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John, a pastor from the San Diego area, returned from his trip to Manipur, India and came back with one story after another of modern-day occurrences of situations we read about in the Gospels and Acts:
You know how Luke writes in general that “a bunch of people got healed in this town, or that town…” He often didn’t record all the specific healings because there were just too many of them to count. That’s what it was like for us in Manipur! Even when I tried to journal them daily, I simply couldn’t keep up with the sheer quantity of physical healings that God was working while we were there.
As we entered each village, I kept thinking about when Jesus said, “Go out and preach the Gospel and heal the sick.” But, what I didn’t know was that my interpreter was telling the villagers that we had come simply to learn about their culture – which I wasn’t.
I would like to… sometime. But not today.
This day, I was much more interested in their salvation than their culture.
So, at the first village we went to, it was a little confusing to me why they kept going on and on about their family, their music and cultural history. Once I realized how things were being interpreted, I told our translator to simply tell them that we had come to preach the Gospel and heal the sick. This, in my mind, would be a much more efficient use of our time and efforts.
The response at the next village was beyond belief! Instead of the children being bored from hearing the same old stories about their family, everyone was lively and engaged – and they brought to us one person after another after another who were sick and in need of God’s healing touch!
There were sick people, lame people, people with broken arms or joints that weren’t working right, stiff necks, headaches… you name it, they poured in, we laid hands on them and prayed and God healed them!
We then told them that if they wanted to follow Jesus, they would need to abandon all their other gods, which is a complicated decision in India, because the culture has been polytheistic with thousands of gods for hundreds of years. But, it was unbelievable to see God speak to their hearts and we witnessed whole families coming to Christ one after another!
There was this one particular lady who brought her mom forward. She had these black, leprous looking toes. After we prayed for her, she said that the pain started leaving, but I couldn’t see any healing manifestation with my eyes. So, while the mom rested, I approached her daughter and asked if she’d be interested in accepting Jesus. She told me that if Jesus healed her mom’s toes, then she would follow Him. I then told her that regardless of whether or not her mom’s toes were healed, judgment day will come and she’ll either be held responsible for her sins or she could accept Jesus’ atoning sacrifice. In other words, “I love you. God loves you even more. But, you are going to go to hell if you don’t accept Christ, despite the condition of your mom’s toes.”
Soon after, we left to get some lunch, and my interpreter came running up to me, telling me that the daughter’s back was healed. (which was so weird, because I didn’t even know that she had any back problems)
While we were eating, this man ran up to us who had heard about the woman with the healed back and he also wanted to accept Jesus and His healing. Over the next four days, our team led over 400 former Hindus to the Lord and watched Jesus heal countless people in miraculous ways!
But the most profound thing that happened occurred as we were sharing the Gospel in this one house and our guide ran in saying that we needed to get into his car immediately. So, I hurried up: “Do you want to go to hell or heaven? Heaven? Good. Let’s pray.” I wrapped up with then and quickly ran to our guide’s car. He raced down a dirt road and suddenly stopped. He then told me, “Get out! Get in that car now.” So I jumped out of his car and into the one next to us. My new driver sped down the road even faster than the first driver. Now, keep in mind, I had no idea who this new driver was or where on earth we were going. But, when I looked back into the backseat, I discovered the smiling face of our interpreter. So, my anxiety was a little at ease, but I still had no idea what we were doing or where we were going.
I then learned that they were taking me to speak at a memorial service for Iboyaima, who had died four years ago and a group was gathering to honor his life, his service and his passion for the arts. An amazing man, from what I understood – but I had no idea who he was! So, I spent the next several minutes learning how to pronounce the man’s name and learning the details of his life.
Then, when we arrived, we were greeted by a huge motorcade with guards armed with machine guns. The Indian media were also there at the huge amphitheater filming the meeting. There were row upon row of dignitaries and government officials there, along with professors and doctors from all around the region. They showed me to my seat, right next to the Vice-President of the International Physician’s Society Against Terrorism – a Nobel Peace Prize winner! They then included me in the service: lighting incense, laying down flowers… and I still had no idea who Iboyaima was!
All I knew was that in the span of just a few minutes, I went from sitting on the floor of a hut leading a family of poor people to Christ to now being shown on Indian television, preaching the Gospel to an amphitheater full of international dignitaries.
I looked out and saw Iboyaima’s widow crying and I remembered the story of Jesus comforting Lazarus’ family in John 11:
Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in me will live, even after dying. 26 Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die.
After sharing the Gospel message, I sat back down next to Iboyaima’s son (the second driver who had raced me to the amphitheater). The young man then leaned over and told me to tell the man on my other side that I am very interested in the arts and I wanted to learn about it. Which, to me, sounded insane! Because I didn’t. I might like to learn more about it… but not today.
The boy continued to prod me to ask, so I complied. What I didn’t know at first was that the whole event was a fundraiser for a theater that Iboyaima was a major donor for. Well, the Vice President of the IPSAT was so excited about my “interest” in the arts that he invited me and my team to a performance at another arts center the following evening. This turned out to be a much bigger event than I had expected. Before we knew it, we were having tea at the dignitary’s home, again surrounded by armed guards (I learned later that he was the former Minister of the Arts for the State of Manipur) and then whisked into his private motorcade. For much of the drive, it was just me, the dignitary and his guards in his huge car, and I knew that I needed to share Jesus with him. So, I said, “I believe that Jesus brought me thousands of miles just for the opportunity that I could sit here with you in your car and tell you how much in love with you Jesus is.”
When we arrived at the theater, he asked me to take the stage and offer a greeting to the audience. Apparently, having an American in attendance gave him and his event a lot of clout. But he didn’t want me to preach. I asked if my interpreter could join me and he replied, “No. I will be your interpreter, and you need to keep it very short.” But no one told this message to my interpreter, so when I walked onto the stage, he eagerly raced up alongside me. But, to save face, he was allowed to stay and to keep appearances, they handed him the microphone.
Well, we couldn’t let an opportunity like this slip by, so we let ‘er rip!
I said, “Thanks for having us here tonight. We love your culture, your food, your clothes (and they all applauded). And Jesus Christ is Lord!” I then went on to detail who Jesus is, how we all need Him, and that He wants to spend eternity with each and every one of us!
It’s often a really good thing that God doesn’t tell us in advance what he will do. Instead, He works in His time, in His ways, through His people in ways that may go beyond our greatest expectations. We just need to be prepared to serve “in season and out of season” (2 Timothy 4:2)