Pastor Peter Haneef attacked; hand cut off

I am sad and sorry that most of our posts of late have been requests for prayer for our leaders rather than reports from the field.

In a recent correspondence with Assembly of Loving God (ALG Church) President Peter Haneef, he wrote the following when I asked him for news from the mission field:

“Dear Susanna 
Glory to the Lord Jesus Christ 

I’m thankful to you for keeping us in your prayers for our ministry throughout Bangladesh. 

We’re a dedicated team ministering for the Lord among jungle people and among village Muslims. By this time we’ve established 127 house churches and every week they are worshiping the Lord in Spirit and in Truth. The Holy Spirit moves wonderfully and there are many, many people embracing Christianity in these days.
 
I will send you the report when I prepare it. Kindly continue praying for us."
 
He wrote that back on June 10, so I’d been wondering when his report would come … and found myself being prompted to be even more in prayer for him and his team.
 
Today I got this message from Pastor Paul:

”Pastor Peter Haneef and gospel team are attacked by a mob of Muslims in a Muslim village in Bangladesh.

Pastor Haneef was carrying a Bible and was speaking to the crowd. Suddenly a group of attackers came with big butchers’ knives and steel pipes and attacked them. Pastor Haneef’s left hand was cut off and thrown away along with his Bible. The other team members rescued him although they were also seriously wounded. The people brought them to the hospital. Don’t know the details. But I am on the way to Bangladesh.”

So of course, he asks us all to be in prayer for this brave man of God and his team. Let's also pray for a safe and successful trip for Pastor Paul.

As ever, we cherish and in fact cannot function without your prayerful support of this ministry. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts!

May our Lord be your forever Guide, Protector and ever-present Help ....

Resting with and testing: ‘His power made perfect in weakness’

Isn’t it one of God’s grandest, deepest mysteries: that His power can be made perfect in our weakness?

Our dear ministry Director Pastor Paul is testing and resting in that one right now, and wants to thank all who have been praying for him and helping with medical expenses. Thankfully he is home from hospital, feeling much better, but still weak and tired. So please keep up your prayers. Ministry ‘out in the field’ of course continues.

We are still not really sure what all was going on with him. His doctors thought it could be aftereffects of the damage he has suffered from being attacked so many times over the years, and then of course the resulting brain surgeries (we have covered all those stories in previous posts).

“But I said, and I fully believe, that those were completely healed by my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ by His nail-pierced hands,” Pastor Paul asserts.

“He will not do His work partially. And also He will not keep His promise partially. His work and promise are always fully done. So I don’t think it is an after-effect of anything. This is what I learned and experienced from my Lord Jesus. He is always good for me. Whatever He thinks, let it be done.”

“So what, then, do you think was going on in the hospital?” I asked.

“It was of course that He wanted to teach me more to stand stable in His faith, to serve Him more without any doubt and hesitation. Of course my body is weak, but His Spirit within me is strong. Let Him use me according to His will.”

He knows the Lord wanted to teach similar lessons to his family, who stood with him and found their faith strengthened through the whole ordeal.

“In this crisis, the faithful servants of God, who love me with the everlasting love of God, stood for me and still stand for me with prayers and kind support, and helped me and my family so much. In the name of Jesus, I’m thankful to them all.”

This precious, mysterious and mysteriously STRONG verse (from 2 Cor. 12:9) is one I stand and live on as well. How about you?

Pastor Paul improves, plus an exciting report from ALG President Pastor Peter Haneef

Pastor Peter Haneef recently flew from ministry with his team in Bangladesh for several visits with Pastor Paul, who is still in the ICU of a Kerala hospital. Pastor Peter serves as President of the ALG (Assembly of Loving God, the umbrella organization for all Bibles for Mideast churches) and is second-in-command of Bibles for Mideast after Director Pastor Paul.

He had to get special authorization to go into the ICU the first day, and says that with the doctor’s permission, he was able to lay hands on and pray over Pastor Paul. At that point, Pastor Paul opened his eyes, saw who was visiting him and became quite emotional. As he attempted to get up, the doctor helped him rise partially at least, and when he tried to speak, only a few words came out. Still, the doctor felt it a good sign.  “Certainly our Lord will heal him soon and miraculously use him for His Kingdom,” Pastor Peter reports. “We hope it in our Lord Jesus.”

When Pastor Peter visited again the next day, they had a similar experience. Pastor Peter explained to him much of what he and others had been doing, about all our prayers, and is certain all he spoke was understood.

“I prayed again and left the room,” he says. “Surely he will come out of this situation shortly, because the whole church and many saintly children of God praying for him from around the world. Praise and thank the Lord. Glory to His name.”

For the last two months, Pastor Peter has been ministering alongside his five-member team in the jungles and villages of north and east India as well as in northern Bangladesh. His team had remained behind to continue the mission work in Bangladesh when he’d come to visit Pastor Paul.

“We were visiting houses, praying for the sick, doing personal evangelism, conducting prayer and fasting services and public meetings,” he explains.

Bangladeshi village people who met with the team and attended meeting

“Many sick people were miraculously healed, and thousands of people have accepted our Lord Jesus as their savior and Lord.”

During those two months, the team established an astounding 79 ALG churches! In some places, he says, “Hindu and Muslim fundamentalists came to attack us, but villagers as well as jungle people protected us and stood against the attackers.”

In one jungle village, a 50-year-old man had been bedridden since his boyhood, his backbone fully destroyed when a wild elephant attacked him. His sisters had been caring for him.

“During our prayer and fasting,” Pastor Peter explains, “he was filled with the Holy Spirit, jumped down among the praying people, dancing and praising the Lord! Several whole jungle villages then turned to the Lord!”

In another village, a blind woman could see after being prayed for, and many sick were healed in other places they visited.

At one point, one ALG missionary couple was accused of converting others to Christianity, arrested, and given a five-year prison sentence. Pastor Peter attempted to intervene by posting bail for them and while successful with the wife, Sheeja, he couldn’t manage to help her husband, Jose. He says they have lawyers there now still working on getting bail for him as the case drags on.

“Once again thank you for your prayers and support,” he says.

Please keep up the prayer shield as Pastor Peter makes his way back to the mission field, and as our dear Pastor Paul continues his recovery. His son Lesly reported from the hospital a few days ago that his doctors consider his progress a miracle! May they be touched through all this as well, Lord.

Indian pastors freed: a powerful answer to prayer

Two pastors in Gujarat, India, walked out of prison about two weeks ago, free again to share the Gospel.

Badri and Ramu* had been arrested earlier in the week, accused under India’s anti-conversion laws too often used to silence Christians who share the Gospel. By the end of the week, however, the pastors were freed—walking out of prison thanks to prayer, solidarity and the unshakable courage that defines the persecuted Church.

After being abducted from their ministry work by members of a Hindu nationalist group, the pastors were first handed over to police and reportedly beaten. They were then transferred to a long-term prison facility where they waited and prayed—isolated, hurting, but of course never alone.

When the Christian relief organization Global Christian Relief learned about Badri and Ramu, they did what many of us do: they refused to let the pastors’ pain go unanswered. They collected the needed bail money and a few days later, the pastors were freed!

These pastors—unjustly imprisoned—are now free and continuing their Gospel ministry, supported by faithful believers in their local community.

This is what it means to be one Church, one family. When one part of the Body suffers, we all can do our part to respond.

These pastors stood firm under pressure, trusting God even from a prison cell. Today, they remain committed to leading others to Christ, no matter the cost.

Their story is a real-time reminder of how urgent needs arise in the lives of persecuted believers—and how the global Christian community responds with compassion and action.

*Names changed for security reasons
You can read the original story here, at Global Christian Relief.

Help needed for ministry director Pastor Paul

Our dear Pastor Paul has been in hospital in India for about a week now, and desperately needs our prayers. Initially admitted with breathing issues, chest and head pains, he lapsed into a coma soon after, so was put on ventilation and admitted to the ICU.
 
His younger son Lesly and his wife Mercy have been with him almost constantly. At one point as they prayed, he came out of the coma and was able to communicate some with them.

He is still in ICU and doctors are saying his issues could be related to the two brain surgeries he endured several years ago. Another possibility is that he suffered a stroke, but that hasn’t yet been determined.

While he appears far better than he was, he remains in the ICU and in need of lots of divine intervention!
 
If you can help in any way—with prayers especially, but funds will be needed for the hospital stay as well—we will be beyond appreciative.