August 2020 Fasting and Prayer Message — Saturday PM

This is a summary of the message from the August 2020 fasting and prayer weekend led by Pastor Praveen and held at our church. We had four sessions, Friday morning and evening and Saturday morning and evening (posted here). During our fasting and prayer sessions, it is usual for the Holy Spirit to speak to us through Pastor Praveen.

Pastor Praveen’s Message – God Will Fulfill His Prophecy in Your Life

Pastor Praveen spoke on Genesis 37 about Joseph and his dreams and visions. He asked how many of us want to have dreams and visions. He said that it is good to want to receive visions and dreams from God. But how much do you believe your visions and dreams? If God is showing you any visions and dreams, they will be fulfilled in your life. That is Pastor Praveen’s experience these last 28 years. God is faithful.

Genesis 37:3-4 says that Joseph’s father loved him more than any of his other brothers. So, his brothers were jealous. When Joseph shared his dreams and visions with them, it led to great disaster in his life. He shared his first dream and right away his brothers said, ““Do you intend to reign over us? Will you actually rule us?” They rejected him because they themselves had not had a dream or vision. This is because Joseph was special. He was chosen by God. Joseph kept quiet – he didn’t argue with them. 

If you are chosen by God in your family, you will have dreams and visions. Opposition will arise against you – because God is with you. Even some of those who are worshiping next to you may reject you. 

Joseph also told his brothers and his father, Jacob, about his second dream. Right away, Jacob rebuked him, “Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bow down to the ground before you?” Even his father didn’t want to hear about his dreams and visions. This was selfishness. Jacob had experienced his own dream when he saw heaven open over him when he was at Luz (Genesis 28:10-22). He thought he was the one to have dreams, not Joseph. But God loves everybody. He will give dreams and visions to his children without favoritism. 

Joseph was rejected by his own brothers and his lovely father. But he kept quiet and trusted in God. He didn’t say anything against them. He knew what he had seen and waited for the time to come. God gave him the power and strength to face rejection. Joseph also faced false testimony later in his life from Potiphar’s wife (Genesis 39). Again, Joseph did not say anything, but kept quiet. In the end, Pharaoh said of Joseph, “Can we find anyone like this man, one in whom is the Spirit of God?” (Genesis 41:38). 

If God has promised you anything about your bright future, your family life, or spiritual life but things are difficult now, just keep quiet. Forget about the rejection and opposition. Trust in God. He is able to fulfill your dream and visions, and your promises in all areas of your life. “Those who look to him are radiant. Their faces are never covered with shame.” (Psalm 34:5).

Many people also gave false testimony in the lives Stephen and John, whom Pastor Praveen spoke about in earlier sessions. The Roman Empire exiled John to Patmos because of the Word of God and the testimony of Jesus (Revelation 1:9). But God, who is faithful, opened the heavens for him, so we received a great revelation. If you are facing a kind of “Patmos” – you feel rejected and alone – God will give you something new in your life. He will bless many people through you. 

Our forefathers faced false testimony because they were God’s chosen instrument. If you are God’s chosen instrument, someday you will face false testimony. Your heart is innocent, but people will make stories against you, even your friends and relatives. But keep quiet. Our own family and friends may reject us, but if you have a dream or promise from God, He will fulfill it before your family, relatives, friends, and community. He will honor you. By their own mouth they will speak about you, “She is a Godly woman.” “He is a man of God.” The rejection is only temporary. If you trust in God, the visions and dreams will come true. 

If we depend on God, he will give us the power and strength to face everything that is happening in our lives. The difficulties will turn to great blessing. We will have a great testimony. All disaster will flee from our lives. God will repay everything with interest. 

Personal Testimony from Pastor Praveen

Pastor Praveen shared a personal testimony about the rejection he experienced from his family after he received salvation in Jesus Christ. 

There are 9 siblings in Pastor Praveen’s family – 3 brothers, 5 sisters, and himself. Pastor Praveen was the 8th to be born. He has one younger sister. In Pastor Praveen’s youth, his 3 brothers were very close to one another, but they did not care much for him. They were jealous because his mother loved him so much and treated him with special favor. They would complain, “Why does she love him so much?”

Pastor Praveen’s mother passed away when he was working in Saudi Arabia as a young man. It was during that time frame that he received salvation from the Lord. Pastor Praveen’s father had died earlier in his childhood. His brothers were left rich and proud. When Pastor Praveen and his wife, Sridevi, returned to India as Christians, his Hindu brothers rejected him. They told him, “Don’t enter our gate. You have no address. Get out!” In India, this is the way people speak to street dogs, “Get out!” They would speak about him, “Always fasting and praying. What is going on? He is crazy!” They invented many false testimonies about him and caused much trouble. They tried to kill him with shame. His third-born brother in particular would have been very happy if he died. But Pastor Praveen loved them.

Pastor Praveen’s brothers tried to cover him and his wife with shame. They did not include them in any family gatherings. When the second-born brother’s daughter married, he did not invite Pastor Praveen and Sridevi to the wedding. This was a shaming treatment in their culture. However, even before the day of the wedding God told Pastor Praveen during a time of fasting and prayer that the marriage would be broken before nine months. 

The wedding was held outdoors in a fenced in area that Pastor Praveen and Sridevi routinely had to walk past. As they went by that day, his family laughed and jeered at them. God told Pastor Praveen, “Love him. That is your ministry.” 

It was not long until Pastor Praveen’s estranged brothers began to have trouble. The youngest of the three brothers had diabetes and the doctors wanted to amputate his leg. He was a young man. Even though this brother hated him, Pastor Praveen prayed for him. He went to see him in the hospital. His brother’s situation had worsened. The director of the ICU, who was a friend of Pastor Praveen, told him that the medicine was not working and that his brother would die. His kidney was not functioning. 

When Pastor Praveen went to the hospital room, his brother and sister-in-law would not speak to him. The brother was very ill. His stomach was greatly distended from accumulated fluid and he was having trouble breathing. Pastor Praveen laid his hand on his brother’s stomach and told his sister-in-law to give him a half cup of water, which she did. His brother was crying now because he could see how much Pastor Praveen loved him. Pastor Praveen prayed and gave the brother the water. After that, the doctor who had said the brother would die saw a change. He said, “There is hope. He will not die.”

While the brother was recovering, Sridevi went every day to clean, treat, and rebandage his wounds. Because Pastor Praveen knows who his God is and understands the power of God, he kept quiet in the face of rejection, and loved his brother. After this experience, the brother was saved by God.

Soon after that, the same brother was again in the hospital and needed blood. At that time, Pastor Praveen was on the 18th day of a 21 day fast. Nevertheless, he said, “I am ready to give blood to my brother.” His brother saw the love of Christ in Pastor Praveen’s life. 

After that, Pastor Praveen and Sridevi moved to the United States. He called his oldest brother on the phone. In their culture, when the parents are passed, the oldest brother becomes like the father to the family. It was very painful when his brother told him, “I have no brother like this. He already died. Don’t call anymore.” Pastor Praveen laughed in the Spirit. 

Still, God continued to bring the brothers to salvation one-by-one through Pastor Praveen, even as He brought Joseph’s brothers to him. God brought each one into difficulty with their health or their finances. Each time God used Pastor Praveen to minister to them, praying for their healing and restoration as well as helping them financially.

Next, the second-born brother experienced a financial downturn. Exactly as God had said,his daughter’s marriage ended in divorce within 9 months of the wedding. Furthermore, her father had paid a very large dowry to the groom and his family. Even though the groom, who was quite rich, did not even value the dowry, it was a big factor in Pastor Praveen’s brother’s financial predicament.  

Pastor Praveen had a dream that his brother would come to him in tears asking for help. This dream came true and God gave Pastor Praveen the ability to help his brother through his many friends and connections within the police department and the courts. Pastor Praveen and Sridevi also regularly sent money to his brother and his wife to help them out. Sridevi even worked overtime to earn extra money to send. Through this experience, his brother and his wife were saved by God and were baptized. They recovered financially and the daughter is happily remarried.

In time, the oldest brother also began to have financial difficulties and lost everything. So great was his distress, he was almost suicidal.  In 2014, when Pastor Praveen went on a ministry trip to India with Pastor Tim Baldwin, the oldest brother took his whole family to the service where Pastor Praveen was preaching. That same day, he was saved by God. He has since recovered financially.  

So, God brought all three brothers to Pastor Praveen. The Lord brought difficulties into their lives and then gave Pastor Praveen a way to help them. God honored Pastor Praveen before them because he didn’t open his mouth, but loved them. Years before Pastor Praveen had received a dream from the Lord that He would bring his brothers to him like Joseph. He believed God and believed the dream. 

There is a sadder note to this testimony. When Pastor Praveen was living in the United States, the younger two of Pastor Praveen’s brothers passed away. God has not told him why and he has not asked. The brothers were saved by God and were baptized. Yet, God says, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy and compassion on whom I have compassion.” (Exodus 33:19). They were both between 50 and 55 years old. Pastor Praveen did not get to see his brothers before they died because God would not let Pastor Praveen visit India for the first 9 years after he moved to the United States. In 2014, after they died, he went to India on a ministry trip with Pastor Tim Baldwin. God told him, “Whoever wanted to see your death – they are gone. Now you can go to your place. Go.” This is the same word God spoke to Moses when He told him to return to Egypt (Exodus 4:19). 

The rejection Pastor Praveen endured as a Christian is similar to the rejection Jesus faced. You can see in Mark 3:20-22 that Jesus’ family rejected him. According to Mark 3:20, Jesus was so busy with His ministry that he did not even have time to eat. “When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.” In this way, His own family rejected Him before the people. This is the natural way with human beings. After His family rejected him, others said that He was possessed by demons – driving out demons by the power of demons.

When Jesus was crucified, He cried with a loud voice and gave up His Spirit. At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from the top to bottom. The earth shook by the power of God, the rocks split, the tombs broke open, and many holy people were raised to life. The people who had accused Jesus were terrified and exclaimed, “Surely He was the Son of God.” (Matthew 27:51-54). The point is, Jesus never opened His mouth against His accusers, even His own family. He kept quiet even on the cross. He showed them love. He prayed for them in His pain. But He cried on the cross for our salvation, healing, deliverance, eternal life. He proved His love on the cross. 

We need to do the same thing. We need that kind of testimony, that kind of character. If we will forgive one another and are ready to face any kind of rejection in the name of Jesus, God will honor us. We must communicate our love not just with words but with deeds. Without deeds, our words are useless. Our families and friends must know from experience that we are loving them. With a hard heart we cannot reach anybody. We must remember, our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, authorities, and the power of darkness (Ephesians 6:12). 

During those years that God would not let Pastor Praveen go to India, his brothers kept asking him to come. “Will you not come? We want to see you. Will you wait until we die to come?” Pastor Praveen told them, “It is not my time to come.” Lately, his oldest brother started asking, “Will you not come? I want to see you.” In 2018 Pastor Praveen travelled to India for a crusade and he visited his oldest brother while he was there. One day, his oldest brother told him that he was sorry for the way he had treated Pastor Praveen in the past. He said that he was now experiencing love, joy, and peace. He told Pastor Praveen, “I can see God in you.” That evening, Pastor Praveen was crying and preaching at the same time.

Love in word and deed is the key. Then we can plunder the enemy. Love is the greatest weapon. We need to love and trust one another. We also must believe one another because the same blood is in us.