CHURCH PLANTING IN INDIA BY PS RAVI SUNDAR
Shalom. Dear friends, this is Pastor Ravi Sundar from Hyderabad, India. By God’s grace, we have been doing ministry since 1997. By the grace of God, my wife and I were called to full-time ministry. In 1997, when we were doing ministry in Chennai, the Lord asked us to go to a place called Telangana. In Telangana, there is a place called Hyderabad. We were invited by the senior pastor to look after the 1000 people congregation. I was the associate pastor for five years, taking care of the missions and in charge of the crusades and conferences.
Building Bible School in Hyderabad
By the grace of God, while we were doing ministry with them, the Lord called us to start Shalom Ministries. God called us to train the pastors and build the kingdom. As we were progressing in the ministry in Hyderabad, the Lord asked to move out of full-time to build a bible school. In 2001, by faith, we bought a piece of property. When we were buying the piece of property, an amazing thing happened. One of our church members wanted to partner with me to buy the property together to get the lesser price. After we paid that advance, he said he could not afford to pay. At the end of the day, I need to pay everything. At that moment, I do not have that much money. While we were praying, the Lord showed us a vision at 2 a.m. In the vision, I was saying to my wife, “Gold, which is in our home.” So we decided to sell that gold. When I expressed this to my wife, she willingly donated all the gold for the ministry. So, we sold everything and we bought a piece of property to build a Bible school. By the grace of God, we planted and constructed a Bible school and we trained 197 students. We planted 80 churches around India and around the Pradesh. I thank God for this vision.
Vision to plant 20,000 churches
As we were progressing, the Lord gave me a vision to plant 20,000 churches in India, across the different states. As we were praying for that, there was a big shift. One of my close friends, Dave Richards, was standing with us and he died with blood cancer. Since we do not have financial support, the ministry began to go down. In that moment, we were trusting God and we were praying. As we were praying, the Lord started giving the faith and opening the doors to build that ministry but the ministry was not strong. We kept on doing the ministry we have been called to.
Joining Hope International Ministries
In this process, one of my friends was supposed to speak at a conference in Siliguri, but unfortunately did not get the visa. So, he requested me to go to Siliguri to preach at the pastors’ conference. So I went there. When I was preparing my sermon in the second session, I met Pastor Brendan. We were really seeking a spiritual covering, seeking a spiritual friendship, seeking spiritual fathers in our ministries who can strengthen us spiritually. Then, when we expressed that to Pastor Brendan over dinner, Pastor Brendan told us about the Hope movement. I really thank God when I heard about the Hope Movement. At first, I thought it is like other ministries that want to plant their own kingdoms but I see a lot of difference between other ministries and the Hope Movement. Hope is not an organisation doing ministry business only but I found that Hope is a family.
When I met Pastor Simon in Kuching, I see a father in his lifestyle. So my wife and I, we prayed to join this movement. We both decided to be part of this movement. Then, we expressed this to our executive committee and they were also willing to follow this vision. All our pastors were willing to join with Hope. By the grace of God, after we joined Hope, our faith has been strengthened, our spiritual life has been growing, our prayer life is entirely different.
Pioneering new church
I really say that there is a spiritual covering. You know every time when I feel that I am in need, when I need help spiritually, somebody will strengthen me. At that moment, I will get a sms or a phone call from Pastor Brendan and Pastor Simon who will coach me; I have seen that. I really thank God for this movement. After we joined this movement, we are planting churches, we did several training programs and we planted a church called Daida last year and we are now constructing the church building. I thank God for this Hope movement, which has given me great strength and great assurance like a spiritual family.
I joined the different Global Conferences (GC); in every GC, my faith goes up. The moment I see the leaders, I see the faith, the family and fellowship. These are the three things that are very strong in the Hope movement. I thank God for this fellowship. I am glad that I am a part of the Hope Movement. My wife and I, we thank you so much for praying for us and supporting us and strengthening our faith. I thank God that through this movement, I believe that the vision will be accomplished. I believe 20,000 churches will be planted in India. One day, we are going to see the harvest, we are going to see the Great Harvest through this movement. We thank you so much for this wonderful time. God bless. God be with you. Shalom. Amen.
Pastor Ravi Sundar
HIM Hyderabad, India
