Early April update from Pastor Peter Haneef
/Glory to the Lord Jesus Christ
I hope this finds you well and in the peace of our Lord. I know everywhere in this world people are going through a terrible situation because of the corona virus. But we can trust only one name on earth under heaven: our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities.
“For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross” (Col 1:19-20).
We pray that our Lord Himself wipes out this deadly virus from the earth and heals the nations by His healing touch, that all will know this Lord Jesus is the author of life and death.
I would like to thank you all for your prayers and generous donations for the people suffering starvation due to the corona virus. The whole of India is in lock-down for 21 days, beginning last week and lasting until April 14. The situation gets worse day by day.
No one is allowed to leave their house, except police, health workers and registered volunteers. Many of our pastors registered themselves as volunteers and are visiting our church members along with other poor people. They have already supplied 420 family kits, which contain rice, wheat and other food grains, cleaned clothes, soaps, masks, hand sanitizers, some general medicines and more. God willing, we would like to be able to provide kits for hundreds of more families.
The national government has made a decision to supply all families with food grains but has not yet begun doing so, and there will certainly not be enough for everyone. People suffer hunger across the country. One family kit which we provide to our members costs US$40 each, and lasts an average family one week. The next two weeks will be even more critical.
Our pastors were able to supply these kits only because of your generous help. Once again I thank you all for considering them as your own body in our Lord Jesus Christ.
May our Lord bless you abundantly according to His riches in glory. And also may He reward you His crown of life on His Great Day.
Please continue praying for us. May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.
With love and prayers,
Yours in His service.
Pastor Peter Haneef, President
The Assembly of Loving God (ALG) Church
Special message from Pastor Peter Haneef
/Glory to the Lord Jesus Christ.
I hope and pray this finds you well and with peace in our Lord. Once again, I appreciate all who are spending time in prayer and fasting and bringing the whole world before our mighty Healer and Lord Jesus Christ in this crucial period of COVID-19.
By God's grace our church leaders report all our members in Asia, Africa and the Middle East are safe from the corona virus so far, and no one is quarantined. Of course it is not because of our deeds but our Lord's amazing grace alone through all our humble prayers with one mind and one spirit. Continue your prayers for our fellow human beings around the world that our Lord will save everyone from this global disaster, according to HIS will. Let His will be done.
Though our church members are safe from COVID-19, many of their families are near starvation, especially in India and Bangladesh. Most are extremely poor and earn only enough for daily life. If they don't have a job on a given day, they won't get wages for that day. We know very well that many households can only buy food and prepare it in the evening when the family man comes with money after laboring. Then husband, wife and children have prayers together and eat together. If someone cannot go to work, our other church members try to help them obtain food.
Three years ago, [Indian] Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked that everyone get a bank account even if they had no money to put in it. People did, but accounts of poor people remain at zero balance. Now they are in a huge crisis. None of our members have jobs due to fear of the virus. They are unable to help themselves.
Our director Pastor Paul, with a team of volunteers, has been visiting many families and helping them with basic foods, masks, hand sanitizers and other supplies. Pastor Paul has not even fully recovered from his recent ordeal, but doesn't care and continues ministering in the hills and valleys. Our prayers are his fortress.
The team has supplied as many needy families as possible with kits each worth US$40. Pastor Paul asked all our pastors and missionaries to help the people who are beginning to starve without jobs. I am happy to say many of our pastors have undertaken this. Certainly, when one member of the body of Christ suffers, the rest suffer. We have about 1,000 families, with three to six members in each household. If you are able, please send your help in this time of crisis. Our Lord will bless you abundantly according to His riches in glory.
+ Job prayed for his friends and the Lord restored all of his losses.
+ Joseph's faith the one true God of his fathers, his prayer and his faithful life saved Egypt from famine, and himself from his own brothers who had meant only evil toward him.
+ The prayers and fasting of Esther and her maids provided great deliverance for her people during their own own time of intense crisis.
+ Peter was delivered from the prison by the constant prayers of the church.
+ We know also about the powerful answered prayers of Elijah.
Our Lord will not turn His back on our prayers. Continue praying without ceasing.
Please remember the words of the Apostle James: “If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill,’ and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that?” (James 2:15-16)
Pray for me and my family too. May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.
With love and prayers
Yours in His service,
Pastor Peter Haneef, President,
The Assembly of Loving God
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Prayer in a time of virus
/by Pastor Paul, Director, Bibles for Mideast
It is the time for prayer. Our Lord seeks His children who really love Him and produce the fruits of the Holy Spirit. Let us pray as the Israelites prayed during the re-dedication of the temple:
“Those of Israelite descent had separated themselves from all foreigners. They stood in their places and confessed their sins and the sins of their ancestors.” (Neh. 9:2)
Jesus our mighty Lord, we come before You. We love You Lord with our whole hearts and we confess our sins and iniquities before You. Separate us from all evils and from what is unholy. We are unable to separate by ourselves; but we can by Your grace. We are not worthy to cast out any diseases or viruses such as COVID-19,, but by Your grace, we can.
"You who are the hope of Israel, its Savior in times of distress, why are you like a stranger in the land, like a traveler who stays only a night? Why are you like a man taken by surprise, like a warrior powerless to save? You are among us, Lord, and we bear your name; do not forsake us!" (Jer. 14:8-9)
Lord Jesus, You have overcome sin and death through your crucifixion and death on the cross of Calvary and You redeemed us from sin and death. You have given us a great hope of rising from the dead through Your resurrection. Your precious Blood shed on the cross washed us and purified us. You are with us though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death and we fear no evil. Your rod and staff comfort us always.
Lord our mighty Savior, You are Most High and Most Holy. We are not worthy to abide under Your shadow. But Your love towards us made us worthy by Your grace. You alone are our refuge and fortress. In Your name, Lord Jesus in Your mighty name, we cast out this COVID-19 attacking us and our fellow brethren around the globe.
In the name of Jesus Christ we shall not be afraid of the terror by night; nor of the arrow that flies by day; nor of the pestilence that walks in darkness; nor of the destruction that lays waste at noonday. In the name of Jesus no coronavirus will affect us or our fellow brethren. For Lord Jesus is our Lord and Savior. He is the King of kings and Lord of lords. He redeemed us by His own Blood. We have assurance in the name of Jesus Christ that He will never allow a coronavirus or any other evil to attack our body, spirit, soul, family, business and dear ones for the glory and honor of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
With love, prayers and Shalom
In Jesus' mighty name
Pastor Paul (Director)
Bibles for Mideast
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“By Your stripes we are healed. For You were wounded for our transgressions. You were bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement for our peace was upon You.” — from Isaiah 53:5
“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.”— 2 Timothy 1:7
“All shall be well, all shall be well … all manner of things shall be well.”
— Julian of Norwich (who actually lived through the time of the Black Death in England)
Some miracles are more complicated BUT attackers all now Christians!
/(with reports from Pastor Paul and others)
Pastor Paul and the two leaders ministering with him in North India—after being brutally beaten by Hindu extremists then dragged away, injured and bloodied—thought they would never experience open, fresh air again (story of their attack and capture here).
For five days they’d been shackled with steel chains and locked away in a dark, filthy cattle stall. Along with the stench of cattle dung, the men were constantly harassed by mosquitoes, bees and other vermin. Their captors refused them anything to eat or drink.
One of the main paths through the village
The pastors had been visiting and ministering in a poor village in North India with 300 families. Not far away, Australian missionary Graham Stains and his children were burned alive by militant Hindus two decades ago.
The local Hindu Dalit* (‘untouchables’) have no education and work for the rich and high class Hindus of the nearby town. They do what they are told by their employers, and paid a fifth or less of the normal daily wages for day laborers, have barely enough to survive. They also know they have no one to complain to (an earlier story on ministry among the Dalit here).
A Bibles for Mideast pastor living and working in a small town about 20 miles away had been struggling to share the gospel among the Hindus and Muslims in his area. Despite constant threats on his and his family’s lives, he had managed to establish a small underground church.
At his request, Pastor Paul and the two junior pastors (one formerly Hindu, the other once Muslim) had come to lead in a time of fasting and prayer for the region, as well as help in house-to-house personal evangelism. The time of prayer and fasting went well, and many came to Christ.
A new village believer with her children
One day, a fellow from another village came to the area to visit his friend, who just happened to be at the prayer meeting. So off he went to find the fellow. He ended up listening to the gospel message and making a decision to join the Kingdom of Jesus! Not only that, when prayed over for serious asthma that had plagued him since childhood, he was completely healed.
He then began telling the leaders about his own village and the poor, unreached people there. So the pastors decided to join him on his return trip, and began sharing the truth of Jesus with the locals.
“We got a good response from the villagers at first,” Pastor Paul explains. “They were curious and listened. But then the high class and rich people came to know that the villagers are becoming friendly with us and being attracted to the gospel.”
A ‘secret meeting’ was called, and the villagers were warned that these Christians were against their gods [the Hindu religion has about 33 million gods—Ed.] and their faith. Anyone who befriends them will surely be cursed by the gods, they were told. Their families and even generations to come will face total destruction.
So a decision was made to capture the pastors, tie them to a tree, and call the police. In nationalist Hindu India, proselytizing is a serious crime with often dire consequences.
The pastors of course knew nothing of the meeting. So when angry villagers along with many of the upper class rich townspeople swooped in, the men were engaging some children and women in front of a village house, telling stories from the Bible.
The attackers pummeled the men mercilessly, then tied them to a nearby tree. They called the police, only to be told to ‘finish them off secretly.’
Energized by such a response, they untied the pastors, beat them again with steel pipes, and dragged them down the road. When they arrived at one of the villager’s empty cattle sheds, they bound the men up and left them there. According to one of the junior pastors, Pastor Paul had not only tried to protect the younger men from the attackers with his own body, he kept saying that he alone was the ‘guilty’ one. The other two were innocent, he insisted … but the attackers would have none of it.
Strength and expectation faint, the pastors prayed and hoped for the best—whatever that might mean. Soon word was out on their plight and believers across the country and world began praying and fasting for them.
On the fifth morning, two couples and three grown children, all members of the same family, flung the door of the stall open and prostrated themselves before the prisoners.
“Save us! Save us!” they cried. Behind them streamed other villagers, all begging for forgiveness. They freed the men from their chains.
The pastors had no idea what was going on. They soon learned that two of the family’s cows had, with no apparent cause, suddenly fallen down and died. Those cows had been their goddesses (Hindus believe cows to be sacred). It must, they thought, be due to God's anger for what they had done to the Christian missionaries.
Not only that, but the very man leading the villagers in their attack had a tragic road accident that night and died. Fear fell on the whole village.
As soon as the men were freed, they were rushed to hospital. Seriously injured, they needed weeks of treatment and recovery. Various villagers often came to visit and of course heard the gospel of salvation from the Christian patients.
Pastor Paul, more gravely injured and with some health issues due to the years of pushing himself, required longer hospitalization and is actually still resting and recovering at the home of a pastor in North India, not yet strong enough for the long trek back to his home in southern India.
Still, as soon as he was released, the village full of his former attackers begged him to visit them. Welcoming him warmly, they listened intently to his own testimony of salvation and the message of Jesus. Every person in attendance accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior!
Village women and men listening to Pastor Paul share; every one accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior!
“I thank and praise my Lord Jesus for all my pastors, ministers, believers and prayer partners for your continuous prayers for me and pastors Abishek and Nasar**,” Pastor Paul says. “I personally thank you all for your prayers and kind helps too. May our Lord reward you all.”
Follow-up ministry is desperately needed in the area.
“We urgently need Hindi and Urdu Bibles for the new believers,” says Pastor Paul.
Please be in prayer for these precious people, and for Pastor Paul’s complete restoration. If you can help in any way to cover costs, please click here.
Another new believer in front of her house
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* Dalits—also known as ‘untouchables’—have traditionally been regarded as having such low status they don't even register on the caste system. Despite laws designed to protect them, they continue to face widespread discrimination and often shocking levels of abuse. Access to education, healthcare, justice and in some areas even safe drinking water remains restricted. They generally live in segregated neighborhoods or in satellite hamlets away from main population areas.
** Names changed for security reasons
UPDATE
Pastor Paul is now back at his home in Kerala in southern India. Please be in prayer for him and the area, where coronovirus (COVID-19) security measures have been implemented due to an increasing number of cases.
May our precious Lord guide and protect us all—from the virus and from fear—as we navigate our way through this global challenge.
