Grace-Based Pastors Conference in India and Donating Grace-Based Books to a Seminary (and Pastors)

Grace-Based Pastors Conference in India

Hello guys, some members in my cell group are organizing a Pastor’s conference in India in February 2012. My cell group is made up of Christians from different Churches, though most or all of us have been impacted by the message of grace – and most attend New Creation. We are all just ordinary Christians who have been impacted by the revelation of grace and the love of God. We also believe the days of the “big men of God” – specially anointed and holy servants of God that Christians ought to look up to because they have something special that we don’t have – are dying and instead all the saints are called to do the work of the ministry. The grace message has often been accused of producing passive Christians and to a certain extent that has been true. However, for us as a cell, we don’t believe in being passive, but in demonstrating the love of God to this world in an active manner. The grace and love of God empowers us to live for Him and bless people and our heart is to go out into the world and make an impact on peoples’ lives. I think two ministries / churches that we really identify with in terms of getting that message and ministry balance is Andrew Wommack and Bill Johnson.

Therefore, though many of us in the cell are not pastors or big leaders in Churches (none of us are actually) – and we still face many challenges in our own lives and are definitely “not there” yet (as Andrew Wommack would say, “I haven’t arrived yet, but I’ve left”) -, we challenge ourselves to step out and share and minister.  So with this Pastor’s conference, we are collaborating with a good Indian pastor friend of ours who is doing a lot of good work in one part of India.

We are holding this conference in a Seminary and targeting over 100 pastors from all over India (though mainly the Southern part). The focus of the conference is going to be on the gospel of grace and the love of Daddy God. All of us are united on this, having had our lives transformed, and thus this is the message we want to share to impact the lives of many pastors and their congregation.

This is going to be an exciting conference. I’m in charge of the curriculum and making sure all the messages are in line and flow from one to another. About 8 people from my cell group are going and 5 of us are going to share about 8 messages in total. We’re going to share on interpreting and preaching the Bible from a New Covenant perspective, righteousness-consciousness, grace, Sonship, union (identification) in relation to overcoming sin and ministry and the practical message of Spirit, Soul and Body and living it out from our spirit. Some of our influences have been people like Pastor Joseph Prince, Andrew Wommack and Bill Johnson.

Three of the 8 of us are pretty new to sharing – two of us only shared our first message in 2011 and one I think hasn’t really shared before. Some may be thinking how we can organize a pastor’s conference when many of us are so inexperienced. Perhaps that’s so. But I hope we’re not going into India thinking that India is a developing country and Singapore is a developed country and therefore we can do this because we’re somehow superior to them and they would respect us because of the fact that we’re out of town and thus know more. Definitely not! I don’t think we presume to go there thinking that we’re somehow better or know better than them. Both sides will learn from one another. For us, we have a very personal message and revelation that we want to share – something that has transformed our lives and we believe will transform the lives of the pastors and their congregation. And we really believe in getting to know the pastors there and not acting like we’re some big shots from out of town. In fact, most pastors would be traveling from afar off and will be sleeping on mattresses  in the Seminary. Our cell group wanted to live with them rather than stay in a hotel – because we truly want to interact and get to know the people and we don’t see ourselves as different or on a higher level than them – but for some security and other reasons this could not be arranged.

Donating Grace-Based Books to the Seminary (and maybe the Pastors too?)

Anyway, so this is what’s happening in February 2012. Actually the main reason for this post is to appeal to people who want to contribute books to the Seminary there in India. The Seminary is new and so they have need for books. I’ve given about 100 or so of my Christian books to the Seminary. They are a portion of the books I’ve bought since 15 years ago. But most of them are not very grace-based. The reason why my cell group is very passionate about organizing this conference is because it’s about teaching and transforming the thinking and hearts of pastors. If the pastors catch the loving and gracious heart of Daddy God and the message of the New Covenant, they will share this message to their congregation. The potential for impact is thus enormous. And that’s why I also believe in investing in books for the Seminary students to read.

So for those who want to be part of donating grace-based books to the Seminary, you can donate through me through the Paypal button below. I will use the money to purchase a list of different grace-based books I know (I haven’t read all of them, but I know they are good). Below is my compilation of various life-transforming grace-based books which I will get with your donation – feel free to comment below and point out some books I’ve missed. And if you want to donate to purchase a specific book, then let me know too. For those in Singapore, you can contact me if you want to physically pass me one of your books. If there’s enough money, I’ll think of purchasing one good grace-based book to give also to the pastors at the conference (maybe 100+). That’s only if we have enough money because we want to be fair and give all of the pastors the book and not just some of them.

1) Books by Bill Johnson of Bethel Church (I put Bill Johnson’s books first because for those who are wary of the grace message, he’s probably the least controversial, and most influential, leader of all names here. While his books don’t address the message of grace directly, I believe his theology and his books, like that of the Vineyard (at least in the past), ASSUMES the foundation of the message of the love and grace of God. He uses a different language and doesn’t get caught up in all the controversies, but he’s definitely grace-based in most senses and his Church even sells Pastor Joseph Prince’s books. I first heard of the message of the Father heart of God through Vineyard and the Toronto Blessing was mostly about that message, which to me is a message of grace using different terms)
2) Destined to Reign by Joseph Prince
3) Books by Andrew Wommack
4) Books by New Nature Publications
5) It is Finished by Nerida Walker (just got this book and it looks interesting)
6) Books by Elyse Fitzpatrick (Elyse is a good Reformed author. My background is in the Reformed tradition and even though I don’t agree with a lot of beliefs in that tradition now (and I think it’s too legalistic for me in general), one section of the Reformed tradition has a very strong “gospel-centered” focus which is very grace-based and which I think a lot of grace-based Christians can learn a lot from.
7) Books by Mark Hankins (good identity in Christ stuff)
8) Books by EW Kenyon (good identity in Christ stuff)

[I don’t have time to complete my list, but I will keep adding books when I have time and will continue to welcome donation for these books even after this upcoming trip because the team may plan to go there regularly in future and work with the Seminary and pastors there and the Singaporean pastor we work with goes there quite regularly]