Chai with Chintas

August 31, 2011

Borewell

Dear Prayer Partners,

We had a BIG disappointment today with the bore well drilling. They drilled the spot the surveyor said was the best spot-even going up to 500 feet, no water. You can imagine our disappointment and the waste of Rs. 34,000. Please pray for God's guidance and wisdom for the next step.

Tomorrow morning Raju is taking us to the family seminar to Nalgonda area, nearly 4 hours from Hyderabad. The seminar is for a local church for 2 days. We will return home late night Thursday. Do not like to be gone long with the way things are with Jay's mom with her problem with Alzheimer's. With Raju driving us, we need to be away only one night. The new Caregiver is working out quite well and Amma is responding well to her for which we are grateful
Love,
Kailas

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Regarding the situation with the borewell, the Lord spoke to our hearts this morning through the following devotional:

"Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed." John 20:29

How strong is the snare of the things that are seen, and how necessary for God to keep us in the things that are unseen! If Peter is to walk on the water he must walk; if he is going to swim, he must swim, but he cannot do both. If the bird is going to fly it much keep away from fences and the trees and trust its buoyant wings. But if it tries to keep within easy reach of the ground, it will make poor work of flying.

God had to bring Abraham to the end of his own strength, and to let him see that in his own body as good as dead, and then take God for the whole work; and when he looked away form himself, and trusted God alone, then he became fully persuaded that what He had promised, He was able to perform. That is what God is teaching us, and He has to keep away encouraging results until we learn to trust without them, and then He loves to make His Word real in fact as well as faith. –AB Simpson

I do not ask that He must prove

His Word is true to me,

And that before I can believe

He first must let me see.

It is enough for me to know

'Tis true because He says 'tis so;

On His unchanging Word I'll stand

And trust till I can understand.

– EM Winter

2 Corinthians 1

³ Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, ⁴ who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. ⁵ For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ. ⁶ If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. ⁷ And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort.

⁸ We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about the troubles we experienced in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself. ⁹ Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. ¹⁰ He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us again. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us, ¹¹ as you help us by your prayers. Then many will give thanks on our behalf for the gracious favor granted us in answer to the prayers of many.

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July 19, 2011

Karleen-Chetan's Engagement

Karleen and Chetan's engagement was a great time of celebration and rejoicing in the Lord for His marvelous work in our family's life.

Jay's relatives at Karleen's engagement

Chetan's relatives

Our Pastor, M. J. Bhaskar Rao, exhorting from the Word of God

Christopher David praying a dedication prayer for the couple. He and his wife counseled them for 2 pre-engagement sessions

Jay's dad - closing prayer

Ark staff presenting a flower bouquet

Our very happy family!!!

The couple with Chetan's family

The lovely couple!!!!

Chetan gave a diamond ring

Karleen gave a watch

With Raju

With Nirmala

Special photo on the roof top

With Laxmi's family

With moms

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June 3, 2011

Photos of the Ark "Promised Land"

We continue to rejoice in God's goodness in granting us this land

  Visiting the Ark's Land with some of the Ashirvad children on June 2, 2011

  The 2 acres are lengthwise-rectangular shape

  Walking from one end towards the Chinta family's quarter acre

We dreamed many dreams as we spent time on the land-sang, praised and prayed together!!!

Bhanu, Krishnaveni (red dress) and Pooja (orange dress) - with Chinta land to their right

Latha, Bharathi and Sowjanya (L to R) - excited about the new playground!!

Praveen Kumar(back), Sreekanth(orange), Arvind(Orange-yellow) and Bhanu(front)-in the vegetable garden

Half of this land is ours-the man from whom we bought owns the second half

Our property is on the other side of the fencing

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June 3, 2011

Photos of the Ark "Promised Land"

We continue to rejoice in God's goodness in granting us this land

  Visiting the Ark's Land with some of the Ashirvad children on June 2, 2011

  The 2 acres are lengthwise-rectangular shape

  Walking from one end towards the Chinta family's quarter acre

We dreamed many dreams as we spent time on the land-sang, praised and prayed together!!!

Bhanu, Krishnaveni (red dress) and Pooja (orange dress) - with Chinta land to their right

Latha, Bharathi and Sowjanya (L to R) - excited about the new playground!!

Praveen Kumar(back), Sreekanth(orange), Arvind(Orange-yellow) and Bhanu(front)-in the vegetable garden

Half of this land is ours-the man from whom we bought owns the second half

Our property is on the other side of the fencing

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March 15, 2011

Uchamla, Gujarat Pastors' Family Conference

Uchamala, South Gujarat, January 26-27: 2 day pastors and leaders family conference was conducted at Uchamala. Dr. Godwin, Gujarat State Area Leader for Evangelical Church of India (ECI) invited and organized this conference. 26 leader couples from ECI and 3 other leader couples from 3 other organizations attended. Jayaraj, and Gujarat staff, Ramesh and Indumati Gohil were the resource persons.

A wonderful opportunity to serve the ECI and other ministry couples

Jayaraj receiving a traditional welcome with a garland by ECI leadership

Ramesh Gohil, Gujarat Ark Coordinator, welcomed with a garland

29 ministry couples attended

Jayaraj teaching with help of an interpreter

Attentive listners

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March 15, 2011

Pastors' Family Conference, Karanji, Maharashtra state

Pastors Family Conference, January 24-25, 2011: We are grateful for the opportunity to conduct 2 day Pastors and Leaders Family Conference in Karanji, Navapur, Maharashtra State near Gujarat border. The conference was organized by Philadelphia Fellowship. 33 leader couples from both Gujarat and Maharashtra states attended. We praise God this has also opened doors for future ministry with Philadelphia Fellowship in other states.

33 Pastor/leader couples attended the family conference

Husband/wife sharing five positive points about one another

Notes for all subjects given in Gujarati/Hindi languages

Couples praying together for their relationship

Group Discussion time

Separate session for husbands regarding Scripture instructions on intimate issues

Indumati Gohil shares on intimate issues with wives

Jayaraj teaching the men

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March 8, 2011

The agreement for the land

Dear Prayer Partner,
The meeting today with the land owner, the board members and the lawyer went well. We had 3 governing body members present and one Annual General meeting (AGM) member. It was good they all were present. The owner agreed to do everything legally without any black money or checks in 2 names as he had been suggesting earlier. The lawyer has drafted the rough agreement for 2 acre land piece. We had to agree to pay the larger downpayment than we wanted, but this is a norm and we had to agree to this.
Tomorrow the agreement will be officially ready for signatures and the downpayment will be made by crossed check. Then the lawyer will prepare the notice to be placed in the paper.The notice will be in the paper by Friday, March 11th. If there is no objection of any form from anyone, we hope to make the next payment on March 25th and the land registration will take place at the same time. We have one more month to make the final payment. We are short some amount so will hope for our house to be registered and house sale deal made by then!!
Hopefully we will see the architect by March 12th or 14th so that we can present the building plans to the village government office for their approval after the registration is completed on March 25th. Once that is done...we are ready for the ground breaking ceremony and begin to build!!!
As you can see God is moving in our midst...and we need prayer for His wisdom at every step of the way!!!

THANK YOU so much for supporting us with prayer each time we sent a SOS prayer request. The Lord has been very kind to us. Please continue to pray that the Lord's hand will be over all these procedures.

In Him,

Jay & Kailas

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February 23, 2011

First Pastors/Leaders Family Conference in Arunachal Pradesh state, NE India

First Pastors/Leaders family Conference in Arunachal Pradesh state, NE India

It was our wonderful privilege to conduct our first family conference for pastors and other Christian leaders just within Arunachal Pradesh near Assam border.

Rev. Steward Yanao Lunghar and his wife, Nyapu, of Himalayan Bible Institute hosted and organized this conference. Rev. Steward shared that although they had all kinds of conferences on their premises, they had never had a family conference before. Thus it was indeed a privilege to impart biblical family life principles to 20 leader couples and other 10 from various denominations who were there without their spouses.

Rev. Lloyd Raine and his wife, Hazel, who had been instrumental in helping us with the initial stage of beginning Ark Family Ministries recently shared this with us by

e-mail from Canada,

"Blessings on your ministry in the north. Assam and Arunachal are two areas that we have never been to. We had a doctor in Calcutta who was from Arunachal. While studying in Bangalore he heard that anti-conversion laws had been passed in his home state and that day he knelt to receive Christ as his Saviour. After graduating he went back to Arunachal to serve as a government doctor but mostly to be a witness for the Lord. In the years since then the church there has grown from less than 1% to more than 10% of the people of the state. So we praise God for what He has done in Arunachal. May the Lord bless you as you go there to minister to the churches and their pastors."

Crossing River Brahmaputra in a local ferry

Jayaraj coming off a small ferry that carried 5 cars!

Rev. Steward (left) and his wife, Nyapu, hosted the conference

20 leader couples and 10 others attended

Assamese notes used in this part of Arunachal Pradesh

Everyone is happy when couples share positive points about their spouse!

Kerry teaching on conflicts

Kailas teaching on the role of a Christian wife, Mrs. Nyapu interpreting

Wonderful time of fellowship!

Enjoyment of sightseeing

Togetherness in all things!

Wow! Did we travel by this????

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February 23, 2011

First Pastors/Leaders Family Conference in Assam state, NE India

First Pastors/Leaders Family Conference in Assam state, NE India-February 16-18, 2011

Pastor Michael Tondia, Executive Secretary of Sadiya Dibru Baptist Association, was instrumental in helping us arrange our first pastors/leaders family conference in Assam state, NE India. 19 couples from this association participated in this learning experience. None of them had ever received any previous teaching/training in this area of Christian life. Jayaraj, Kailas and Kerry were the resource persons. (We will post testimonies of the participants once they are translated by Pastor Michael and sent to us.)