Category Archives: Just One Minute

Sep 13 2024
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Just One Minute

How God Strengthens Us in Our Darkest Moments

Acts 18 records Paul’s first visit to Corinth. This chapter includes a matter that, at first glance, seems odd in a great man of faith as Paul—fear.

While Paul made great progress among the Gentiles, he faced blasphemous opposition from Corinthian Jews. As Paul experienced their ferocity, fear rose in his heart.

One night, he had a vision of Jesus who told him, “Do not be afraid any longer, but go on speaking… I am with you… no man will attack you… I have many people in this city” (Acts 18:9-10).

Every person who contends for the Lord faces the rage of those who hate God. In the Old Testament, Elijah won an overwhelming victory over the prophets of Baal. But when Queen Jezebel remained set in her idolatry even after the miracle of God, she threatened Elijah’s life. He fled and hid in a cave, convinced he was the only faithful one left in Israel.

Moses, David, John the Baptist had their own bouts with fear. Even Jesus Himself, bearing His true human condition, experienced every human emotion including fear.

In 1517, Martin Luther experienced fear when he faced a hostile religious establishment, seemingly all alone.

Recent years have presented the greatest challenges I have ever faced in my ministry. Fear is a very real thing which I also face.

The question is not whether we have fears, but what we do with them. Does fear master us, or do we master fear? Do we retreat from Satan’s rage, or do we trust our Lord through his rage?

Jesus, who was truly human, knows from experience how fragile we are. He does not leave us alone in our fear but encourages us through it. He came to Paul, not to chastise him for weak faith but to strengthen him and re-confirm His call on Paul’s life. He assured Paul that He was for him, and that he would bear much fruit in Corinth. He had a purpose, and he would fulfill it no matter what. Paul stood firm.

When we stand firm despite our fear, we will also bear much fruit because God is faithful to deliver. God is glorified by the fruit we bear in this life, and we are immortal in this life until we accomplish our purpose.

God is faithful even in our mortality. Martyrs for the faith, such as Stephen, did not die in vain but paved the way for Paul’s conversion and future mission to the Corinthians and many others. Think of Odisha missionary Graham Staines and his two sons, trapped and burned to death by a murderous mob. A terrible death indeed, but how many men and women now serve Christ in Odisha today through their sacrifice and suffering?

Paul, who endured more than his share of suffering, and must have faced fear many times, has written, “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us” (Romans 8:18).

Paul kept his perspective. He remained close to God who continually encouraged him and gave him hints of greater glory. Even those little hints overwhelmed all the enemy threw at him.

May God encourage each of us through our own struggles with fear in troubled times!

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Aug 17 2024
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Just One Minute

Bridging Cultures: Paul’s Approach

Paul’s visit to Mars Hill in Acts 17 has some important lessons for us today as we confront a culture that has become almost as pagan as the Athenian culture Paul confronted.

In many ways, the Athenians of Paul’s day resembled our own. Yet Paul made an impact upon these heathens, and some of them had their eyes opened. This should encourage us in our own day.

See if you recognize some of these Athenian traits in our own day: rationalism, materialism, relativism, promiscuity (even in religion), rampant sexual perversion, i.e., homosexuality and pedophilia, human trafficking (in this case, slavery), worship of beautiful people, belief that education is the solution to society’s problems, a two-tiered justice system, just to name a few.

Like many people in our own day, these jaded people had no knowledge or trust in inspired scriptures. Quoting from the Old Testament would have meant nothing to these elites steeped in Epicurean and Stoic philosophy, and worship of many gods and goddesses.

Indeed, when Paul first began to speak to them of Jesus, most of them initially brushed him off as an “idle babbler” and a teacher of “strange deities.”

Yet Paul never assumed the privileged Athenian know-it-alls were too far gone for redemption. These pagans also possessed the image of God. They had eternity in their hearts, and these facts inadvertently revealed themselves in the pagan philosophies of the day. So he approached them through the very words of their own philosophers who possessed some truth–though not all of it. For example…

Sometimes we quote Paul, who said to them of the Creator God, “In Him we live and move and have our being,” not knowing that we are actually quoting a pagan Cretan philosopher named Epimenides (c.a. 600 BC). Through such links with their own thinkers, Paul led them to consider Jesus Christ. We are told that his approach struck a receptive chord. Some of them stopped laughing, listened to what Paul was trying to tell them—and they believed!

Paul demonstrated that before we can effectively communicate the gospel to anyone, we must first understand where they are coming from. Only then can we link them to Jesus. We must love them even as God loves them, knowing that Christ died for them as He died for us. The Good News resonates with people of every background—if we take the time to know them and present the truth in a manner they best understand.

Some teachers at IGO training centers and many graduates come out of Hindu, Sikh, Muslim or Buddhist backgrounds—religions regarded by many westerners as “unreachable.” But today, they communicate Jesus Christ to their own people. In many ways, evangelists and church planters from non-Christian backgrounds are the best gospel communicators of all.

Dr. Mahendra Singhal, a former Hindu who knows Hindus and leads an outreach to Hindus, has said, “Hindus believe in going to the extremes in showing love to someone… I have discovered in my witnessing to Hindus that they are generally moved by the depiction of Jesus on the cross to validate His love for us.”

Paul’s approach still works. May his approach become our own as we stand for Christ where we live, work and learn!

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May 03 2024
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Just One Minute

Resistance Against Truth

“These men have upset the world!”

These charges were leveled at Paul and Silas after they preached the Good News in Thessalonica. They must have done a great job in making the gospel clear to all who heard them. Acts 17 tells us that many people came to Christ, both Jews and Gentiles. For these people, the gospel was a welcome fragrance.

To others, it was the stench of death. Some Jews hated the message, and wanted to make Paul and Silas pay for ruining their day. They accused Paul and Silas of promoting another ruler besides Caesar. These Jews hated the rule of Caesar, but they hated Jesus even more.

This episode illustrates a truth about the Good News. Even when clearly presented, it will win some and infuriate others, even to the point of violence. In one person, the Holy Spirit brings new life; in another, the gospel reveals spiritual death.

Why do people reject the gospel? Such people love their sin above all else and resent having it exposed by the light of Christ and told that it is evil. They want to call evil good, to run their own lives without accountability to anyone, including God who made them.

No doubt some people who opposed Paul and Silas were religious, but they were dead to the true God. They wanted to turn the truth of God into something that sounded moral and sounded comfortable. As such, it was something less than truth. They preferred a god that helped them feel good about themselves, not repent. When Paul and Silas reminded them of their sin and God’s holiness, they recoiled.

Paul and Silas did not follow the seeker-friendly approach popular in many churches today. The seeker-friendly approach may lead people to adopt certain ideas from the Bible that appeal to them, but fail to reveal sin leading to repentance. They become devoted to their own ideas of God more than to God Himself.

A spiritually dead person can have spiritual longings, but they are always less than God. They still hate the true God even when they speak in moral and spiritual ways. In real life, they operate according to natural thinking.

The seeker-friendly approach operates on the false premise that one can share the gospel and lead a person to God without upsetting anyone. The seeker-friendly approach is a sign of how much the culture has impacted the church more than the church has impacted the culture.

George Barna reports that in his research, he has found that only 6% of today’s adults have a biblical worldview. The average American church person’s dominant worldview, he says, is syncretism, a collection of contradictory beliefs pasted together to suit themselves. A growing number of people in churches believe in reincarnation and that people are basically good. Fewer pastors preach the gospel with the clarity of Paul and Silas.

Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil. He has already defeated Satan at the cross and invites us to join Him in enforcing His victory. He also warns us that Satan will go down swinging hard.

Let us move forward like Paul and Silas, assured of victory but also steeled for resistance from those who refuse to bow the knee to the King of kings. Let us remember that Jesus has already won.

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Apr 07 2024
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Just One Minute

God’s Unexpected Choices

God can work through anybody! That is a vital lesson we can all learn from Acts 16.

In Acts 16, Paul takes the gospel for the first time to Europe. His venture plants a gospel beachhead in a pagan Roman colony, Philippi—through a woman. In Paul’s day, women were supposed to stay home, not start new and earthshaking movements. The woman, Lydia wasn’t even a native of the city, but came from Asia Minor.

She followed the God of the Jews, but there were not even enough Jews in Philippi to start a synagogue. So, she just met with a small band of other like-minded Gentile women at the riverbank. With this seemingly woeful and unnoticed group, Paul began his ministry—and ultimately changed a continent. As we read on, Lydia became a more dynamic believer and leader than anyone expected. Another example…

In those early days of ministry in Philippi, Paul and his companion-in-ministry, Silas, delivered a girl possessed of demons. That miracle unjustly landed them in jail because Paul ended the livelihood of those who exploited the poor girl’s misery for profit.

Instead of complaining, Paul and Silas praised God for His many blessings which outweighed their present trials. God responded with an earthquake that caused chaos in the prison. The jailer almost committed suicide, thinking all his prisoners had escaped, and he would now suffer death from his superiors for losing them.

This jailer was likely a cynical man hardened by the dregs of humanity. There was nothing religious or idealistic about him, and yet something about the lives of Paul and Silas touched him. In his sudden weakness, the shaken man approached them and asked, “What must I do to be saved?” That night, we are told, the jailer and his entire household—wife, children, relatives, servants—put their trust in Jesus Christ.

This unlikely woman, Lydia, and unnamed Roman jailer, along with his household, became part of the new fellowship of believers in Philippi. Every believer who comes from a European heritage or has received guidance through European believers ultimately owes a spiritual debt to these two unlikely people for an important reason…

The Philippian church did not become a self-centered, religious social club. In his letter to the Philippians, Paul praises the Philippians for their faith and vision for the lost. They were not content to keep the faith to themselves but joined Paul’s mission to deliver the faith to Thessalonica and the center of Rome itself.

Let us not forget that Paul himself was an unlikely messenger—a “Jew of the Jews,” a former terrorist and fanatic who became God’s messenger to the Gentiles he once despised.

The lesson is clear: never underestimate what God can do through you no matter what you or others may think of your abilities. God is always able to work in unexpected ways in unexpected people to accomplish His greater work.

I see this all the time as I meet with Indian evangelists and pastors. Again and again, IGO training centers graduate men and women from the most unlikely backgrounds whom God has called to do great things for the Kingdom.

What unlikely and unthinkable thing is God willing to do through you to affect lives and destinies of people for generations to come?

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Oct 21 2023
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Just One Minute

Impossible Victory

In times of crisis, we must know what to do to gain victory. Acts 12 gives us a good model.

In Acts 12, heavy persecution hit the Jerusalem group of Jesus followers. It came against them from the enemies with the most money, the strongest military and political power, and a long and established religious tradition. Herod Agrippa, who ordered the persecution, was a ruthless king who cared nothing for God nor man, only his own power. He wanted to do something to please the religious establishment.

Among those who died was James, apostle of the church, brother of John, son of Zebedee, one of Jesus’ three closest disciples. Peter waited in jail for public humiliation and certain death, delayed only by a religious holiday. We are told that he was guarded by 16 soldiers and chained to two of them. Short of a miracle, Peter was going to die.

The death of James was a terrible blow to the church, and the loss of Peter and his teaching would put the church in jeopardy. No one took the situation lightly. We are told the whole church met for an all-night prayer meeting over this humanly impossible situation. It was grim, but not hopeless.

To make a long story short, the miracle happened. An angel came to the prison and snatched Peter from his chains, from the guards and from certain death. His rescue was so dramatic, it caught everyone by surprise, including the prayer warriors.

This miracle took place because of how the church responded to the crisis. They did not just wait for God to act, nor did they panic.

Luke tells us the whole church met for an all-night prayer meeting and prayed “fervently.” The Greek word means they strained themselves to the utmost to reach their goal. They were not half-hearted or ritualistic in their prayers but wholehearted. They may not have been eloquent, but they gave themselves with total sincerity, expectancy and trust that God would come through. They moved God with their faith in Him.

There is great advantage in praying together. Prayer builds upon prayer, faith builds upon faith, until they find themselves praying for things only God can do. God wants us to pray for “impossible” things and expect Him to do them. He delights when we trust Him as our Father. He wants us to grasp the authority He has given us to deal firmly with the “Herod Agrippas” of our lives (see Matthew 16:19).

It never pays to be passive with God. God is “in control,” but in His sovereignty, He wants us to confront opponents with authority to speak and decree words of release and freedom, to destroy the works of the devil. Certainly, the devil was at work through the political and religious elites of that day. The church recognized it, taking the situation seriously, yet refusing to panic or regard themselves as victims.

We also live in crisis days, facing our own “Herod Agrippas.” Let us pray “fervently” in the spirit of the early church. The prince of darkness is grim, but we must not tremble for him. Instead, we must pray, united in wholehearted sincerity and confidence in the God of the impossible. No chains and prisons need hinder His purposes in this world and in our lives when we ask in faith.

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Sep 08 2023
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Just One Minute

What Made This Church So Great?

If the conversion and Holy Spirit filling of the Samaritans, the Ethiopian eunuch and the Roman centurion Cornelius seemed radical to Jewish believers, what happened at Antioch must have gone off the charts.

The three people mentioned above were considered Gentiles, but they had at least some connection to the Jewish traditions. The people of Antioch were total pagans in just about every way imaginable, and then some. Yet in Acts 11, Luke portrays a fellowship of Jesus followers that has become a model for us in our own day.

Antioch became the gospel gateway to the rest of the Gentile world, the missionary headquarters leading to Europe, the rest of the Roman Empire, and ultimately, to us today. In Antioch, Jesus followers first became known as “Christians,” a term that once had a meaning far beyond the established religious groups we know today. What makes the Antioch church so great?

No one knows who founded the Antioch church—probably an unknown lay person. Whoever it was, the church also had supernatural roots. “The hand of the Lord was upon them,” Luke records. What a remarkable description! They depended upon the power of God, not their own knowledge and ingenuity. They heard the voice of God and saw Him work miracles in their midst. Programs were less important than people and the pleasure of God’s company.

As a result, record numbers of people from pagan backgrounds were turning to Christ from every background. They hungered for fellowship with God and with one another. They became involved in serious and effective prayer. They heard God speak to them through the Word. They had a Great Commission vision for the world. Deep understanding and application of the Word was vital to them.

From the Antioch church Paul launched his great missionary journeys that ultimately spread the gospel throughout the Roman Empire. Many other lesser known but powerful missions to the world had their beginnings at Antioch because the people there believed in self-multiplication.

Personal and corporate discipleship was the rule. Continuous spiritual growth and maturity was the goal. These people in the Antioch church were not rural hillbillies but sophisticated and cosmopolitan men, women and children from the third largest urban center in the Roman Empire.

Another unprecedented feature: Jewish and Gentile believers fellowshipped with one another. In today’s culture, that would be like Brahmans eating with Dalits, or whites hanging out with Black Lives Matter folks, or hippie-types enjoying fellowship with corporate executives. Such phenomena are “God things,” impossible to reproduce apart from a move of the Holy Spirit.

How many of our own churches today resemble the church in Antioch? As Henry Blackaby has said, “We have become satisfied today to live without the manifest presence of God.”

In spite of Bible resources unavailable to any previous generation, few church members today open their Bibles or pray. Few church members demonstrate any power of the Holy Spirit. Few church members have any vision for the world. Few churches are little more than religious social clubs. It is no wonder that the world as a whole considers the church powerless, useless and irrelevant.

Pray for revival and renaissance in the church. Pray that every fellowship returns to the Antioch model. Only then will we see our world change.

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Jul 01 2023
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Just One Minute

Unexpected Jesus Follower

The miraculous conversion of Saul of Tarsus gives us hope for our own day.

Saul of Tarsus was the last person anyone expected to follow Jesus Christ. That he would later become the missionary to the Gentiles, willing to face beatings, stonings, prisons, shipwreck, and to lose his life for the sake of Christ was beyond unthinkable to anyone who knew his murderous reputation.

Already, he was implicated in the death of Jesus’ first martyr, Stephen. He possessed a fanatical hatred and fury against Jesus’ followers that rivaled or surpassed that of today’s radical terrorists. When Jesus’ followers fled Jerusalem to escape him, he chased after them, determined to destroy this affront to his beloved traditions. Who knows how many more believers died at his hands or at the hands of those who followed his orders?

In Galatians 1, we read his own description of his total devotion to the faith of his forefathers. The more people who followed Jesus Christ, the more infuriated he became. Nothing, he resolved, would or could stop him from achieving his goal of 100% eradication of Jesus’ followers and Jesus’ memory from the earth. And then…

On the road to Damascus, he met Jesus Christ face-to-face. In a split second, Saul’s life—and our own lives and destinies—were forever reversed.

In that split second, Saul of Tarsus became the man later known as Paul the Apostle, the greatest Jesus-believer the world has ever known. Everyone who reads this piece owes an unpayable debt to him and to Jesus Christ, our risen Lord, who made it all possible.

In those dark days before the light from heaven blinded Saul of Tarsus, most Jesus followers wondered how long it would take before that determined killer caught up to them. They did not count on what God was about to do to change the course of history.

In our own dark days, with so much demonic activity in India and our own nation arrayed against the advance of the gospel, is it not also hard for us to believe that anything will soon change? By the day, everything seems to get worse and worse and worse.

Many prominent Christians even say we live in a post-Christian age. Many of our children and grandchildren, raised in the church, are deserting the faith in droves for New Age, witchcraft, drugs, transgenderism and the like. We are told we will live as powerless exiles on the outskirts of Babylon until Jesus raptures us out of the mess.

But God never adopts a losing scenario. He is the same yesterday, today and forever. He is the same God who reversed the life of Saul of Tarsus in a split second. Jesus’ life, death and resurrection, the coming of the Holy Spirit—and Saul of Tarsus’ conversion—remind us that God’s work on earth never retreats but advances.

What God has shown us in the past is a foretaste of what He plans for the future. The greatest works of Christ have yet to take place in India and the world, in this country, in your lives and in the lives of those we love.

Surely, that day will come in a moment, like the conversion of Saul of Tarsus on that Damascus road. Pray and praise God for that day!

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Jun 03 2023
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The People You Detest

Philip’s story in Acts 8 has profound lessons for us today. Though his divine appointment with the Ethiopian eunuch is perhaps better known, his ministry in Samaria is equally profound.

Philip’s adventure in Samaria teaches us that we should never put God in a box, but do whatever He asks of us even when it appears detestable and absurd.

It takes place at a time of persecution. Stephen’s martyrdom set off the persecution directed by the fanatical Saul of Tarsus, forcing Jerusalem believers to flee for their lives. One of those exiles was the Spirit-filled Philip who felt nudged by the Holy Spirit to proclaim Christ to the Samaritans in their capital, Samaria. We first read of him in Acts 6, one of seven men selected to meet the needs of Hellenistic Jews.

This venture of Philip into Samaria is most unusual. Philip was a Jew, and the average Jew detested Samaritans as half-breeds whose religion was an odd mixture of Jewish and pagan beliefs. They hated the Samaritans so much, they took the longer and harder route around their territory just to avoid contact with them. This deep-seated and irrational hatred had persisted for centuries.

If Philip had any of these natural tendencies, he pushed them aside and obeyed the Holy Spirit. When he did, he discovered sincere spiritual hunger among these hated and rejected people. They saw signs and wonders, heard of Jesus’ love for them, and experienced multiple deliverance from demonic spirits. They welcomed Jesus as their Messiah and received the Holy Spirit. Luke tells us in Acts 8:8, “There was much rejoicing in that city.”

Not many years earlier, Jesus Himself had visited the Samaritans and changed the life of the woman who met Him at Jacob’s Well, near the town of Sychar. That transformed woman opened her people’s eyes to the true Messiah and made it possible for Jesus to do a great work among them (John 4). These people had already demonstrated their spiritual hunger.

But Jesus did not complete the ministry to the Samaritans. He paved the way for Philip to do even more. He wanted to share His own joy with others like Philip who would obey His invitation to join Him in His work.

Did He not specifically tell His disciples before His ascension, “You shall be My witnesses . . . in Samaria” (Acts 1:8)?

What an important lesson (and invitation) this is for all of us! We all have people in our lives whom we regard as “impossible” when it comes to openness to the Good News. Like the Samaritans, they could be members of a particular ethnic or cultural group. They could be family members whose rebellious or obnoxious ways have repulsed us for years, even decades.

When Jesus included Samaria in His Great Commission, He was essentially telling His disciples (and us), “You shall not only be My witnesses to the people you know, but also to the people you most detest. You and they will rejoice when you do this unlikely and impossible thing.”

Let us allow the Lord to identify any “impossible” people in our hearts so He can transform us to accept His possibilities and obey Him. In this way, we all, like Philip and the Samaritans, will also rejoice when we see God bring the impossible to pass.

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Nov 29 2022
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Just One Minute

The Early Christians Recognized this Threat

Sometimes it really strikes me—the irrationality of unbelief. The refusal to bow to fact, to rational argument, even the clear hand of God. What is most striking is how the most unbelieving can also be the most religious.

In Acts 4, Peter and John, by the power of Christ, have just healed a man lame from birth, convincing 5,000 people to follow Christ, demonstrating the power of God. But the ruling religious Sanhedrin of Jerusalem arrest both Peter and John and throw them into jail. The religious leaders could not deny the healing. They could not deny the power and boldness of Jesus’ uneducated disciples, but they want to stop them.

They knew about Jesus’ miracles. When Jesus died, they saw the massive temple veil rip from top to bottom. They could not deny Jesus’ resurrection. In Acts 5, Gamaliel, a wise elder member of the Sanhedrin even warned them that if what Peter and John did “is of God, you will not be able to overthrow them; or else you may even be found fighting against God.” They could have reconsidered their position, but they refused.

Unbelief shows little compassion for those freed by Christ from bondage. The religious establishment did not share the healed man’s joy. They did not empathize with his years of infirmity, his inability to care for himself, his wasted talents, his decades of destroyed dreams, the lectures from others about his imagined “sins” that brought his condition, the taunts of thoughtless children. They were lifeless and loveless.

Stone-cold unbelief can strike fear in those who speak truth, especially if the unbelievers have more power, money and political authority.

Don’t we find stone-cold unbelief in our own world today, even in our churches, whether in India or the USA? In both nations, men and women with power and authority care nothing about the God of the Bible and want to hurl Him from His throne (see Psalm 2). At times, they appear to be invulnerable, subject to no other law but their own whims and agendas that drip with unbelief and contempt for God and others they regard as lesser than they.

The early Christians recognized this threat. They saw the odds against them, but they did not flinch before the stronger foe. Peter said, “We cannot stop speaking about what we have seen and heard.”

They went to prayer, remembering the God who called them is the same God who created the heavens and the earth. They remembered Jesus’ wondrous acts. They remembered how God uses even His enemies to accomplish His purposes. They knew that the stronger power of God who raised Jesus Christ from the dead would sustain them. The scriptures tell us they prayed for boldness to preach, for signs and wonders.

God answered their prayers. He filled them anew with His Holy Spirit. In time, in 70 AD, after much patience and giving the religious authorities forty years to repent of their unbelief, He destroyed their decadent and unbelieving religious structures. In the meantime, the gospel continued to spread to “the uttermost parts of the world” as it does today.

May God help us to continue steadfast in their footsteps before our present opposition. The gospel of Jesus Christ always has the last word.

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Oct 21 2022
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How to Convince Many

Often, Christian witness today is based upon apologetics—rational arguments. While apologetics has importance and may win a few people to Christ here and there, too often we are satisfied with a few. The problem with apologetics is the likelihood for someone to make counter-arguments and excuses. The arguments may go on forever.

Acts 3 demonstrates that in the power of the Holy Spirit, our witness can become an irresistible force with which no one can argue.

Acts 3 begins on an average day with Peter and John just before afternoon prayer at the temple. They confront a lame man. For years, the man was a fixture at the temple gate, eking out a living in the only way he knew—begging. Most likely, Peter and John had noted the man before, but on this day, the Holy Spirit enabled them to really see him.

They did not just stop to toss him a coin or two, or ask God to bless his day with successful begging. Instead, they invoked the authority of God to heal the man. That day, the man, lame from birth, stood and walked.

A great crowd saw the miracle and gathered around, amazed. They were not hostile. They gazed in wonder. They all had seen this man for years, carried in and carried out, unable to move on his own. Now, he was running and leaping in joy. The healing of the lame man got their attention.

Peter and John quickly told them it was not their own power, but the power of Jesus that healed the man. A few weeks earlier, some of the people who heard this had called for Jesus’ crucifixion, but they did it in ignorance, not knowing who Jesus really was. Peter told them how the prophets prepared the way for Jesus and for this day. This healing was a sign that a time of great restoration had begun that will eventually rid the world of Satan, evil and death.

The amazed people hung on to Peter’s words. In Acts 4, we read that at least 5,000 men believed the message because of what they saw that day.

A display of God’s power prepared the way. The people could not deny what happened. Arguments alone would not have won so many people.

This same power of God is available in our own day. Our evangelists in India, many from non-Christian backgrounds, experienced healing and deliverance which brought them to Christ. Now, they go into unreached areas doing the same works in the power of the Holy Spirit that changed their own lives. Acts 3 is taking place all over India today—power encounters that convince many that Jesus’ power exceeds the power of their old deities.

Acts 3 is our model as well. Let us not be cowed by the anti-supernatural element in many of our churches that tries to preserve an orderly status quo but paralyzes our influence. Let us not say we aren’t good or pious enough for this. Like Peter and John, we have been made clean by the blood of Christ.

Around the world, people are convinced more by God’s power, less by arguments. In today’s evil world, why would Jesus abandon his most powerful weapons against Satan? Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever.

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