India
Population: 1.4 billion | Hinduism: 80.1% | Christians: 2.32%
DPM-India Director, Elsie Daniel, writes: The growing persecution of Christians in India is not just limited to violence against churches and Christian organizations, but it is slowly growing to include laws against conversions, although this is permitted under the Indian Constitution. Schools, hospitals and any institution run by Christians are targeted. Persecution also takes the form of threats and false complaints being made against people practicing Christianity. This persecution is aimed to instill fear into the hearts of Christians, who have been challenged that by 2024 (next year) India will be made a “Hindu” country and will be purged of all Christians.
We therefore have a real urgency to train as many pastors and Christian leaders as possible before it becomes difficult to do so. Thanks to your generous giving, Derek Prince Ministries has recently been able to hold a number of pastors and leaders’ seminars, with hundreds attending.
The teaching given in our seminars (using Derek’s material) encourages the pastors and leaders to firstly stand firm and secondly not to fear. Fear comes from lack of a deeper knowledge of the Word of God and the promises we have in it, as well as a lack of understanding of the spiritual weapons God has given us to stand against the forces of darkness that rise against the church. These seminars bring huge encouragement and education to church leaders of their rights and privileges in Christ. Derek’s books and SD cards that we distribute to them then provide an extensive library to bring encouragement from God’s Word.
We recently held several meetings in Maharashtra state. The first was in Sholapur with 130 pastors and leaders. One senior pastor, Sholapur, 89 years old, had a health challenge and many “healing preachers” had prayed for him without success. When we taught on The Divine Exchange and encouraged the pastors to confess the exchange that related to their situation, this pastor realized it was up to him to inherit his healing. Later that day he took my hand with tears in his eyes and said:
“Thank you for coming to minister here, I thought I did not have faith and I had almost given up what I was praying for, but the Word you shared today has strengthened me and given me the assurance that God will answer my prayer.”
We also held an evening meeting at a church where close to 100 believers had gathered. God moved mightily in this meeting and many women were set free from demonic bondages.
The second meeting was at Jalna for 70 leaders. Every person who attended that day testified that they had received a deliverance in some way – either spiritually, physically, emotionally or mentally.
From there we went on to Khargar in Navi Mumbai where we held a conference for pastors and leaders. Once again, the Lord ministered to them through the Word and every person who attended was strengthened by the teaching. One pastor said,
“I had so many questions and misconceptions in my mind, that God dealt with today and gave me clarity about.” His wife held on to us and said, “I can feel a dark cloud has lifted off me... I feel so light. Preaching excites us but at the end the effect is just gone. But today the teaching of the Word has brought something into my spirit which is still in me, and I know it will remain until God has worked out His Word in me.”
Looking Ahead
We have a number of pastors/leaders’ conferences coming up soon:
- North Karnataka in July to minister in three major cities.
- Maharashtra in August, where we will travel to Pune and Sholapur rural pastors’ fellowships.
- Karnataka – Bangalore, Bellary, Belgaum and Hubli - in early September.
- Orissa in November – a state that has seen much persecution in the years gone by and church leaders need much encouragement and strengthening.
- The Andaman and Nicobar Islands in January to reach pastors in Diglipur and Hut Bay and other islands not reached before. This will be achieved by bringing the pastors on these various islands to the mainland (Port Blair) for a one-day seminar using Derek’s teaching.
- Shillong in the state of Meghalaya in the north east in February. This was the first place where we began our India outreaches in 2010 and we have not been able to visit since 2013. We plan to hold a three-day conference with pastors and leaders from Shillong and the surrounding areas.
At each meeting, we also plan to distribute Derek’s teaching materials and promote the DPM-India websites.
The total cost to hold these conferences is NZ$13,500 (approximately $2,250 each). With the Government aiming to make it even more difficult for Christians in India, it is vital that we continue to visit these pastors and leaders and train them in the Word of God using Derek’s material. Would you please prayerfully consider sponsoring part of the cost of one of these conferences; any donation you can make would be greatly appreciated.
Nepal
Population: 30.8 million | Hinduism: 81.4% | Christians: 1.42%
We would like to begin by thanking you, our DPM supporters, for partnering with us. Your generous giving has helped us to undertake a huge amount of book reprinting in Nepal over the past year.
In total, 20,000 Derek Prince books in the Nepali language were reprinted in 2022 and these now all been distributed and are a great blessing to pastors, Bible college teachers, graduates and Christians all over Nepal.
Pastor Dhan Bahadur, from Jante, East Nepal, writes:
“Derek’s books have become regular nourishment for me. I teach the new believers from Self Study Bible Course; Foundations for Righteous Living and other titles. I marvel upon the wisdom God has given to Derek Prince. I have not seen any people reading Derek’s books who were not appreciative for having his books with them! We do not know how to read, write or understand English, therefore Derek’s books in Nepali are like a mine of spiritual wisdom for us all. Thank you and God bless you.”
We are very excited to advise that 5,000 copies of each of the 10 booklets making up the Laying the Foundation series have now been published in Nepali. We know that Pastor Gopaljee will do an excellent job distributing this foundational teaching to 5,000 pastors, Christian leaders and believers. Since Gopaljee joined DPM in 1997, he has done an amazing job translating and printing a total of 87 titles in Nepali. We have three distribution centres in Nepal – Kathmandu, Itahari and Pokhara - from where these books are both sold and freely distributed in the market place. Based on Gopaljee’s huge success in distribution over the last 26 years, we know that he will get these 50,000 booklets, containing Derek’s sound teaching, distributed within a very short time. Pastors in Nepal are hungry for Bible teaching and to date with over 823,000 of Derek’s books already widely distributed, we are confident that the Lord has laid a strong foundation of the Word in His church in Nepal.
Along with printing these 50,000 Laying the Foundation booklets, Gopaljee has a further 22 titles which need reprinting. The cost for this is approximately NZ$39,000.
On behalf of our DPM teams in India and Nepal, many thanks for whatever gift you can make.
