Sensing God at Work Around Us in Khammam even before we start our Mission

My Mom completely stopped worshipping the Idols that she used to. But, she still has some idols left in the house. So, I confronted with her on that in a loving way. She was very hesitant to let me take them out and throw them away. I was sad and upset on that. As I’m learning to go to God first on anything, I prayed on it. Later, she came to me and said that she not only stopped worshipping idols completely, but also will throw them away soon, but just not now. She is afraid of the idols cursing us, especially Autumn as she is with a life in her. I was trying to be careful on not to push her and force her through questioning her believes as I just trust in our God and in His Power. She was asking me questions like, why she can’t do both worshipping Jesus and participating in communion with her friends and family in worshipping idols, and also asking me why, just like some guys that we know, I follow Jesus but I just let my parents do whatever she wants to and not to pursue after her to follow the same.

Yesterday, when God provided an opportunity, I told her that I don’t know about all those guys, but I’m pursuing after her out of my love for her and I don’t want death to separate us eternally that we never see each other again. Not only that, but I can’t bear the thought of her suffering the loss of “hope and love” of God for good. Then, I shared what Ravi Zacharias shared once in one of his books. When his Mom died, at her funereal, all he could think repeatedly was “she is gone”. He was disheartened, filled in grief, sorrow and hopeless. I could see myself in that. The loss would be unimaginable and unbearable for me. But, then, Ravi’s father came to him and asked him to finish his thought, “she is gone to where”. That’s when the amazing hope that we have in Christ took him over. She is gone to heaven and, one day, he is going to see her again. So, I told her that, one day, I want to have that hope. The thought of not having that hope, even writing this, makes my heart cry so deep and pushing water into my eyes.

Please Pray for the Holy Spirit to Seal the Saving Faith in her Heart permanently through the precious Blood of our Lord, Jesus, that was shed on the Cross for her.



This was right when I was explaining her why I'm after her finding Jesus. Nothing is better than spending time in kitchen and talking with her to have great fellowship with her.



It is sad to hear her finding humanly reasons for and dismissing the Prayers answered by God, which caught her by surprise and moved her when she was visiting us last year. My fears came true on this as all the fellowship she has is with her friends and family who are very strong Hindus. It reminded me, , which emphasizes on Christian fellowship for the believers.

But I trust in God’s Timing and in His Power, and finds hope in His Love for her as, compared to my grief for her to find Salvation, how much more His, who love is perfect, grief would be for her to find Him.

If I picture Jesus, I would picture Him scratching, not just knocking, loud on the doors of the heart of every lost person with hands covered by blood with the hope that the person would open the door and let Him into his/her heart, but not a picture of all smiling and glowing Jesus as some religions portray while the lost are suffering death.

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When we rent a car here, it comes with a Driver. On last Saturday night, my Dad called for a car for me to go to Airport to pick Keith and his daughter, Susanna, traveling to join our mission at the Airport. The drive is 5 hours long. An hour before we are supposed to leave home, the driver called my Dad and expressed his worry about the chance of missing Church in the morning. Listening to that, I was excited to meet him as he seemed to like Church and Jesus a lot, and also his name is Swamy, which means he is a Hindu convert. Right after I got into the car, not wasting any time, I asked him his testimony. We talked for 4 hours straight. He has a great testimony and he came to Christ not long ago, just little over a year ago. He really loves Jesus a LOT. I told him that he is my inspiration in loving Jesus.

I serve Jesus. But, I don’t love Him with my whole heart yet. Lately, with God’s grace, I have been working on in that area, just to be in love with Him. Even my Bible study, Experiencing God, with Students on-campus is very helpful for me on this. While talking to Swamy, Martha and Mary’s story from Luke 10:38-42 came to my mind. I need to slow down and reflect on God more.

Listening to Swamy talking about the church he goes to on its worship, prayer, ministries and fellowship, I have decided to visit the church with him and take my parents with me as I and Autumn have been praying for a church where my parents can find good fellowship for a while. After picking up Keith and Susanna, we hurried back home so all five of us can go with Swamy to his Church.

At the Church, we were received well, and, personally, I could say that it was my best worship that I had on a Sunday morning. The only complain I have is the length of time that the whole service took. It lasted for 3hrs and 20mins. But, at the same time, I like it not to worry about time and not it to be like all pre-planned according to time, but just wait on Him and led by His Spirit when we gather to worship Him on Sunday mornings. Simply, if I knew it earlier on how long the service would last, I would have been prepared to set a big part of my Sunday aside to be in Him.

In the end, the pastor’s wife came over and took my Dad’s phone number, and told me that they would follow up with my Parents through calling them and visiting them in person.

Please pray that, if it is God’s Will, my parents would get hooked up with this Church and find great fellowship which would lead them to get into an ever increasing loving relationship with Jesus, our Lord.

The Church we went to on Sunday. I wish I have taken a picture with the Driver and a picture in the Church during the Service.

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We are leaving to Hyderabad tomorrow (Wednesday, 29^th) to start our Mission. Please lift all of us involved in it up in your prayers that we would wait on God in the Holy Spirit and join our LORD, Jesus Christ, in His work right where we are, and let Him work through us.

This time, we will be travelling by Train as Keith and Susanna are not so excited to drive as there were several moments when their hearts literally stopped beeping in their drive from Airport -J.

Did I mention that the sermon at the Church on Sunday was on Prayer? I’m looking forward to talking on the subject in few days.

Thank you for all your support and for joining me daily in this Mission through your Prayers in the Spirit.

Some more pictures:



I can witness the work of Holy Spirit in my Dad. He simply says, "I asked Jesus for few things to happen, and all those occurred. So, I know He is God and I believe in Him"



The best mangos are found in India. Especially, in Southern India. After 9 years, I could make it to India in the mangos season.


 

Keith, the Man, and the Dad, who is witnessing to my Mom and to her friend through the way he treats and loves his daughter. As many do not have Dads who model Christian values, I realized that it is the best way for men to witness to women here. Also, he and his daughter, through their behavior, outfits and mingling with people and guests, they fixed the perspective of many around here on American culture, which is not just what's shown in HollyWood movies. Everyone loved them both. His motto is to be like Indian when in India as much as possible. With that, man, it makes it a lot easier to talk about Jesus with them.

 

Caram Board. It is like a mini-pool, but you flick it with your fingers instead of using pole. Keith loves it and wants to get one for his home and four for the Cross Cultural Club to have some competative games among international students once we come back.



Wherever We are is our Mission Field

Yesterday, Keith called me to go with him and meet this Asian Guy who is the president of International Students...some association at the U. He recently got baptized in LDS church,, but sounded like he is not totally sure of what he is doing, so Keith wanted to have a talk with him. We had a great talk eventhough I couldn't give my full attention as I was being interrupted by my work simultaneously (I brought my work laptop and connected to the wireless network there).

He is one of those guys who go philosophical and caught up in the middle of many views that are offered by all the prominent religions in the world, and it was hard to talk to him. We 3 talked about 90 mins. Lot of talks, lot of assumptions, lot of IFs and BUTs, but no Scriptural reference to the Bible. But, I learnd stuff from Keith's answers and counter arguments. And, learned how to use Perspective Cards. (I love Campus Crusade's several cool methods and techniques to share Gospel or initiate a Spiritual conversation). I kept feeling prompted to share the Bridge illustration with him. So, in the end, when we were ready to leave, I drew the Bridge illustration and read the verses on what Jesus saved us from, how He saved us, and how we can have Salvation through Him. To the questions in the end, he confessed that God is knocking on the door of his heart and he heard the Gospel. But, he couldn't say it for sure that he received Him yet.

It is intersting to note that, in some religions, one does not need to truely accept and receive Jesus, but still can be baptized and considered saved. Few weeks ago, I was listening to a message on Ordinances and Sacraments, and on how some treat Ordinances as Sacraments and believe actions like Baptism would Save us. After all, changing the meaning and purpose of what Jesus did on Cross while using the same names and concepts.

In the end, I'm happy that I got to use the Bridge illustration which is one of my most favorites as a practice before I go to India.

I have a Prayer Request for today.

One of the good traditions in Indian culture is not to send guests back home with empty hands, so they are given a small gift while they are leaving when they attended a party or function in our home. All my Indian friends here always followed that tradition. But, we never followed that before.

But, today, they are throwing a Baby Shower for Autumn in one of our friends' houses. This time, I felt like we follow that tradition, and, along with a small gift, we place a Gospel Tracks and a DVD - "The HOPE" (The Story of God's Promise for All People) in the gift bags.

There are around 20 families that are attending the Baby Shower. So, we are literally going to hand out Gospels to 20 families to take them to their homes.

They all clearly know who we serve. I always raise the flag of "Jesus' follower", and try to talk to them about God from time to time in a very friendly way. They still love me, love us and even throwing a Baby Shower for us. So, I guess I'm not pushing too hard -:) We keep praying for their Salvation every week.

My request for you is to pray for today as we handout the dvd and the gospel track, that God works through those to start working in their hearts and to enable them to come to Him and to establish relationship with the true one living God. 

Thank you for all your prayers. And, thank you for joining me in the Spirit in Christ.

Learning to be Strong in God

I can't express how glad and fortunate I am to have you willing to pray for me. All of you had a lot longer walk with Christ and a lot deeper relationship with God than I do. Realization of the fact that persons like you are supporting me in various ways on this mission keeps me grounded in Christ and makes me more humble in Him.

I have two prayer requests at this moment.

One -

1 Corinthians 1:27 - "But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong"

We are joining a retreat that the Campus Crusade in Hyderabad is having during our Mission Trip. They asked me to share Word on a couple of topics. Without asking me to choose the topics, they chose topics for me and put me on schedule, and sent out the flyers -:). When I looked at the topics, first, I was little frightened and then laughed at myself in Christ. The topics they chose for me are: "Finances" and "Praying with Power".

If I had to list the areas that I'm week the most in, exactly, these two topics would be the top 2.  You can verify that with my wife who knows me the best.

Yesterday, as I and Autumn were helping with kids in AC at K2, the memory verse for kids was,
Ephesians 6:10 - "Finally, be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power."

I don't know about kids, but it spoke to me well -:).

When I started gathering material to prepare the Word on these topics, I realized that, more than anything else, God wanted to strengthen me in these areas.

How amazing it is to walk with Christ. I'm very glad that He is not the god whom I used to server and with whom all I had was a conditional give-and-take relationship, but He is the God with whom I could have an ever growing love relationship through which I will keep getting strengthened and become more and more like Him. What an amazing God we have and what an amazing gift we have through Jesus.

So, please pray for me that God guides me and leads me in preparing and delivering message on these two topics.

Two -

To confess one thing, in fact, if there is one group of people that I struggle to connect with, that is Indians. It would sound strange, but it is true. Please don't take me wrong, and I'm not trying to generalize it. But, it may be because, while growing up, I was surrounded by individuals who often talked down on others on their backs and who were culturally prideful and hypocrites, and, personally, me being one of them, it haunts me back now. I feel being judged and feel week in their presense. It is very evident whenever we go on a random evangelism on campus. I'm way comfortable in sharing Gospel to students from any country except India.

I do really struggle connecting with Indians in Christ. I'm serious. I shared this with few before. I always talked to Autumn about this.

When the Angel of the LORD appeared to Gideon and asked him to go, his response was
Judges 6:15 - "My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family."
Judges 6:16 - "The LORD answered, "I will be with you,"

So, please pray for me that God goes with me in this trip and, guides me, leads me and strengthens me in every step I take in this entire trip.

Again, it is my privilige and I'm so honored to be able to connect with you in Christ in Spirit. What an amazing relationship we have through becoming One in Him.

God bless,

Naveen

Getting ready in Prayers

For many of you who went on mission trips several times already, it might sound silly. But, for me, a lot of nervousness, fear and awkwardness on one side, and a lot of excitement and heart felt need to share Christ with others on the otherside are taking over me on this mission trip. I feel like I could use Prayers more than anyother time in my life right now.

Not long ago, just 5 years ago, I remember arguing against Christianity and defending Hinduism with believers at the Christ Community Church. And, at that time, I never thought that, in 5 years, I would not only accept Jesus Christ as the only way to God, but also establish an every growing relationship with Him deep enough to follow Him back home to bring others to Him.

Things that I want to get done before I leave are:

1. Recollecting all my memory verses that I memorized before in sharing Gospel.
2. Practicing Bridge illustration, Four Spiritual Laws, Gospel Tracks, and Selorium Cards techniques in initiating spiritual conversations. Also, may hit the campus for random evangelism a few times again with those.
3. Preparing a 3 minute Testimony again and practicing it over and over.
4. Spending more and more time in Prayers and in daily Devotional Quite Times with God.

It is nice that I and Autumn started a Bible study on Experiencing God with students on campus and also I got to be part of a deeper study on the Book of Isaiah with a couple of guys from our Church as it is helping me to tune myself to God and to be sensitive to any calls and prompings by the Holy Spirit.