[00:00:00] [Music] thanks for being here today this is Kevin Conover I’m your host on educate

[00:00:06] for life radio and we have a fantastic program lined up today I’m really excited for the guests that I have one

[00:00:12] pastor Alexander John and John methide and pastor Alexander pastor Alex he is

[00:00:20] the pastor of India Christian Fellowship here in San Diego County and I’ve had

[00:00:26] the privilege of being with him at his church many times amazingly friendly

[00:00:34] it’s incredible but what I’m really excited about is that we’re gonna be talking about reaching people in India

[00:00:39] for Christ today they have a missionary John Murtha that they support in India

[00:00:45] and they’re gonna talk to us all about what it’s like to do missionary working in here and some of the obstacles that

[00:00:50] you can be praying for also there’s an opportunity to support them if that’s what you want to do the website for

[00:00:56] India Christian Fellowship is ICF san diego.org ICF san diego.org and you can

[00:01:02] also reach pastor john pastor alexander john at eight five eight two oh six seven one eight eight that’s eight five

[00:01:09] eight two oh six seven one eight eight so pastor Alex and John thank you so

[00:01:15] much for being here today this is exciting thanks for being here thank you so much for having us absolutely and so

[00:01:21] why don’t we get a little bit of background here pastor Alex when did you start india christian fellowship here in

[00:01:26] san diego restart India custom fellowship a say a prayer meeting it was 2003 I used to

[00:01:34] live in Los Angeles I used to drive here so one of our family moved here for work so I came to see him and then we met

[00:01:43] another Indian family so we thought okay pray together so we start to pray and one of our friends lost the ovens in

[00:01:50] Chicago so he applied here in coal coal he got the job here so when he had three

[00:01:56] families we had to meet every other Saturdays for prayer so that led to

[00:02:02] another survey that become a Bible study and that became a you know Saturday

[00:02:07] evenings we meet together some more people gather together so that is what you start yeah and if you’re listening

[00:02:13] if you’ve if you were wondering if they were actually these guys were actually from India or not it’s pretty obvious by

[00:02:18] their accents that they are so if you struggle to understand some of the things they say just you know click

[00:02:26] rewind and you can listen to it again so you’re all set there so hopefully we’ll try to speak slowly yeah yeah yeah I

[00:02:33] love it I love it okay and and Pastor Alex you actually have known John for a long time

[00:02:39] because you guys actually were learning together about Christianity in the Bible

[00:02:44] and theology together is that right yes yeah you’ve met 30 years ago Wow in 780

[00:02:50] that’s incredibly thought you guys were like 35 years old you guys met when they

[00:02:56] like you were five or so yeah so so you guys grew up in India and John what led

[00:03:04] you to decide that you wanted to dedicate your life to serving Christ in

[00:03:10] the position of a missionary yeah after my graduation I joined in the seminary

[00:03:16] first Alex mentioned here we studied together and after my is when I am

[00:03:27] studying in seminary also I have a visit to go outside from my state we work

[00:03:33] among the poor and needy and especially the marginalized and neglected people so

[00:03:38] since long days I was praying Lord guide me and show me where I have to move or the missionary work so in the

[00:03:46] year 1994 after the graduation from seminary I got a vision from God

[00:03:51] especially the state Odisha where Christians are suffering for the sake of

[00:03:58] gospel very poor and nearly people are their last per division I moved to to

[00:04:05] Odisha in 1994 okay and so you felt that God was leading you

[00:04:11] to a part of India that where there’s a lot of persecution and a lot of suffering now originally John pastor

[00:04:19] Alex you were telling me that you are from southern the southern tip of India what is the name of the part of India

[00:04:26] you’re from Kerala Kerala okay Kerala and tell us a little bit about the

[00:04:32] differences because you know I think for a lot of people who are listening when they think of India they just think you know it’s all the same right but

[00:04:38] different parts of India are vastly different yes yeah there has to Nina in different states there is 22 different

[00:04:46] languages Hindi is the national language and the state that we me and Pastor John

[00:04:53] came from we are the southern part of India called Kerala okay it is more you know educated and 100

[00:05:00] percentage literacy and more st. Thomas came to this state you know 2,000 years

[00:05:06] ago so that is where there is a 25 percent a Christian population there 25 percent say again yeah 25 percentage of

[00:05:12] caroli the state that we came from are Christians Oh Christian charge percentage yes yeah it’s more prominence

[00:05:18] they are rich they are influential in all those things so we come from a more comfortable place in that sense okay so

[00:05:25] when you go to North there is more you know more Hindus and point-three percentage point 1 percent is very less

[00:05:31] number of Christians in those days and culturally it is different language is

[00:05:36] different food is different the way everything is it’s almost like traveling to completely accelerate the every state

[00:05:43] is like that ok Christian culture now so would you say that where Christianity

[00:05:49] has spread in India that there is more tolerance there’s more less persecution for those areas or how

[00:05:58] does that affect because you were saying that the place that you went oh oh dress–i is that am I saying that right

[00:06:05] yeah Nisha Odisha which is kind of southeast

[00:06:10] central India versus Kerala which is at the very tip there’s more persecution

[00:06:16] there there’s more there’s more persecution of Christians right yeah

[00:06:22] yeah and and is it so when when Christianity in the place where you’re from you said like 25 percent is

[00:06:28] Christian obviously there’s less persecution there for people in general there’s more tolerance is that right

[00:06:35] we have more religious tolerance in this Carol at the station do you come from yeah so they’re very receptive people so

[00:06:42] they accepted gospel gladly because there is no a system is no sort so

[00:06:48] severe in southern part of India its system doesn’t have as much influence influence I was there educated people

[00:06:54] okay so they gladly embrace the Christianity and the missionaries came and preached and missionary started

[00:07:01] schools and different places so they are more interested in English education so

[00:07:07] the people gladly send their children to schools yeah so through education and

[00:07:13] Mission hospitals was there in in Vellore in the in Chennai and Karnataka

[00:07:19] in Bangalore so that is more refers on that the community okay but the context

[00:07:25] is utterly different in in North India so they are not so receptive towards

[00:07:30] gospel because of this tradition and caste system and people are more fearful

[00:07:37] because of less education so they are

[00:07:42] not so receptive and compared to the southern states of India I see what you’re saying okay that makes a lot of sense now you were saying pastor Alex

[00:07:50] you were saying earlier that India is now ranked 10th in persecution on a

[00:07:58] variety of sites where they ranked where what countries are persecuting Christians the most India is now ranked

[00:08:05] 10 and so when we look at that because of the influence of Hinduism they’re

[00:08:12] trying to protect their religion from being from people becoming Christian yeah the reason I think that last five

[00:08:20] years especially there is a government is more you know Hindu radicals and Indu

[00:08:25] nationalism those kinds of things and also there are many of the states and a conversion laws you cannot convert from

[00:08:33] Hinduism to any other religion really yeah you can go back to become a Hindu but you can go from Hinduism to any

[00:08:39] other liddie so the states he works and other some many states actually passed and they conversion loss so it become

[00:08:46] illegal for I can the gospel with you for you to believe and accept Christ and became a Christian

[00:08:52] you can do that by law and now will you be put in prison or yeah the people don’t do it they will be put in process

[00:08:59] yeah yeah that’s what they face every single day now have you had experiences like that John where you you are sharing

[00:09:06] the gospel with somebody and they want to they want to become a Christian but they’re so afraid of being put in prison

[00:09:12] or whatever that they say yeah I can’t do it so in my context many missionaries arrested and put behind bars because

[00:09:20] they preached gospel so because as post Alex mentioned is anti conversion there the religious act

[00:09:26] on special beliefs they’re not really in Orissa in Arunachal Pradesh and some of

[00:09:31] the northeastern states of India and gherkin so this is a common incidence in

[00:09:38] the North Indian context missionaries are beaten and killed and in Orissa

[00:09:43] itself in 99 in January 22nd Orwell know that you said and Australian missionary

[00:09:50] Graham Staines and his two sons Philip and Timothy brutally killed by this miss

[00:09:56] Andy Hindu forces and in 2008 also no

[00:10:01] result there was a write in the condom artistic another tribal populated mystic

[00:10:10] in Orissa so more than 100 believers and missionaries were killed by this Andy

[00:10:18] gospel force force and the government didn’t do anything to stop it government also was supportive because

[00:10:25] this this one political party the the BJP and they was ruling that that stayed

[00:10:34] that that day okay and are they still in power are they not no they’re not in

[00:10:39] power now but during that time that particular party was in power over at that stage that their Breann state they

[00:10:46] are rolling in the country now nor that state government could not take any strong message but the in the in the

[00:10:53] last stage of the right the central governments in the police forces and

[00:10:58] right came to under the okay so if you if you didn’t hear that

[00:11:05] there’s a movie that recently came out called the least of these it’s the Gram stain story and it’s about an Australian

[00:11:12] missionary who was working among the lepers in India but the Hindus the radical Hindus actually burned him and

[00:11:19] his sons alive in a Jeep and this is where John math I work sand so please be

[00:11:24] praying for him we’re gonna keep talking about this and you can learn more about what it’s like to be a missionary in India stay with us my guest our pastor

[00:11:30] Alexander John and John methide ICF Sandiego org is the website that’s India

[00:11:36] Christian Fellowship if you’d like to support them or get in contact with them or find out more about this please do so

[00:11:42] you can give them a call or visit their website stay with us we’re gonna be right back

[00:11:50] [Music]

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[00:12:54] thanks for being with us today you’re listening to educate for life radio I’m your host Kevin Conover and my website

[00:13:01] educate for life org has all kinds of resources that you can check out where you can actually take classes on things

[00:13:07] like Buddhism and Hinduism and Islam and and understand what the what different people believe you know I think it’s

[00:13:13] really important that we understand how other people think because that helps us to be able to better share the gospel

[00:13:20] with other people when we know what they think and what’s going through their minds and their background and their experiences then we’re able to do a

[00:13:26] better job of meeting them where they’re at Paul said I am all things to all people so that by God’s grace I might

[00:13:33] win some so that’s what we’re we’re talking to my guest today pastor alexander john and john Mathai

[00:13:39] ICF san diego.org and the indian india christian fellowship is in Poway

[00:13:44] California if you ever want to visit it’s a wonderful church that you can check out their websites ICF San Diego

[00:13:50] org and they support John Maathai in India he’s currently in Odisha where he

[00:13:56] is ministering to people and reaching out to people with the love of Jesus but it is dangerous it’s something God has

[00:14:02] called him to and he’s risking his life in order to love people to Christ many missionaries have been killed in in an

[00:14:09] effort to reach out by radical Hindus and other people and this is interesting

[00:14:16] I wanted to ask you guys about this because you know you know in in wherever

[00:14:21] Christianity goes they start schools they try to set up a good stable

[00:14:27] environment with water and all these things and we know that in parts of India it’s extremely poor there’s tons

[00:14:34] of poverty in Calcutta India is well-known as one of the most poverty

[00:14:40] stricken places and yet people don’t seem to want that help even though they

[00:14:45] desperately need the hope of Jesus Christ to be able to live well and so

[00:14:51] this is a difficult situation to be in where these people desperately need help but at the same time they’re so

[00:14:57] superstitious that they’re not getting the help they need so how do you go about John how do you go about reaching

[00:15:04] people in India what is your method in order to go out and and draw them to Christ

[00:15:11] so we are providing them the education because most of the people in village

[00:15:17] area they are illiterate especially the tribal people are not interested to send

[00:15:23] their children to schools so they will send them to take care of the cattle and

[00:15:28] because of starvation there is no food sufficient food to take them no

[00:15:33] electricity and nor drinking water so the so the first thing we are focusing

[00:15:39] the education we had to educate them you’re starting schools in vernacular language so they can come in and and

[00:15:46] study and sometimes we are conducting medical camps or this malaria jaundice

[00:15:53] so many water related diseases are there is there still leprosy yeah leprosy also

[00:16:00] was there so we have a separated or hospital for the Leopards so there was a time in in in my context so there

[00:16:07] excommunicate the Leopards from the society so they may wander here and there as baguettes they are not

[00:16:13] permitted to stay stay with their community now are they so for our

[00:16:18] listeners who don’t know a lot about the caste system or the social structure yeah can you explain a little bit about the

[00:16:24] caste system and what when a leper is kicked out of you know the social circles it’s it’s actually kind of like

[00:16:30] the New Testament where a person has yell out unclean and so forth yeah so so

[00:16:36] are they permanently just pushed out of society and and what do they have what do they do from there and so forth so

[00:16:42] they are not permitted to stay with their family they will be isolated so

[00:16:48] the missionaries especially the the mother Teresa the the Daughters of

[00:16:54] Charity they are especially wing yeah just like Graham stays there the people

[00:17:00] they approach these lepers and taking care of them and providing them food and

[00:17:06] their accommodation and medical facilities they are dressing their wounds and they are giving awareness to

[00:17:12] the community the leprosy can be treated it can be healed so they must be loud

[00:17:18] and society has to take care of them so through there’s this noble and

[00:17:23] charitable act so again they can be a good citizens even after the leprosy also healed so

[00:17:30] say it is noted and not willing to accept them even their family members Wow

[00:17:35] so do they do the Indian people they hit people who are a Hindu do they see what

[00:17:42] you’re doing and all the good you’re doing and are they happy about it or are they mad about it because I see all

[00:17:48] these good things you’re providing clean water and education and so many good things so what they’re telling that the

[00:17:55] out of love of Christ and Bible it is Jesus mode with the compassion when he

[00:18:00] saw the multitude missionaries moved to a society and community out of compassion and the love of Christ yeah

[00:18:06] but people took it in other sense they are interpreting that your intention is to convert people from Hinduism to to

[00:18:14] your Christianity so they misinterpreted out of there the wrong intention some of the people

[00:18:22] they are attacking missionaries and preventing them don’t come again and so

[00:18:27] many unfortunate things are happening because we are doing out of love because

[00:18:33] Bible says Jesus loud them so it is our primary duty to take care of the poor and you need people like the lipids yeah

[00:18:42] and so pastor Alex you’re doing ministry here in San Diego how many immigrants are there from India

[00:18:50] here in San Diego according to the latest statics that we tried to find out there are 25,000 Indian immigrants in

[00:18:57] Greater San Diego area that’s charge from you know East County to all the way

[00:19:02] to North County you know almost towards the Riverside area so that is the largest population that we have yeah and

[00:19:09] so so I mean you have a big ministry here in and of itself in reaching people who have who have immigrated immigrated

[00:19:16] to America yes and now my experience is that a lot of people from India you know

[00:19:23] have high degrees as either doctors or

[00:19:28] Engineers or whatever it’s funny because I was at a car dealership I was buying a car and the guy that was helping me was

[00:19:35] from India and he was talking to me and he said that his parents were mad at him

[00:19:40] because he didn’t finish getting his engineering degree and he had decided he

[00:19:46] wanted to get married and have kids and so he got a job at the car dealership and they were upset so from a social

[00:19:52] perspective and a family perspective is there an expectation among Indian families that a person you know works

[00:19:59] hard and gets a degree you know higher degree how does that work yeah Indian culture is hierarchical okay so the

[00:20:06] higher you go you knows that that is good look yeah so and also there is no

[00:20:12] individual thing so what do you do when you succeed or fail let affect the

[00:20:18] family okay so not just me you yeah what do you want to do with you

[00:20:24] what you wanna do doesn’t matter matters of you come to us so education is high value yeah so that’s what so the people

[00:20:31] those who you see here are the cream of the society in India okay they are well educated they are here so the way they

[00:20:37] want to spend here through the influence is through education so that the number

[00:20:42] one thing they try to do is either you are a doctor or an engineer so that is like you know highly paid jobs and

[00:20:49] dreams of the Vidya so that is a big thing so I have a question and that pertains to that so if you have these

[00:20:55] people that have engineering degrees and they’ve got doctorates and so forth how

[00:21:01] do they connect Hinduism with is there is there a disconnect between Hinduism

[00:21:08] and this high these degrees or do they say Hinduism works fine for me what are they

[00:21:15] are they generally Hindu are they generally agnostic or the people that immigrate the people immigrate to our

[00:21:22] experience is that because they are coming to a new social structure so they

[00:21:28] see their freedom they see the value of human beings the intrinsic value that

[00:21:33] people have the dignity all those things but still they are born into Hinduism

[00:21:39] they carry their gods here and goddesses here they try to leave their life in such a way and in and Western society

[00:21:46] Yoga is a entry point for these things and they go that’s a different conversation but that is what it goes so

[00:21:52] people don’t live in here still carry their the moral as most of them are living as Hindus here they

[00:21:58] practice Hinduism heroes okay so I am so what what are the obstacles you have in

[00:22:04] reaching out to people in in the local San Diego community when you’re when

[00:22:09] you’re trying to minister to them yeah the our churches consist of five different language groups so so we do

[00:22:15] English services because our children those were born and brought up here and they don’t speak our language so they

[00:22:21] are American Indians that Indian Americans they’re first Americans then they you know they say according to them

[00:22:28] unfortunately they are born to Indians here so that’s what they see yeah so that is because of that we try to

[00:22:33] reach them you know speaking in the Indian anglish languages and English we communicate so challenge we face is the

[00:22:41] affluence people have no need yeah here so you have money you have car you have

[00:22:46] degree you have everything else there you don’t need God anymore there it’s the complete opposite of what you see in Odessa in audition right yes yes

[00:22:54] okay so huh that’s really interesting yeah I I’ve had I had a guy I was

[00:23:00] talking to tell me he was from India but he said he worshiped all the different

[00:23:05] gods because he told me he said I just don’t know which one is true but I’m

[00:23:10] just gonna pray to all the gods and I said do you pray to Allah he said yeah I prayed to Allah this morning and he he

[00:23:17] said all these different gods were all good they all had good in them and so he was going to just pray to all of them

[00:23:23] umm and Hinduism tends to be polytheistic right so how does that

[00:23:29] affect people’s thinking when they come from a culture which says hey all always are good ways how does that affect them

[00:23:36] when you say John Jesus Christ is the way the truth and the life right he’s the one true God how

[00:23:43] do they deal with that so the diversity is the beauty as I as

[00:23:50] past Alex mentioned in behaviors different culture different language groups they belongs to different

[00:23:57] religious groups so one way we are cooperating each other and allow each

[00:24:02] other and accepting all religion but the perspective of Bible Jesus came to this

[00:24:10] world for to everybody respective of their caste creed and color and religion so we

[00:24:19] always threw our weights and deeds we want to explain them Jesus loves everybody and Jesus said the Gospel of

[00:24:26] John I am the way life and truth so they are spending lot of money and torturing

[00:24:32] their book body and practicing all these really religious rituals to get salvation or in moksha

[00:24:40] but Bible by faith you can get salvation that is the basic teaching we are giving

[00:24:48] them no ended up doing all these things just accept Jesus as your personal Savior and confess your sin because for

[00:24:55] the for getting a remission from sins they are doing lot of things yeah so we are just simply introducing the love of

[00:25:01] Christ to them so many are attracted reading through the scripture so there

[00:25:07] they came to the saving knowledge of Christ and many people have embraced the Christian faith and that now they are

[00:25:14] leaving a very very comfortable life and peaceful life peaceful useful because

[00:25:19] you no longer have to do so many things oh we have just introduced the love of Christ to them because Christ died for

[00:25:25] everybody amen amen that’s fantastic my guests today are pastor Alexander John

[00:25:30] and John Maathai and ICF san diego.org is their website eight five eight two oh six seven one eight eight if you’re

[00:25:37] interested in supporting their efforts in to reach those who are from India or

[00:25:43] in India please get a hold of them look them up check them out it’s an

[00:25:48] incredible ministry and there are so many people that need the love of Jesus where they’re ministering so please

[00:25:55] check that out stay with us we’ve got two more segments left we’re gonna talk a little bit more about this we’ll be right back

[00:26:01] [Music]

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[00:27:06] thanks for being here today you’re on educate for life radio I’m Kevin Conover your host my websites

[00:27:11] educate for life org love to have you check it out my guest today our pastor Alexander John and John Maathai from

[00:27:18] India and John is here just on a short trip two months staying here in the

[00:27:24] States he’s supported by the India Christian Fellowship pastor Alexander John’s

[00:27:30] congregation and we just want to encourage you if you have a heart for missions you’ve if you have a heart for

[00:27:36] India or the Indian people this is a great opportunity to get involved and make a difference support them through

[00:27:42] prayer or financially in order to help people that desperately need help parts of India are extremely poverty

[00:27:49] ridden I mean they’re still dealing with things like leprosy and all kinds of horrible debilitating diseases as well

[00:27:55] as the lack of clean water and education and so many different things and John

[00:28:01] you have quite a few stories about some of the things that have happened in India you were just telling me off the

[00:28:08] air Pastor John was Alex was telling me that what happened with this lady who heard you on the radio

[00:28:14] yeah Indian communities basically in a gearing community so main professional

[00:28:21] job is a Greek culture so most of the people in the evening time this daily

[00:28:27] very laborious they’re listening radio listening to the radio okay the transfield the radio the previous

[00:28:33] leaders known as wish irani they are sharing gospel in different languages

[00:28:39] including tribal language okay so once it happened happened I know that family

[00:28:44] very personally one lady one Hindu lady lady since long days she was bedridden and she was

[00:28:51] paralyzed okay just listening the gospel in her own language through radio

[00:28:58] they’re introducing Jesus is the one who healeth all the sickness yeah so she couldn’t understand who is Jesus she

[00:29:05] called your daughter and cell we come and listen through radio they’re introducing some new doctor so finally

[00:29:13] the concluding part of the message they said wherever you have you can he says can heal you so the mother and

[00:29:19] daughter together prayed Lord we are not able to go for further treatment they tried many medicines and still

[00:29:26] suffering the moment the prayer concluded as a result of prayer she

[00:29:32] believed in Jesus then the new doctor and she got healing and I got this

[00:29:38] information from Renault form the missionary from the village so I could

[00:29:43] visit them and and they received a baptism and we conducted a Lord’s Supper

[00:29:49] service also in their village through this the healing many people came to Lourdes

[00:29:54] so radio ministry so effective yes Tilly miracles are happening when

[00:30:00] people listening Gospel message through radio in their own language and dialects

[00:30:06] that’s absolutely incredible praise God so so here’s this for those of you are listening so basically this lady heard

[00:30:13] on the radio that Jesus can heal people and she thought he was a doctor yeah

[00:30:18] well he’s the great physician right and so so she prayed to be healed and she

[00:30:23] was healed and then that leads to many people getting saved see that’s that is great and so to keep these shows on the

[00:30:29] air and everything though that that cost money right so you being a missionary there you’re a full-time missionary done

[00:30:34] now do you work a job on the side also or you’re just getting funding from the church in order to be able to no no I’m

[00:30:40] glad for you and your family I am a full-time missionary so friends and well wishes are supporting us yeah so we know

[00:30:48] the kingdom of God is not built upon money the extension of God’s kingdom prepares a lot of money for our

[00:30:54] traveling for printing for giving them Bibles for medical camps and literacy

[00:31:00] program or for providing them the Bible literature literature and Bible

[00:31:06] materials and study materials in their own language so we need the prayer and support from or from our prayer partners

[00:31:14] and those who are loving the work in India yeah and you were saying pastor Alex that some people if you give

[00:31:21] directly to you know the government or whatever that a lot of times the money never gets to where it needs to go yes

[00:31:27] yes the other understanding is there with with the boat weather with the

[00:31:32] ministry or missions or with the government forget about it that nothing happens at all we’ll never go where

[00:31:37] ministries over there yeah ministries also because this is larger ministries all kinds of things happen so I know him

[00:31:42] 30 years yeah and what happens in the field you know because the if you be a bicycle I was surprised actually you

[00:31:50] know I said who wants a bicycle nowadays actually yeah because but when we thought about I thought like that but

[00:31:56] when a missionary in the field get a bicyclist like you get a BMW for free

[00:32:01] yeah how much excitement you look how I was blown away actually by seeing that excitement and things you know so that

[00:32:08] simple thing even now in this day and age he’s still useful and it is needed

[00:32:13] so we think mission and ministry is like a lot of people gathered or things like that but some of the places there is a

[00:32:19] day like can you imagine that a lady hear about Jesus she think is a doctor yeah kind of people still are alive

[00:32:26] yeah in this day and age and the part of that voice just shows the need people have enormous needs other things so if

[00:32:33] you’re listening what I mean even something as small as buying a bike for a missionary over in Odisha is

[00:32:39] significant so if if your har if you feel the Holy Spirit talking to you and telling you to support what they’re

[00:32:45] doing the money is going to go directly to what John is doing over in India so

[00:32:50] you can contact a pastor Alex again his website is ICF San Diego org and their

[00:32:57] phone numbers eight five eight two oh six seven one eight eight if you want to see an immediate impact for your

[00:33:03] investment into the kingdom of God this is an incredible opportunity to do just that and so so John now do you have

[00:33:11] family you have wife and kids I got married when my wife name is Lizzy Joe

[00:33:16] and we are blessed with the two children okay let’s discern it yes and he’s studying in in the school that told to

[00:33:24] grade his name is Joel and our daughter is Johanna she’s in the sixth grade say

[00:33:29] I said together as a family we are staying in the capital city of Orissa and we are coordinating the different

[00:33:36] missionary activities in universe state and I am moving to a neighboring state

[00:33:41] also or teaching and taking class and coordinating different mission activities that’s great now are you

[00:33:49] growing is your congregation are you seeing some good fruit as far as other people who are feel called to serve as

[00:33:56] missionaries there and to continue to spread the gospel yeah and pastoring in it church also in the boonies er City so different

[00:34:03] language people are attending your service we have a Bible studies and we

[00:34:08] are equipping or local people to go out as missionaries because missionaries are not born they are made it is the duty of

[00:34:16] the church take you paid them to teach them so because this is the time for the

[00:34:21] native evangelism yeah 10 years back we are preaching about the cross culture evangelist of somebody from South India

[00:34:27] or some other parts us to come and learn language and culture and work among them this was the teaching previously we

[00:34:33] followed but the last 10 years we are focusing the native evangelism we occupy

[00:34:39] and teach and train the local people so they can do more effective and

[00:34:44] meaningful ministry than V people yeah so this is the time for the it’s a mom

[00:34:50] it’s a lot more difficult to come cross culturally where European you’re coming from out of the culture you don’t understand it versus just being in there

[00:34:56] in indigenous to they can work more effectively in their own context so they

[00:35:03] know the language and the climate and culture so it is very easy to spread gospel through the local missionaries so

[00:35:11] we are planting we have some training centers in gherkin I make them the multo community and you know result so we have

[00:35:18] a training center spencey also yeah to do that because a missionary go on with

[00:35:24] more money actually you train up local people so they go back and they leave there they leave out the gospel you know

[00:35:31] so that is what happened and years four or five years ago there is a family accepted Christ and came to the faith

[00:35:38] and because of the V ladies didn’t like that they burned their house so then they when he called and let us know we

[00:35:44] said we had to build a house for them Wow so finally they built the house after four years these people those who burn

[00:35:50] the house and those who perpetrated those kind of stuff they saw that what Christians are loving each other and

[00:35:56] doing thing one by one they started oh my goodness that’s amazing well that’s that’s an incredible story we

[00:36:02] have one more segment left where we’re down to our last segment here I hope

[00:36:07] that this message is encouraging you you know sometimes we we feel like oh what’s happening or you know there’s bad things

[00:36:14] happening but like pastor Alex just said you know this this group they they have their house burned down but people see

[00:36:19] the good deeds that are happening they see the love that Christians are showing for each other Jesus Christ said do your

[00:36:25] good deeds in front of man so that they may praise your father in heaven and I think when we people see the authentic love of God in a community

[00:36:33] it’s very magnetizing right people want to come to that they want that that love

[00:36:39] that people have so we’re going to talk a little bit about this the difference between the cultural aspects of Hinduism

[00:36:46] and what’s going on there and Christianity how they’re different when we get back we have one more segment

[00:36:52] left so I hope you’ll stay with us [Music]

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[00:38:00] thanks for being here I’m Kevin Conover and you’re listening to educate for life radio we’ve got all kinds of fantastic

[00:38:06] shows that you can check out on our youtube channel as well as our podcasts all kinds of interviews with people from

[00:38:13] all over the world with different experiences we’re actually going to be interviewing upcoming here Ken Ham from

[00:38:19] Answers in Genesis on Friday as well as a woman who is not a Christian she’s

[00:38:24] we’re gonna be interviewing a psychic to talk about her experiences and we love

[00:38:30] to have different people from different perspectives on the show as well as those people who are serving the Lord and following Christ and that’s what we

[00:38:37] have today pastor Alexander John and John Maathai if you’re interested in supporting their efforts they’re both

[00:38:43] originally from India and God has given him a ministry reaching out to Pastor

[00:38:49] John Pass Alex here in San Diego reaching out to immigrants there’s about 25,000

[00:38:54] immigrants from India here in San Diego there are ten Hindu temples pastor Alex

[00:39:02] told me and so there’s a big need for people to be able to reach out to these communities that we don’t necessarily

[00:39:07] run into all the time and the blessing of having somebody like John over in

[00:39:12] India doing what he’s doing is that he’s he’s somebody who’s familiar with the culture he grew up in the culture he

[00:39:18] knows all about the culture he lives in the culture and so he’s equipped to be able to reach out to these people with

[00:39:23] the love of Jesus and you know one of the things I was reflecting on was I’ve

[00:39:29] heard you know a lot of Ravi Zacharias and his apologetics and also Dinesh D’Souza is also from India and to hear

[00:39:39] what they had to say about their experience growing up in the Hindu culture how is what is the contrast John

[00:39:45] between the Christian you know Christ’s admonition to love your enemies pray for

[00:39:52] those who persecute you is it a lot different than Hinduism or is it or is there a lot of similarities or is there

[00:39:58] a lot of differences differences are there but we are trying our level best

[00:40:04] to show them what is the real life love of Christ so in the case of gram stain’s

[00:40:10] murder though gram stain’s and his two sons brutally killed by these radical groups

[00:40:18] gram stain’s wife sister Gladys said I am forgiving them just for that one

[00:40:24] statement the ender whale came to know that Christianity is the religion of tolerance and forgiveness even in the

[00:40:33] top Hindu leaders also appreciated that statement so she could forgive the killers of her husband and two sons you

[00:40:40] see in our words and deeds in her day-to-day life here showing them so

[00:40:47] Christ the teachings of Christ you have to love your enemies and pray for them

[00:40:53] and forgive and forget so through our deeds we can exhibit them so more people

[00:41:03] will be attracted to Christianity through our deeds than our messages so

[00:41:09] it’s interesting too that you know you were you were saying that in

[00:41:14] Christianity your loving people and you’re helping them to see Christ

[00:41:19] through the way you act yeah and in within Hinduism there’s a lot of works that have to be done yeah now they’re

[00:41:25] trying to get to Nirvana is that right yeah yeah and so in order to get to Nirvana or in order to reincarnate into

[00:41:33] something better they have to do a lot of things as a heavy load on their shoulders yeah so when they hear the

[00:41:38] message of Christ in that you’re saved by grace through faith it’s not something that you do yourself how does

[00:41:43] that impact the people you’re talking to is that that is that a very foreign concept for most of them or when they’re

[00:41:51] listening the gospel message of salvation by faith yeah more people

[00:41:56] especially this new generation they are more interested in in that principle because many people their forefathers

[00:42:03] even some places in human sacrifices in the tribal Beltane I know in the books it is written that even people doing

[00:42:11] this human sacrifice and animal sacrifice just to please gods and goddesses so when they listen the the

[00:42:17] pure gospel so more people will be attracted because they could understand

[00:42:23] that because what they are doing is the wrong and it is noted of continuing in that so

[00:42:29] salvation by faith is a very very powerful yeah now I know a long time ago

[00:42:37] there was a practice where widows if their husband died they actually had to be burned with their husbands died so

[00:42:44] the Sony was play yes sorry is that how you pronounce it now is that still practiced or is that

[00:42:50] gone that is gone during the time of villain Gary in West Bengal is the

[00:42:56] neighboring state of Odisha so all that built was practicing study for that the

[00:43:02] time of villain query William curry Oh William K the person who took initiative

[00:43:10] and during his time because of their mission activities and awareness program

[00:43:16] so he was completely prohibited in India we are so proud about that

[00:43:23] due to the missionary activities such as that the wrong practices and older traditions was banned in India for that

[00:43:31] and then what about the whole thing with the cowls is that still a very very much

[00:43:37] part I was talking to actually a Microsoft engineer who was helping me he

[00:43:43] was in India and I actually asked him about that and I said do you mind if I ask you a personal question and I said

[00:43:49] why do Hindus revere cows and he said well we believe that our ancestors live

[00:43:55] in the cows and he and I said really and and he said yeah and I said do you

[00:44:01] believe that and he said I don’t know I he said I went to McDonald’s yesterday

[00:44:06] and I hate hamburger so he said he felt really bad about it but so III and then

[00:44:12] it was interesting because he said his Christian friend had just invited him to church and I said oh that’s awesome you

[00:44:18] should go so how does that impact things that the attitude towards cows as padeen

[00:44:24] do tradition they believe that cow is a new holy animal so they are considering

[00:44:29] it as the one of the one of the God so norm normally people worship the cow early morning that they will

[00:44:38] they will wash the cow and the garlands and all these that they’re putting this just like Sindhu and they are providing

[00:44:45] a special food to them so normally they are worshipping the the cow so recently

[00:44:51] so many unfortunate things happened in in in the North India that cow slaughter and somebody’s taking the Beavers so

[00:44:59] people are posing them so so many unfortunate the crowd killed some people

[00:45:05] because they cure them because they kill the cow not because they that is an

[00:45:11] unfortunate thing but government is taking some strong steps to do to arrest

[00:45:16] the culprits and giving the awareness that that thing is happening but because

[00:45:23] they consider the cows and holy animals so they’re compelling people everybody has to worship the cow so through

[00:45:31] teaching solely these such things can be changed yeah so I hope the situation

[00:45:36] will change in the coming future does that affect their ability for example to have food because they won’t eat cows

[00:45:42] would they be better off what is there more starvation because they won’t eat cows or is that not a factor no they are

[00:45:50] vegetarians basically in that sense but the other what we see is how is a god yeah so the cow has more value than a

[00:45:57] human being in India now treated better than better than many places so you can touch the cow you can do any of those

[00:46:02] things actually so so the politician so all these things are God’s you know and so that is a contrast to the question go

[00:46:10] back actually what you are asking create recreation thing everything is God for

[00:46:15] the Sun man star and Moon and cow and mountain and snake and everything is God

[00:46:20] yeah so you don’t see that raw Hinduism here it is more filtered that you see here in

[00:46:25] our place but that is very real I still have really you say God is everywhere

[00:46:30] but they they say what is in everything that is the difference yeah yeah well

[00:46:38] you know guys I I think it’s just a big blessing to have you here and I thank you so much for what you’re doing

[00:46:44] praise God for that what he’s doing and if you’re listening I hope that this has been an encouragement to you that

[00:46:50] there’s a huge in India and there’s a lot of people desperately looking for hope

[00:46:56] desperately looking for a way out of the pain and a lot of the misery that’s created by believing something that’s

[00:47:03] not true you can support pastor Alexander John and John Mathai ICF San Diego org is the

[00:47:09] website please check it out eight five eight two oh six seven one eight eight if you’d like to talk to pastor alex directly he’d be happy to

[00:47:17] talk with you and just share more about what they’re doing and and how the money is used or and so forth or just go check

[00:47:24] out their church too it’s up in Poway if you’re nearby it’s a fantastic opportunity to get to know people kind of break out of the mold and

[00:47:30] get to know some people from india it’s it’s fantastic so thank you guys for being on the show today thank you

[00:47:37] absolutely okay god bless you and I’ll see you on Friday at 12:30 I hope you’ve enjoyed it and

[00:47:44] we’ll see you then with Ken Ham and some other guests too god bless you have a great day

[00:47:50] [Music]