In this episode of The Evangelism Podcast, host Daniel King interviews Pastor Brian Anderson, a ministry leader from Northern India. They discuss the challenges faced by the church in India, including anti-conversion laws that restrict evangelism. Pastor Anderson shares about his ministry, the Light of the World Ministries, and the vision of the Empowered 21 movement to reach every person in India with the gospel by 2033. The conversation highlights the importance the power of the Holy Spirit in fulfilling this ambitious goal.
Summary:
- Pastor Brian Anderson is from Northern India and leads the Light of the World Ministries and a movement called “From the Soil to the Mission”, which aims to develop indigenous church leadership in India. [0:37]
- The churches in Northern India, especially in the state of Uttar Pradesh, have faced significant persecution, with many churches being closed down and pastors being jailed. [2:11] [2:48]
- Several states in India have passed anti-conversion laws, which make it difficult for Christians to openly preach the gospel or hold church services. This has severely impacted the ministry work in these regions. [3:36]
- Despite the persecution, the Indian church is growing in numbers and spiritual strength, with a focus on unity and collaboration among different ministries to reach the unreached people groups in India. [5:49]
- The Empowered21 movement is working to support the Indian church through initiatives like a nationwide prayer movement and by bringing leaders together to share resources and insights. [6:57]
Transcript:
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (00:00):
Welcome to the Evangelism Podcast. I’m Daniel King. I’m excited about telling people about Jesus today. I have a very special guest with me, Brian Anderson from India. Thank you for being on the Evangelism Podcast.
Pastor Brian Anderson (00:12):
Thank you. Thank you for this opportunity.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (00:14):
Yeah. So we are at the Billion Soul Conference here in Korea in Jeju Island, and it’s a global harvest conference and it’s so beautiful to see what God is doing in many different parts of the world. Tell me a little bit about your ministry and what God has called you to do in India.
Pastor Brian Anderson (00:37):
Thank you. My name is Brian Anderson and I’m based in Northern Power of India. I come from Chal Penha and I am the founder and visionary of the ministry called the Light of the World Ministries. And we are in our ministries across India, across North India. And I’m also leading a movement called “From the Soil to the Mission.” It is in our language, which means “From the Soil to the Mission.” And the vision of this movement is to develop indigenous voices, indigenous leadership so that they can take the baton and lead the next generation of leaders in the grassroots level, leaders in their churches. And so how do you do that? So what we do is we provide four to five things for them to develop themselves as the leaders. Number one, we give them education, we try to help them to connect with Bible seminary so that they can, because if you know a little bit about India in Southern part, it is really strong. We have mission missions and the basis of missions and we have growing number of churches in southern part of our nation. But in northern part, if you talk about churches are rapidly growing, that is something that God is moving and doing in Northern India. But then there is a lack of leadership and education. So we provide them, we provide them education, we help them to have exposers so that they can know what exactly God is doing globally providing platform to them. So this is how we help them to grow.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (02:01):
Now I’ve heard that there has been a lot of persecution and opposition against the church recently in India. Are you experiencing some of that in your area?
Pastor Brian Anderson (02:11):
Absolutely. Our churches in up TDE are facing a lot of persecution. We are not able to connect our Sunday services, our main churches. We have 35 churches in North, especially in up tde. And one of our main churches was closed because of the persecution. And now we are trying to use wisdom and trying to meet in small groups. We are not going to have the large gathering because it is something that is giving them signal that yes, there is a group, there is a church going on. So every village or and have churches. That’s a big thing that even midst of persecution, God is growing his church. So obviously we are facing persecution and especially in the northern power of India and central power of India, our churches in up facing persecution. And because of which our churches were closed in up and now we are meeting in small house groups and some pastors were also put in jail. If I talk about year 20, 24, like 600 pastors from up alone were in jail. But yes, there are agencies and the people who are helping us out so that they can come out of it. But yes, we definitely need more prayers.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (03:27):
And I heard that in some states in India, they are passing anticon conversion laws.
Pastor Brian Anderson (03:33):
Yes.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (03:34):
What impact has that had on the ministry that you’re
Pastor Brian Anderson (03:36):
Doing? Yeah, almost 12 to 13 states of India is facing the Anticon conversion law right now. And according to that law, you cannot have open air meeting. You cannot preach the gospel if you’re found preaching on the street. Or even sometimes I heard news from our coworkers that they were celebrating just a birthday celebration going on. And the pick people from the birthday celebration calling that now you’re having a conversion meeting. So they’re actually targeting delis and targeting villages because these people do not have the exposure to go to the government. So it’s easy for them to pick those people believers from there and pastors and putting them in jail. So situation is really severe. It’s hard for us to preach the gospel to conduct Sunday services. It’s really bad. Even during Christmas they would come and vandalize the churches. So something. Yeah,
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (04:30):
That’s very sad because the constitution of India guarantees freedom of religion.
Pastor Brian Anderson (04:36):
Absolutely.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (04:37):
And what they’re saying is you have freedom to have your religion to stay in the religion you were born in.
Pastor Brian Anderson (04:43):
Exactly.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (04:43):
But you’re not allowed to try to ask someone to change their religion. That’s right. Which is actually against freedom of religion because in the Christian religion, Jesus told us, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. We don’t force anyone to be a Christian, but part of Christianity is to freely offer people the opportunity to come to
Pastor Brian Anderson (05:06):
Jesus. Absolutely.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (05:07):
And so it’s actually against freedom of religion to have this type of law.
Pastor Brian Anderson (05:11):
Absolutely.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (05:11):
And I think that India, the largest democracy in the world, it has a history of being tolerant of all religions and respecting the rights of every minority group. I think it’s very important for India to remain committed to religious freedom, which includes the religious freedom to tell people about Jesus and to invite them to have a relationship with Jesus.
Pastor Brian Anderson (05:43):
That’s right.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (05:44):
What’s the perspective of the Indian church on these anticon conversion laws?
Pastor Brian Anderson (05:49):
See, the one thing I would say here is our churches are not afraid at all, even midst of persecution. When we see what is happening in Egypt with the people of Israel, God’s children, even though they were persecuted, but they were growing in numbers, this is what something happening. Even in the midst of anticon conversion law, churches are growing in their numbers and they’re also growing in their spiritual health. So this is something we are so blessed to witness about. And they are more stronger, they’re more united, and churches are growing. But at the same time, obviously there is a fear around them and they feel sometimes helpless. But then we all come together and help them and encourage each other so that they can grow. Yeah.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (06:33):
So today I’m wearing my Empowered 21 shirt, which is a movement of spirit empowered believers from around the world, a relationship based network. And you are on the cabinet for India. So tell me, what is Empowered 21 planning in India? What will God do in India through the spirit empowered movement?
Pastor Brian Anderson (06:57):
Absolutely. We met with Bill Johnson in Singapore, I believe two months back. And then we are planning about different initiatives in India. So one of the initiative is prayer movement. We need to mobilize more prayers. At the same time we are trying to help people to move into the more stronger theological insights and gathering the leaders so that we can have more networks and collaboration coming on one platform so that they can move together and help each other. So this is something that we are doing and Empower 21, obviously I was so blessed to be part of this cabinet because it is a spirit led movement where they understand what is going on and praying for each other. Such a great collaboration happening.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (07:43):
Yeah, I think we need the power of the Holy Spirit. Absolutely. I mean, when you look at how the church is growing around the world, the churches that believe in the power of the Holy Spirit, they believe that God heals today, that we can receive the spiritual gifts of the Holy Spirit.
Pastor Brian Anderson (08:03):
It’s
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (08:03):
Those churches that are effective in evangelism. They are growing, they are increasing. And with the Holy Spirit on our side, we can’t be stopped. Now, the vision of Empower 21 is to take the gospel to every person on Earth before 2033, that every single person on Earth would have an authentic encounter with Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit before 20 23, 20 33. And I think this is a vision that comes from God, that we would reach everyone starting with the individual, that every person would have an encounter with Jesus. And so obviously, if we’re going to accomplish that vision, India is a big part of it, over 1.2 billion people, 1.45 billion
Pastor Brian Anderson (08:51):
Now
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (08:52):
1.45 billion people. And if we’re going to reach everyone, we have to reach India. And so what ideas has God given the Indian Church to make that vision or reality? How do we reach everyone in India?
Pastor Brian Anderson (09:12):
If you talk about the land of India, it’s the land of diverse culture and people group. So the first thing we need to do, our practice in our churches is loving the diversity. We cannot see because until you unite together, you cannot achieve this target of reaching everyone by 2023. So number one initiative would be loving every diverse culture, every diverse people group, and welcoming them in one plate form. That’s the number one thing. Number two, I believe there are a lot of movement and collaboration happening with people ministries individual, as you said. And it’s like one movement or one particular ministry, one individual ministry is not going to help us to reach that goal. So what we need, the alliance of all the movement, the alliance of all the collaboration and networks, when everybody come together and understand this broader vision of reaching every individual, we got 4,500 and almost 4,000 506 20 unreached people group, the largest unreached people group, UPG in the world. So how we can do that, by uniting each coming in unity and as well as helping all the networks coming in alliance, then we all can go ahead and achieve what we want to do. Amen. Amen.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (10:32):
Well, what is the language that you speak in your state?
Pastor Brian Anderson (10:36):
Hindi.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (10:36):
In Hindi.
Pastor Brian Anderson (10:37):
Yeah.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (10:37):
Okay. Let’s finish today by praying for India. But can you pray in Hindi
Pastor Brian Anderson (10:42):
Absolutely.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (10:42):
For the people of India?
Pastor Brian Anderson (10:43):
Exactly. Let’s pray with our permission. Amen.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (12:05):
Brian, thank you for being on the Events podcast.
Pastor Brian Anderson (12:07):
Thank you so much. We
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (12:08):
Love you. We love India. And I am praying for the evangelism of God all over India. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Pastor Brian Anderson (12:16):
Thank you. Thank you so much. God bless. Thank you.
