|
|
Team Visit in October 2006 A team of seven went out to India in October 2006, five people from the UK and two from USA. Our purpose was to visit the ministry of Harvest India and to participate in a pastors' conference and conduct a big evangelistic campaign in an unreached part of Andhra Pradesh. One of the team members wrote: God really blessed our time in India. It was filled with lots of hardships and intense spiritual battle, but the Lord broke through with great victories. We had a chance to minister in many villages, to feed the hungry, dedicate several wells where drinking water was desperately needed, and to minister to orphans, the elderly and the neglected.
There were 674 pastors present at the pastors' conference and they seemed really blessed and challenged by the teachings they received. Among other things,  they were taught the Impact Plan of church growth and received it enthusiatically. As for the gospel meetings, there were 5,000 people present on the first day and 1,500 came to Christ. On the second day, 25,000 were in attendance and 650 came to Christ. On day three, which was also the day of the Hindu Festival of Lights and Ramadan, (celebrated much like our Christmas and New Years Eve combined) there were 20,000 in attendance and a further 1,400 came to Christ. Then on the last day, there were 30,000 in attendance and there was an amazing mass conversion. When Chris Lewis gave the invitation, it seemed like the whole stadium responded, and we had no way of counting such a large number. It could have been anywhere between 15,000 and 25,000 who gave their lives to Christ that night. Though we don’t know the exact numbers, we do know that each sector of the crowd had a pastoral team responsible for it and that they will know who was in their section and have followed them up. Harvest India has the most efficient follow-up strategy that I have ever seen, so I have confidence in the work they are doing. 
On the last Sunday there, we visited a couple of churches and they were already overflowing with new converts from the campaigns, and Harvest India is also busy at work establishing at least 25 new churches out of the new converts who came from various villages in the area.
THE NEXT MISSION TRIP TO INDIA IS OCTOBER 2008 |
|