Tamilnadu

Pastors Conference 2009

We are busily planning for our next event in India, a pastor’s conference in Madurai, Tamil Nadu. It will be our biggest Indian undertaking yet, with about 1500 pastors expected. This has the potential to have a huge impact on the area, as we are taking steps to ensure that only senior pastors or someone they have appointed attend. Therefore, each participant will represent a different congregation and community that they will be trained and equipped to reach. Because conferences in India are basically free for the attendees, (the cost of travel, accommodations, food, etc. is carried by the host) the reported numbers can sometimes be a bit deceiving as pastors will bring their families and several congregants to a conference. This practice makes the event less cost efficient as far as outreach, as there may be many people in attendance, but few communities and churches actually represented. Pastor Thomas and his team in India are making sure that our efforts are going to reach as many areas as possible by limiting the attendance to senior pastors only.

We continue to receive positive feedback from our previous conferences, so it is very exciting to be able to build on that experience and look expectantly at what God is going to do with this one. Hosting 1500 pastors is a daunting challenge, both logistically and financially, but God is faithful and we are excited to see how He is going to work things out and advance his kingdom in South India and beyond.

--A Note From Our main ministry partner in India, Pastor Thomas Maher--

Dear Friend,

Greetings to you in Jesus Name! I am very glad to contact you through this letter. I thank God for allowing me to share with you what God has done through you and your ministry in India. I am very pleased to inform you that it has been great blessing to partner with you in this great missionary work in India. Since 2006 we have partnered with DJEM (Don Johnson Evangelistic Ministries) and God has been doing great things in India.

I trust this report will bring great joy among the supporters and prayer warriors of DJEM. By the grace of God we have been able to train over 2400 pastors and leaders through "The Way to Heaven” conferences. Don has personally trained more than 1400 pastors and leaders and we have also used his material to train many more on the subject of The Way to Heaven.

It was nice that we were able to translate and print the book The Road to Heaven in Tamil language. I can say that it has been such a great benefit to the churches and ministers. My office received numerous letters concerning this book, all of them saying that it has been very beneficial in helping them grow spiritually. We have been able to distribute over 2000 copies for free of cost. We still would like to print several thousand more books in Tamil and other Indian languages as well.

It was also a great help to the churches to give them other resources. Along with Don’s book we were able to provide Jesus Film and God’s Story on DVD for free.  These CDs were also distributed to over 2000 ministers. It is our strategy that if 20 people in the church read The Road to Heaven book in Tamil there will be more than 40000 people that will read it and be blessed. Likewise, if one church will project Jesus CD to over 150 people, the 2000 church leaders and pastors would show the life of Jesus on CD in their locality to over 300,000. What a tremendous blessing to the people of India! We have brought the pastors to this commitment and provided these CDs and books for free of cost.

Don’s recent three trips to India made a great impact among people and church leaders. It was such a great help that DJEM could provide food, accommodation, travel, books and CDs for all delegates of the conferences so the poor pastors could come and learn the word of God. Although we do not have accurate record from pastors about the salvation of people in their area, generally the report from pastors show that several thousands might be saved. Glory to God that the way God has been using Don Johnson in India!

Once again I want to thank Brother Don for his great desire and willingness to partner with us in preaching the gospel to unreached people and train as many pastors as we can in India. Thanks again for DJEM's prayer and financial support for Indian ministry. May the Lord continually keep growing this ministry more and more so that it might be a blessing to millions of people in India and around the world. May God Bless you!

Yours in His Mission,

Rev. I. Thomas Maher, Founder / President , The Indian Council of Missions