brothers who are taking care of this family I deemed it best that those nearby can take care of this family. Therefore, I intentionally did not visit them as I used to. 

A few weeks ago, the father of the family had a serious health issue which was attended to by the saints who lives nearby. Though I was informed of the health issues, I decided to stay back and pray for the family. In fact, as a family and the church, we prayed for the father of the family. I was waiting for the proper time to meet the family.

The time finally came, and after a long long time indeed, my wife and I visited the family. As we fellowshipped about the family's situation, especially the father's health condition, the Lord gave me a burden to fellowship on the family's spiritual health condition. The instant words the Lord gave me was, "extra oil." Therefore, we had a wonderful time of fellowship on our need to wait for the Lord’s return and while doing so, we must have the extra oil by paying the price.

For the foolish, when they took their lamps, did not take oil with them; But the prudent took oil in their vessels with their lamps. (Matthew 25:3-4, RecVer)

Today, we must take care of our normal Christian life. Salvation is free but for the reward, we must pay the price to buy extra oil to be able to receive the reward. Daily, hourly, we must pay the price to buy oil. Daily, we must exercise to gain the extra Oil, the Spirit, to fill our spirit all the time. No one can pay the price and buy the oil for me. Nor can I, for anyone else. Each one has to bear his own burden. Each will be judged or rewarded. So, we must be prudent to pay the price to buy the golden oil, the Holy Spirit.

I released my burden of encouraging myself and all the saints present in the meeting to pay the price to buy the extra oil by taking care of our daily living. I also emphasized the need for the church life for our Christian life to grow. One important practical point is to be filled with the word of God in our mind by spending as much time as possible to read the Bible, pray over the word of God, spend time to pray daily, and pursue the Lord in all possible ways. Though I did not specifically told the saints to come to the church meeting, the sister of the family declared on her own that once her dad is getting better they would physically come to the Lord’s table meeting regularly. Later, we all prayed together and sought the Lord’s grace to be prudent virgins paying the praise to buy the extra oil.

But the prudent answered, saying, Perhaps there will not be enough for us and for you; go rather to those who sell, and buy for yourselves. (Matthew 25:9, RecVer)

Yesterday, in the online meeting with the seekers from Madhya Pradesh, the Lord gave me the same burden of the need to buy extra oil to be filled with the Spirit in our soul. For this, the price includes dealing with the world, denying the self, taking up the cross, loving the Lord, and following Him. There may be other ways of paying the price too. Whichever way, the price must be paid to buy the extra oil. This is the normal Christian life of laboring on Christ to gain the extra oil and to be transformed in the soul to gain the reward. This is also the way to make ourselves ready for the Lord’s coming.

Watch therefore, for you do not know the day nor the hour. (Matthew 25:13, RecVer)

Be Fruitful and Multiply

And God said to him, I am the All-sufficient God: Be fruitful and multiply; A nation and a company of nations shall come from you, And kings shall come forth from your loins. (Genesis 35:11, RecVer)

In the beginning of this new year the Lord’s speaking to me has been, "Be fruitful and multiply." I trust in the Lord’s word and His promises. To me, this promise is related to my personal life and also the church life I am in. I must be fruitful in fruit bearing. And as the church, we must be fruitful in gaining increase in number. This has been one thing personally and corporately as the church we have to see the promise of God being fulfilled. Having said that, I am also aware that without the blessing of the All-sufficient God, we cannot be fruitful and multiply. We need the all-inclusive blessing of the all-sufficient God.

It takes the exercise of much faith to believe the promise of the Lord. Looking at my situation I feel completely hopeless. Yet, looking up to the Lord I am completely hopeful. This time, I must believe in the Lord’s word rather than my own feeling and assumption. For the past many years I have been struggling to bear fruit as I ought to, and I think I am still struggling. Though I have been regularly and weakly going out to preach the gospel, I feel the result is yet to be seen. Everytime I went out to preach the gospel, the Lord graced me to preach the gospel to at least one. In fact, many times to as many as five contacts. Yet, the gaining of remaining fruit seems still a distant dream. Though I may be discouraged at times, I still must be faithful to the Lord’s commission. 

The commission the Lord Jesus charged to everyone is to preach the gospel and discipling. There can be no discipling unless there are disciples gained through gospel preaching. Therefore, gospel preaching must be done by all the saints despite the outward situation whatever it may be.

Go therefore and disciple all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. (Matthew 28:19, RecVer)

Even as the Lord gave the promise to be fruitful and multiply, He also gave the opportunity to preach the gospel. Last week we had one whole week of gospel preaching in Gurugram with the trainees. I was blessed to participate in the gospel preaching in the afternoon sessions during the weekdays and both morning and afternoon sessions during the weekends. Every time we went to preach the gospel, the Lord gave us at least two to three people to whom we could preach the gospel. In this way, the Lord's promise to be fruitful and multiply is being fulfilled, I believe.

Some of the gospel contacts are MNC company managers, engineers, call centers employees, caterers, house keepers, chefs, and security guards. As many as can hear the gospel must hear the gospel. There must be the gospel preaching and it must always be the first and highest and unique commission of the Lord. Without the quantity there cannot be the quality. First, there must be the quantity of gospel "raw materials." Then, out of this quality, there will be the sons of peace, the quality gospel as the fruits of the gospel. May the Lord grace me ever to Carty out this commission of preaching the gospel regularly so that I can really and practically bear spiritual children to be fruitful and multiply.

Lord, fulfill Your promise and.make.me fruitful and multiply.

Ministry of the Word to Bilaspur

As usual, after attending the books exhibition at Madku, on the Lord’s Day we came to fellowship with the saints who are meeting as the church in Bilaspur. 

The burden the Lord gave us this time was to help all the saints to grow in life. First, by showing them the meaning of a Christian life according to the Bible: The Christian life is to live Christ.

For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. (Philippians 1:21, RecVer)

For this to be true, there is a need for growth in life, which is Christ in our spirit spreading and saturation our soul, mind, emotion, and will. One of the greatest hindrances for growth in life is human natural concepts that can be dealt with by the renewing of the mind. So, a good number of Bible verses were used to delve deep into the matter of renewing the mind through the word of God till the mind of Christ becomes our mind.

Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, (Philippians 2:5, RecVer)

And then be full grown man until Christ makes His home in our hearts.

Who desires all men to be saved and to come to the full knowledge of the truth. (1 Timothy 2:4, RecVer)

That Christ may make His home in your hearts through faith, that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be full of strength to apprehend with all the saints what the breadth and length and height and depth are and to know the knowledge-surpassing love of Christ, that you may be filled unto all the fullness of God. (Ephesians 3:17-19, RecVer)

Furthermore, to help the saints practically, the emotion needing to love the Lord Jesus even above parents was also touched. And finally, the need for our human free will to be one with God’s will was also made known to the saints. Some young saints were not able to discern between God’s will and their parent's will. Sometimes, when parent's will did not align with God’s will, children were made to choose their parent's will in the guise of doing God’s will. Only by such dealing of the soul, can there be the growth in life for the building up of the Body of Christ. 

In fact, this was the burden the Lord gave me a few days ago. I already foreknew that the Lord wanted us to minister to the saints in the church in Bilaspur. This was also in line with the present speaking of the Lord; the growth in life for the building up of the Body of Christ.

This time the Lord restraint me from speaking anything other than the only burden He gave this time. Though there were some matters I thought to fellowship,  but the Lord strictly stopped me from fellowshipping. Even the brothers themselves did not bring any matter they brought to other brothers. It was not the time to deal with anything else other than dispense life through the ministry of the word. When the truth is ministered and life flows, there will be healing!

Then said He to me, This water flows out toward the eastern region and goes down into the Arabah and goes to the sea; when it flows into the sea, the water of the sea is healed. And every living creature which swarms in every place where the river goes shall live, and there will be very many fish when this water comes there. And the water of the sea shall be healed, and everything shall live wherever the river comes. (Ezekiel 47:8-9, RecVer)

Lord, bless the church in Bilaspur and recover them fully into the fellowship of the Body of Christ!

Ministry Literature Distribution: Madku Massih Mela, Chhattisgarh

As usual, we had come to this islet again this year for the exhibition and distribution of the ministry literature. Many seeking Christians all over central India, especially Chhattisgarh, had come to visit our stall. Though we were there for only three days out of the seven days, twenty two boxes of ministry books and tracts were sold and distributed. 

On each day during the three days, the Lord brought different groups of seeking believers, especially, Pastors, to whom we introduced the ministry face to face and one on one. A good number of them already knew us as we also came year by year for the past few years. Some brothers testified that though the mela was going on, ours had the truth. He expressed his gratitude for making the truth available to God’s children. Yes, that was excatly why we were there for. All other stores basically came to to do business by selling items of Christianity including Bibles, but our goal was much beyond selling. Our goal was to make the ministry of the age, the ministry of the  word, the healthy teaching, and the faithful word available to all the children of God.

Two groups of brothers from Champa-Korba region and Bilaspur region came to visit us at the book stall on two different days. In fact, they were first introduced to the ministry of the word a few years ago at the same venue in the same Madku Masih Mela. Now, they have taken the stand for the Lord’s testimony. And now they are akso in the process of bringing them into the fellowship of the Body of Christ. Anotejr group of believers from Betul region also came for fellowship. They too were contacted in the same venue a few years ago. This has become a strategic place and time for contacting seekers all over central India. This time too, new contacts were gained for further follow-up. 

The Lord honored our burden and He also blessed us to release this burden. The word of God sown as a seed has been bearing fruits all over North India now!

Lord, bless Your move in North India among the Hindi speaking believers.