As you hopefully know, we’re doing village ministry this month, and we visit a different village each day. Every day we pray many many times for healing and provision. We pray for the blind, the mute, the lame. There are times where I’m praying with someone, and I’m absolutely sure they’re going to be healed. I have no doubt that right there, in that moment, God has the power to heal them. And then nothing happens. This happens over and over and over again, every single day. Sometimes it can be a little discouraging.
But I know that, per Lamentations 3, the Lord has given us a specific portion to pour out into these people, and that portion is enough – it is everything that they need. I also know that sometimes the healing comes, but not right there while we are watching. This was affirmed today in an awesome way.
Our team and team Aperture are both doing village ministry, and we had the opportunity to attend part of a pastor’s conference today. Pastors from all of the surrounding villages gathered for a time of worship and encouragement. It was an amazing privilege and an awesome opportunity to worship with over 100 pastors, all fighting the fight and spreading the gospel here in India. After the opening worship, they spent some time thanking our teams for serving their villages. (They gave us these giant Leis….it was crazy). Several of the pastors came up and shared stories about the experience of our team visiting their village and their church for a day.
It was incredible to hear these pastors talk about our 1 day visit, and all that came out of it. There were so many stories about people we had prayed for, who had been completely healed. It was an unreal experience, sitting there hearing these stories, remembering the faces of the people we had prayed for, and hearing how God was continuing to work in their lives, and how the entire village had been impacted. The pastors shared over and over again how encouraged their congregation was by our team’s 1 day visit.
I remember one specific night John and I prayed for a women after the end of a service. She was laying just outside the church entrance. Her legs were completely paralyzed – she couldn’t walked. We prayed like none other, and I was so sure she was going to be healed right there. But nothing happened. But then today the pastor of that congregation got up and shared how he went back and visited the next day, and the Lord had completely healed her.
We still have a few days of ministry left here in India before we head on to Thailand. God is certainly moving here, His kingdom is advancing, His family is growing, and lives are being changed. And I’m ridiculously blessed to be able to share in a small part of that, and to encourage the believers here who are spreading the light in the middle of all this darkness.
