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Mark Swiger | Reaching India with The Gospel

Between 1996 and 2006 Mark Swiger conducted more city-wide crusades in India than any other ministry. He preached face to face to millions of people and saw over half a million people turn to Christ. His television program “Healing for You Today” reached millions throughout Asia. Now God has given him a plan to raise up 300 evangelists who will impact the nation of India for Jesus.

Learn More: https://markswiger.org/

Transcript: 

Evangelist Daniel King (00:00):
Between 1996 and 2006, mark swagger conducted more citywide crusades in India than any other ministry. He preached face to face to millions of people and saw over half a million Hindus and Muslims turned to Christ his television program “Healing for you today” Reached millions throughout Asia. Now God has given him a plan to raise up 300 evangelists who will impact the nation of India for Jesus.

Evangelism Podcast Host (00:42):
Welcome to the Evangelism Podcast with Dr. Daniel King, where Daniel interviews, full-time evangelists, pastors, missionaries, and normal everyday Christians to discover how they share their faith. They’re powerful testimonies and amazing stories that will inspire you to reach people with the good news. And now here’s your host, missionary and evangelist Daniel King.

Evangelist Daniel King (01:07):
Welcome To the evangelism podcast. I’m Daniel King, and I’m excited about telling people about Jesus today. I have a very special guest with me, mark swagger. Thank you for in joining me today.

Mark Swiger (01:20):
Well, it’s wonderful to be here. My brother, I’m excited about what God is doing in this hour.

Evangelist Daniel King (01:27):
You have been an evangelist for many years, been really involved in helping to disciple people. And I know that you did so many events in the nation of India. How did you first get started as an evangelist?

Mark Swiger (01:48):
Well, I was pastoring a, oh, I guess it was, you’d say it was a medium sized church, a church of about 250 people in rural Maine, which was, it was a big crowd for rural Maine. And it taken us many years. I’d been pastoring for about over 15 years and, and we eventually got into a, a good size church and built it up. And I finally had a nice home and a nice family and swimming pool and the trappings that come with, you know, a little bit of success and right in the midst of that I the Lord gave me a dream, just a one minute dream in the middle of the night. And it changed my whole life in the direction of my ministry, but I saw a vision of a landscape and the Lord said memorize what you’re seeing.

Mark Swiger (02:44):
And so I memorized this landscape and the buildings and different things. And I didn’t know how, but I knew I was looking at the nation of India somewhere in India. And the Lord spoke just these words. He said, these people are among the poorest people on the face of the earth. And I think from that he imparted his heart, his love for the people into my heart. I think he was talking about more spiritual poverty than he was physical poverty. But when I, when I, before I saw the landscape, it was like two big black doors opened up and revealed this landscape. So I didn’t I knew it meant the Lord was gonna go open up doors to go to India, but I didn’t know what that meant. I didn’t know anybody in India. And so I knew that I just kind of put it on the back burner.

Mark Swiger (03:39):
I didn’t wanna try to make something happen. And about six months later, I got up, I was turned on the television. It was about two o’clock in the morning. And at that time, a relatively unknown evangelist was on his name was Reinhard Bonnke. I’d heard of him, but he hadn’t. He had only started doing the, the massive crusades that he was known for later, but I caught his television program. And, and suddenly as I was watching this to my surprise, the spirit of the Lord fell upon me and the Lord spoke, not audibly, but just of that, you know, that reverberating atmosphere of his, of his word, he said, do in India, what Reinhard Bonnke is doing in Africa. And I tell people, I felt like a five year old kid that, that the Lord said graduate from college tomorrow. You know, that’s how I felt.

Mark Swiger (04:37):
It felt like it was so impossible. I’d been pastoring, small churches, and to go into mass evangelism seemed like it was impossible, but I knew it, there must have been a way for that to happen. If God asked me to do it, it couldn’t be totally impossible. So I was going back to bed. Well, I decided to call the the one 800 number at the end of the program. I still remember it one 800. He heals. And that’s a good number. I Lord, if you, if you want me to get on do what Reinhard Bonnke, he’s doing, I gotta find out what he’s doing and how he’s doing it. So I figured next time he would come to the states. I would attend to his meeting. So I, I needed to get on the mailing list. So that’s why I called his ministry.

Mark Swiger (05:28):
The one 800 number and a nice lady, took my name and address. And I was on the mailing list and I was going to bed. It was now three o’clock in the morning. And my phone rang back and I said, who could be calling me at 3:00 AM? Somebody in the church must have died. And I answered the phone and a man said, did you just call Reinhard Bonnke ministries? And I said, yes. And I’m thinking, yeah, me and, you know, hundreds of others or thousands of others. And he said, why did you call? And I said, I didn’t wanna say the Lord just told me to do it’s doing in Africa. He would think I was crazy. So I just said, I called to get on the mailing list. And he said, well, next month, Reinhard Bonnke is going to be in India, doing a crusade in India.

Mark Swiger (06:24):
I said, I didn’t know. He went to India said, yes, he’s just started going to India. I said, well, who are you? He said, I am Reinhard Bonnke’s brother-in-law Dr. Ron Shaw. And he invited me to India and to be part of the team there. And so the, I went and attended the crusade and I thought I would carry bonks bags for about five years, you know, and learn what to do, but they didn’t need anybody. But I got a tremendous impartation at the pastor’s fire meeting. And they put me to work promoting the crusade in churches as part of the team. But long story short the Lord somehow did a work in my heart to where it seemed, where it seemed impossible to do crusades. It somehow seemed easy. And so the following year I began, I did six crusades back to back and over a couple of months period.

Mark Swiger (07:27):
And just the rest is history. I ended up doing 52 crusades, citywide crusades there in India. And I was on television throughout Asia for a couple of years. And by God’s grace, we did a, I don’t, I never did do what bonky was doing in Africa. We didn’t get up to that level, but by God’s grace, we were able to see crowds of a hundred thousand around in that level. But we we’d go to the unreached places and the smaller places, but I know I took a long time there to get that across, but that’s, that’s how I got involved in, in evangelism.

Evangelist Daniel King (08:06):
A 52 crusades in India is an amazing accomplishment. Of course, it’s really just a drop in the bucket. India has 1.2 billion people, and there’s such a huge harvest field there. But one time you shared with me a plan that God had given you for raising up evangelist in India, who would go village to village, and you had an entire plan for that. Yeah. Tell, tell me about that, because I think that that vision comes from God and there will come a day where it will come to pass in Jesus’ name.

Mark Swiger (08:46):
Well, you know, I, I wrote that vision down and sent it out to every major evangelist. It was called. I called it operation Fox fire. It was named after, you know when Sampson caught 300 foxes and the Lord showed me catch a hold of 300 evangelists, you know FY brand evangelists and get 300 and, and make 150 teams out of them and, and outfit them with the mobile crusade vehicles, trucks that turned into, you know, platforms with sound systems. And so I wrote the vision down. I sent it out to different all the different ministries and nobody would partner with me except I did get a letter back from Marilyn Hickey. And I, I mean, everybody was nice. They just were, you know, were busy and they didn’t didn’t feel led to help, but Marilyn Hickey said, write it down, make it plain though.

Mark Swiger (09:48):
The vision Terry is shall surely come to pass. And so I built the first mobile crusade vehicle and a dear brother a major ministry pledged 5 million to build the hundred and 50 crusade, mobile crusade units. And I was just getting, I was recruiting the 300 fire brand evangelists from all over India and in the different languages they speak. And I, I was, I was getting a, a school rented where we could train them, like in a military environment, you know, and I was gonna bring in the biggest names of evangelism to impart into the 150 teams. And all of this was in place. And I had left India for just a short time to go to Singapore. And when I tried to get back in, I was blacklisted and I lost all the equipment and I had vehicles and I had big sound systems and I had everything in place.

Mark Swiger (10:56):
And somehow I think they got word of my plans. <Laugh> the government of India did. And they blacklisted me and I’m still blacklisted. It’s been 16 years, but that one mobile crusade vehicle I built Daniel it’s been active all these years and going from village to village and seeing a harvest of souls, but I it’s still on my heart. I would love to see that happen. And you know, what really has blessed me is that Daniel NDA is doing something similar in Africa. And I know you’ve been involved in that, you know, in raising up those fire brand evangelists there. And so that really excited me to see that, but I, I don’t know at what point the, how long more the vision will tear, but I’m still ready and, and able, I’m still breathing. I’d like to see that happen before, before I go onto my reward. But that’s, that’s what happened to operation Fox fire.

Evangelist Daniel King (11:59):
Yeah. And I believe that that vision is a vision that comes from God and what comes from God cannot be stopped by man or by government. And so the God has given you the vision. And, and I think that that that vision will come to pass. I, I have seen with the evangelism bootcamp that Christ for nations is doing in Orlando, Florida. They’ve been raising up and training up evangelists who are going throughout Africa, and now many other parts of the world preaching the gospel. Amen. And I could see a school for evangelism in the nation of India. And of course it’s so needed. India has blacklisted, not only you some of my other evangelist friends have also been blacklisted. So I, I think it is so important to, to raise up evangelists from within India that can’t be kicked out. They have to sure. Keep them there. And, and you know, now with modern technology with zoom and we, we could have a school of evangelism even from a distance and be training up evangelism for India. And, and so though at Terry, it shall surely come to pass and

Mark Swiger (13:25):
Well, yeah, Daniel, I’m glad that you mentioned that because I’m getting kind of maybe a little bit long in the tooth here, but it just never dawned on me that I didn’t have to be there to conduct this school and training. And neither to you, you know, something we could do. I would just love you to be part of training those 300 fire brand evangels in India through zoom or online. And I think we could really still have an impartation into their lives.

Evangelist Daniel King (13:55):
Mark, you have seen so many miracles in your ministry, blind eyes, open deaf ears, hearing cripples, standing up and walking. What role do you think miracles play in evangelism,

Mark Swiger (14:10):
Miracles and signs and wonders are absolutely mandatory. You cannot possibly preach the gospel with any effect at all, or be effective as far as seeing people saved and, and affecting the multitudes. You cannot do it without signs and wonders and miracles. When Jesus sent them out, he sent them out into every city where he would self would go, and he told them to heal the sick cast out devils, raise the dead if necessary. And in other words, do what he would do if he were there. And that’s what Jesus wants us to do. The same thing. He’s the same yesterday, today and forever. He wants us to do the exact same thing he did. And we need to represent Jesus completely and fully, not a partial Jesus, but, you know, as they say, well, the real Jesus, please stand up. You know, we went, when I first started going to India they had 300 and 300 million gods.

Mark Swiger (15:15):
They, they say over there and I prayed, I cried out God, don’t let me give them 300 million. And one gods that cannot help them. I must represent the Jesus in his fullness, the Jesus, as he really is, and the heart and love and the power of Jesus and our word is not to be in word alone. Our gospel’s not in word alone, but in power and demonstration, it must be. And I tell everybody, don’t leave home without it. Don’t go on the mission field. Don’t attempt to preach the gospel. If you do not have signs following and the Lord working with you in this way in your ministry,

Evangelist Daniel King (16:00):
What comes next? I heard you’re going to Mexico for a crusade soon.

Mark Swiger (16:05):
Yeah. In November, I think it’s fifth, six, seven, and eight. We’re doing a crusade into Mexico, Mexico, which is about an hour south of Mexico city. And in our advanced work I heard it’s going excellent. And we’ve got over 300 churches in cooperation for those meetings so far. And even in the advanced work there’s been tremendous miracles happening in the churches following the man that’s doing the advanced work, promoting the crusade. So that’s what you wanna have. People will say my goodness, if the, if the advanced man does this, what will happen when mark shows up? You know, so <laugh>, you know, the, the, you need even have miracles in your advanced work. So that’s really why all the churches are getting excited already, even before the crusade, crusade and faith is rising. So we’re excited about that.

Evangelist Daniel King (17:06):
Let’s talk a little bit more about the 300 evangelists that God gave you the vision to, to raise up. And I, I, I think a lot about coaching evangelists, training evangelists, what are some of the principles that you think would be important to impart into those evangelists?

Mark Swiger (17:28):
Well, of course they need to have the relationship with Jesus Christ. I would say one thing very important in my own life too. It’s been to to have a prayer life and the importance of speaking in other tongues, this cannot be overemphasized in your devotional life. The apostle Paul said, I, I speak in tons more than you all. And there’s a reason why he need, why he did that. And he needed to, to have an effective ministry and have a worldwide impact as he did. And there’s just so many things that are necessary. So I try to, by God’s grace to speak in tongue of minimum of one hour a day, and that would be the minimum. If you can do more, do more, because it’s a level of prayer that you’re praying what God wants to happen, not just what you want to happen.

Mark Swiger (18:30):
Most of our prayer life, if you examine it, it’s us making a request for God to do this. Please do this, please do this. And we’re, we’re we’re kind of ordering God around. You know, who’s really the servant here. Who’s serving who w from our prayer life. And I began to see in the Bible, it says they serve God with prayers. And I realized, I, I wanna serve God, Lord. I wanna pray what you want me to pray, and I want to serve you in prayer. And I cannot overemphasize give yourself to that and it’ll make a tremendous difference. Be faithful in it. And you’ll have a tremendous difference in your, in your ministry and in your personal life too, is you serve the Lord in prayer, prayer, what he wants you to pray. And then you’re really serving him rather than him just serving you, fulfilling your requests. Amen.

Evangelist Daniel King (19:27):
<Laugh> amen. Well, if someone is listening and they’d like to learn more about your ministry or support your crusades, what is your website? So people can connect with you.

Mark Swiger (19:40):
Well, it’s mark swagger, M a R K, and then swagger like tiger. All one word, S w I G E R, mark, swagger.org or.org. And that’s all they need to know or Google mark swagger. And I usually come up number one in the Googles, cuz there’s not too many mark swaggers around.

Evangelist Daniel King (20:04):
Wonderful. Well, thank you so much for being on the evangelism podcast. I appreciate it.

Mark Swiger (20:11):
Thank you. My dear friend and powerful evangelist, Daniel King honored to be with you.

Evangelist Daniel King (20:18):
Amen.

Evangelist Daniel King (20:19):
Thanks so much for listening today. I am excited about telling people about Jesus and I want to invite you to be a part of helping us to rescue people from hell and take them with us to heaven. There’s two things you can do to help. First of all, can you go find the evangelism podcast on apple iTunes and leave us a positive review by giving a review, you will help other people find these valuable resources about sharing our faith. And second, would you become a financial partner with king ministries? Every single dollar that people give us enables us to lead at least one person to Jesus. And so that means for only $1, you can help start a party in heaven. And so today I want to invite you to become a monthly partner. You can start out for just a dollar, but if God puts on your heart to do more, of course you can do more. But please go to king ministries.com and become a monthly partner with us today to help us to lead more people to Jesus. Thank you so much. And God bless you

Evangelism Podcast Host (21:38):
For more information about how to share your faith or to financially support our worldwide evangelistic outreaches. Visit king ministries.com. Again, that’s king ministries.com.

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