On Pastoring in India, with Pastor Harshit (Pastors Talk, Ep. 219)
What is it like to pastor a church in India? On this episode of Pastors Talk, Jonathan Leeman and Mark Dever discuss the differences and hardships that pastors face in India as well as what it is like to be a Christian in India. They talk about biblical literacy in India and incorrect assumptions the West commonly makes. Finally, Pastor Harshit shares ways that Christians can pray for churches in India and encourage Indian believers.
- What is it Like to Pastor a Church In India?
- Biblical Literacy in India
- How to Pray for Churches in India
- What It is Like Being a Christian in India
Transcript
The following is a lightly edited transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.
Jonathan Leeman:
Hi, this is Jonathan Leeman.
Mark Dever:
And this is Mark Dever.
Jonathan Leeman:
Welcome to this episode of 9Marks Pastors Talk.
Mark Dever:
A truly ecclesiastical conversation.
Jonathan Leeman:
For pastors everywhere.
Mark Dever:
Including even in the subcontinent.
Jonathan Leeman:
That’s right.
Mark Dever:
But what most people don’t realize is not all of the people in the subcontinent live in the Indus Valley.
Jonathan Leeman:
And with us, we have Harshit, Pastor Harshit from, can we say where?
Mark Dever:
The other side.
Pastor Harshit:
India.
Jonathan Leeman:
India, a pastor in India.
Mark Dever:
But listen, by your name, can we tell that you don’t speak Punjabi?
Pastor Harshit:
Probably some people would think that, yeah, I speak Punjabi. If they just went by my last name.
Mark Dever:
How is your Punjabi?
Pastor Harshit:
Zero.
Pastoring a Church in India
Mark Dever:
Do you pastor a church in India?
Pastor Harshit:
In North India, yeah.
Mark Dever:
And it’s populated by Indians?
Pastor Harshit:
It is in India.
Mark Dever:
Well, there are expat churches.
Pastor Harshit:
Not where the city that I am. Very few expats.
Jonathan Leeman:
Your city is over a million people?
Pastor Harshit:
Almost five million people.
Mark Dever:
There are German language churches there?
Pastor Harshit:
None.
Mark Dever:
There are Chinese-language churches there.
Pastor Harshit:
Certainly not.
Mark Dever:
Korean language churches there?
Pastor Harshit:
Not at all. It’s primarily Hindi-speaking churches.
Mark Dever:
Punjabi congregations there?
Pastor Harshit:
I don’t think so. I think it’s primarily Hindi and maybe a couple of English, maybe.
Mark Dever:
How’s your Hindi?
Pastor Harshit:
It’s my mother tongue. It should be good.
Jonathan Leeman:
How long have you been pastoring your church?
Pastor Harshit:
In that church for the last three years, but in that city almost 10 years.
Jonathan Leeman:
Okay.
Mark Dever:
How would you say it’s going?
Pastor Harshit:
God’s grace, it’s quite encouraging, everything seems to be going okay.
COVID’s Impact On Pastors
Mark Dever:
I think a lot of pastors here in America are very tired after COVID. I think COVID put some unusual stress and strains on congregations about meeting and not meeting and then disagreements among members of the church and sometimes even leaders of the church about how to respond to restrictions and closures. Was the same thing going on among Christians in India?
Pastor Harshit:
I mean, I was following what was happening in the West, in America. I don’t think that was the case for us, or for many churches in India.
Most of our people were happy to just come back waiting as soon as the restrictions would go down and people just keen to just come back. It didn’t do any damage in that sense.
Mark Dever:
Was there controversy over whether or not to comply with the restrictions?
Pastor Harshit:
Generally, Indians are very good at following authority. So if the government says something generally, they think that it is for their good.
And we felt the effect of COVID in ways I think a lot of people around the world did not. So I think they were very happy to just comply with certain restrictions for a period, for sure.
Mark Dever:
It seemed more obviously dangerous to people in India.
Pastor Harshit:
Yeah. We saw it very clearly.
Mark Dever:
Higher mortality rate.
Pastor Harshit:
Yeah, I mean, it was really bad, yeah. The second wave for sure.
Jonathan Leeman:
How did you meet Mark?
Pastor Harshit:
I met him in 2010 when he came. No, actually I met him in 2007. I came here for a weekend with a pastor called Robin Weeks.
Jonathan Leeman:
Right, that’s right. I remember going on a walk with Robin and maybe you.
Pastor Harshit:
I think so.
Jonathan Leeman:
The group of us back then. Well, listen, my goal for this conversation, I would just love to hear, imagining the average pastor driving down the road, listening to this podcast, kind of curious about what your church is like. What pastoring a church in India is like.
Mark Dever:
Is it like their church in Indiana?
Jonathan Leeman:
Yeah, that’s exactly right. So let’s just start with your church specifically. You’re the senior pastor?
Pastor Harshit:
mhm…
Mark Dever:
Well, you wouldn’t use that, the equivalent of that phrase.
Church Leadership Positions In India
Jonathan Leeman:
What would you call it? Just pastor or?
Pastor Harshit:
Most people don’t even call me pastor, just call me Pahir, which is a word for an older brother.
Jonathan Leeman:
Okay. Plurality of elders?
Pastor Harshit:
We do have, yeah. A plurality of elders, yeah.
Mark Dever:
What are people who are older than you call you?
Pastor Harshit:
Son, pastor, good friend.
Jonathan Leeman:
But it is a formally recognized office.
Pastor Harshit:
It is a formally recognized office and I do, I mean, yeah.
Mark Dever:
Your people would understand you to meet the qualifications of First Timothy 3 and Titus 1.
Pastor Harshit:
Certainly, certainly. I mean, yeah, it’s all there. I think very similar in the sense. People have a clear understanding of who a pastor is and what my task is.
Jonathan Leeman:
There are a number of brethren churches, aren’t there in southern India, south India?
Pastor Harshit:
All over India, yeah.
Jonathan Leeman:
They wouldn’t have that same recognition.
Pastor Harshit:
They just use the word brother and have a variety of elders and avoid using the term pastor.
Sermon Content and Length
Jonathan Leeman:
What are you preaching through right now?
Pastor Harshit:
I’m taking a break right now. Our brothers in our church are preaching through a series of Psalms. I was preaching, I just finished Exodus. I Am’s of John just before this.
Jonathan Leeman:
How long are your sermons?
Pastor Harshit:
Depending on the Sunday.
Jonathan Leeman:
Ballpark.
Pastor Harshit:
Fifty to sixty-five minutes.
Mark Dever:
So Harshit, when you say just preaching through the I Am’s of John, is that the kind of thing that you would have an eye to publishing?
Pastor Harshit:
That’s not what I was thinking. I was thinking it’s my people, the church, primarily that come to a church. I think we’ve just finished Exodus and it just seemed a good thing to go to the New Testament and try to show them Jesus, he’s the same Jesus that was in the Old Testament.
Mark Dever:
Amen. Many of the Christian books in English currently, but also old ones, purely written titles I could name, began their life as sermons.
Pastor Harshit:
That’s true.
Biblical Literacy in India
Mark Dever:
Is there a tradition or practice right now of Orthodox, biblically informed Indian pastors publishing their sermons as Christian books for Christians to read?
Pastor Harshit:
I have thought about it, but I don’t think there’s a big culture for it yet. Biblical literacy is very low. Literacy is low, biblical literacy is low, and a desire for reading is very low still in India. And we’d love to see people pick up those things eventually. I think that’s in the future one day.
Jonathan Leeman:
Mark, why that question?
Mark Dever:
Because I think one of the ways you create that culture is by just beginning to do it.
Pastor Harshit:
Thank you for saying that. I think we’re already thinking about it.
Mark Dever:
If you wait until there’s a demand, you wait until the world has beat you to it.
Pastor Harshit:
That is true. So I’m going to start a season on Colossians, and one of my hopes is that I would put it into a book form.
Mark Dever:
Yeah, and your purpose is still of course your church. That’s your primary purpose of course. But even as you and I still benefit from Spurgeon’s sermons that he preached, I mean there’s just, there’s additional benefit to be got out of the work you do in writing that sermon.
What is an Expositional Preacher?
Jonathan Leeman:
You call yourself an expositional preacher.
Pastor Harshit:
I think so, yeah.
Jonathan Leeman:
And you encourage your students and interns to be expositional preachers.
Pastor Harshit:
That’s right. That’s correct. Yes.
Jonathan Leeman:
And your definition of an expositional sermon is?
Pastor Harshit:
The point of the passage is the point of the sermon applied to the lives of the people here and now, yeah.
Jonathan Leeman:
Now, would you say you have a particularly literary congregation? I’ve heard a number of people say that expositional preaching only works in a literary and sometimes even in say Western context.
Mark Dever:
With wind pews and pipe organs and long traditions of going to Dad’s school.
Jonathan Leeman:
That’s right.
Pastor Harshit:
I think a lot of those people are mistaken. They themselves have not put into practice that kind of preaching in their own lives in churches, even from the places that they’ve come from, number one.
Number two, if you spend enough time with people around the world and people who are semi-literate or illiterate background, they’re not educated, but they are, they’re smart people. They understand proposition and teaching.
The whole life generally doesn’t work around storytelling. I mean, you have villages, you have in villages, you have these committees that come together to decide and work the functioning of the villages. They don’t go and say to one another, hey, let me tell you a story about this, or let me tell you a story about that.
They just say, hey, the five things that we want to do in this meeting, and this is what we should do, and this is how we should go about. I think it’s just the way naturally people are wired to think and to present their case and then conclude and draw inferences from what they’re trying to say. So I think it’s very faulty. It’s a faulty thinking reasoning.
Personally, I have seen that in the ministry that I’ve been involved with, and we’ve seen good preachers in India, and those who have been are the ones who can take the scripture and point the eyes and nose of the people to the text and say, hey, this is what the Bible is saying and this is what it means for us in three different ways. And it’s very helpful. I think that’s a very helpful way of doing…
Jonathan Leeman:
So when the Western sociologists say, oh, people around the world only learn through story, that’s kind of patronizing.
Pastor Harshit:
Very patronizing and very simplistic and very reductionistic.
Mark Dever:
And not true.
Pastor Harshit:
Certainly not true. I do not. I mean, everybody likes stories.
Should You Change Your Sermons Based on Your Audience?
Mark Dever:
Do you preach differently to different kinds of more or less literate congregations of people in India?
Pastor Harshit:
I mean, maybe when I’m in certain settings, maybe I can use slightly bigger words. I can use slightly different kinds of illustrations.
I could quote more authors, those kind of things. When I’m talking to a slightly less educated crowd, I think maybe I might repeat a few things more and use more anecdotes, but it’s essentially the same thing.
Mark Dever:
But don’t you think your sermon would be stronger, whatever kind of crowd you’re speaking to, if you would quote, viewer authors?
Pastor Harshit:
That is true always.
Mark Dever:
It’s a very research paper kind of thing to do.
Pastor Harshit:
I don’t do that. I’m just saying maybe.
Mark Dever:
Okay.
Jonathan Leeman:
Mark, do you adjust your preaching of kind of same question that you asked Harshit?
Mark Dever:
Yeah, I think so. I mean, I’ve got, I’m about to go on a trip tomorrow where I’m giving six or seven different messages in several different settings. And yeah, I definitely have more and less full notes depending on what the setting is. Yeah.
Jonathan Leeman:
So we make adjustments according to our audience.
Mark Dever:
Always.
Pastor Harshit:
That’s common sense.
What Does A Church Gathering in India Look Like?
Jonathan Leeman:
Yeah. Nonetheless, we can go overboard with that. Okay, so I’m walking into one of your church gatherings. It’s going to last how long?
Pastor Harshit:
We started at 9 almost 12 o ’clock, 9 to 10, 10 to 11. Yeah, 11 o ’clock.
Jonathan Leeman:
So two hours. How many songs are we going to sing?
Pastor Harshit:
Six or seven, depending.
Mark Dever:
So it’s a pretty short service.
Pastor Harshit:
I thought it was kind of okay. Two hours is okay. 9 to 11.
Jonathan Leeman:
And most of those songs have been written by who?
Pastor Harshit:
Some Indians, some translated Western hymns.
Jonathan Leeman:
Okay. And the Indian ones, are they recent or are they old?
Pastor Harshit:
A mix, a mix of some recent, some contemporary, but usually with contemporary, we have to play around with certain words. Older hand songs tend to be more theologically sound and more biblically rich.
Jonathan Leeman:
Would it be inappropriate to ask you to sing one of your favorite Indian songs?
Pastor Harshit:
I don’t know want to do that now.
Mark Dever:
I don’t want to hear the words because I wouldn’t understand them, but I am curious about what the tune is like. To me, would it sound distinct? Philip, are you good at this?
Pastor Harshit:
He is great.
Mark Dever:
Come on, Philip. Oh, just for a second. And Philip, understand, neither Jonathan…
Jonathan Leeman:
Who’s Philip?
Pastor Harshit:
Philip is… He works with us. He helps run for the Truth Publishing Ministry in India.
Jonathan Leeman:
Okay.
Mark Dever:
So neither Jonathan nor I speak Hindi, so you won’t bless us by the words, assuming in the New Testament, not speaking without translation. All we’re wondering is the sound. Does it sound to us like a Western tune for him?
Jonathan Leeman:
To sing us a melody.
Mark Dever:
So if you can just… Well, not a note. Just if you guess what a melody would be like or a main line of an Indian hymn.
Philip:
Harshit, tell me a song which I should sing.
Mark Dever:
Like one of your congregation’s favorites. What’s your congregation’s… One of their favorite songs to sing.
Philip:
*singing… Something like that.
Mark Dever:
You have a great voice, brother. So Philip, just a quick question or Harshit, there are little variations in the voice? I can’t do it.
Philip:
That’s why I said that it’s a very classic Hindi song.
Mark Dever:
But is everybody standing there who sings, are they able to do that?
Pastor Harshit:
Not perfectly, yeah.
Mark Dever:
But generally, they do.
Pastor Harshit:
Generally, yeah.
Mark Dever:
In a way if you tried to teach that to our congregation here, you would expect them not to be able to do that.
Philip:
Yeah, maybe because it’s a very Hindi song.
Pastor Harshit:
We do sing it quite regularly, quite frequently. I’m glad he did it, not me.
Corporate Prayer In India
Jonathan Leeman:
Okay, so you’re gonna preach for 50 to 60 minutes, you’re gonna sing about six songs. Praying, public prayers, corporate prayers?
Pastor Harshit:
Yeah, so…
Jonathan Leeman:
How many of those?
Pastor Harshit:
Prayer of thanks, I do a pastoral prayer most Sundays, and a prayer of confession. I think we start with an opening prayer. I think like four or five prayers at least.
How to Pray for Churches in India
Mark Dever:
In our pastoral prayers, when we’re praying for Christians in India, what should we be praying? Obviously, a lot of things would be the same as we’re praying for ourselves. I got that, I understand that.
So if we’re praying about the points of my sermon for us, we can pray that for you. I got that. What would be things that people wouldn’t just innately know that it would be really good if we pastor here to lead our congregations praying this, this, and this for our brothers and sisters in India?
Pastor Harshit:
I think perseverance and faithfulness in the midst of all seemingly difficult situations. For a lot of Indians, they’re just trying to like, I mean, materialism is a huge challenge. I think because they don’t have it, that’s why they want to have it.
That’s why they’re constantly thinking about where can I get more money from. How can I secure my career? My children’s future should be okay. And that’s a huge thing. And often at the cost of just compromising with the faith, I think we can pray that Christ is sufficient, and they’ll be satisfied in who He is and what He has given to them, for them, done for them.
I think unity among the churches, gospel churches, gospel minded, they’d be like kingdom-minded rather than just my own ministry, my own church. Think outside the churches, pastors wanting to encourage not just their own churches, but other churches. I think those very specific things that you’ve
Mark Dever:
Have you read the book by Jonathan Leeman, One Assembly?
Jonathan Leeman:
I have read it, yes.
Mark Dever:
Do you recall the third chapter, it’s where he talks about Catholicity?
Pastor Harshit:
I do, yeah.
Mark Dever:
So you’re talking about that kind of thing where you’re very much concerned about the gospel work going on, regardless of what church it’s going on in.
Pastor Harshit:
Yeah, and that’s one thing that I’ve learned of being at Capitol Hill, being with you guys, with you specifically. And I think I’m grateful to the Lord for that perspective that I’ve received from here and just helps us to see the gospel of the Lord go out and actually grow. The joy that you see as it has, it’s kind of like compound interest, kind of the way it just keeps going and growing.
Mark Dever:
If you could see more things that the Lord is doing, why do you not want to stare at that and be encouraged and even tell others about it Amen.
Jonathan Leeman:
As you described your church service, it sounds a lot like what you and I saw at Capitol Hill Baptist.
Pastor Harshit:
It’s not cut in copy, cut, paste. I think a lot of people would like to say that and they just write it off like that. I think what we are trying to do is we were doing a lot of things before even I came to Capita, similar things.
I think what we are just trying to do is be faithful, be biblical, teach the Bible, sing the Bible, pray the Bible. I mean, I think therefore it’d be very similar to Capital Hill in some ways.
Mark Dever:
There are no elements of our service that began with us. I mean, everything we’re doing, churches have done for centuries.
Jonathan Leeman:
Right, but permit me to grind an axe just here for a second. Nine marks is basically an American Western thing.
Pastor Harshit:
Terribly, terribly false. It is very false. It’s a lie that a lot of people love to put and push, and I dislike hearing that. It’s not an American thing.
It’s a biblical thing. It’s a New Testament thing. It’s for anyone around the world. And if people deny those things, I think they are just falling away from New Testament Christianity, which is a shame and a sad thing.
Sometimes people are so anti-American that they just want anything that vaguely is associated with America. They just want to reject it and I think that’s unfortunate.
Mark Dever:
Would you say India has had a long hard relationship with the West?
Pastor Harshit:
It’s because of the British Raj. I think it’s just the mentality that we were colonized by the British and therefore anything that seemingly looks like, comes from the West must be good.
Mark Dever:
So is there no thought of celebrating what William Carey did?
Pastor Harshit:
William Carey is long forgotten. I don’t think, I think the Westerners care more about him than we do. Unfortunately, yeah. I wish we did more.
Church Size in India
Mark Dever:
How many people are in your church?
Pastor Harshit:
Approximately 200 with 40, 50 kids, 150 adults every Sunday.
Jonathan Leeman:
Is it a challenge for them to get there?
Pastor Harshit:
Depending on certain families, those are from, there’s some people who come from families that are not happy with what they’re doing. So for them, but –
Jonathan Leeman:
From Hindu background families?
Pastor Harshit:
From different faiths, yeah. But generally, for other people, I think it’s okay. Sometimes the work, where the workplace they are would make it difficult for them to come intentionally.
I think just put them at jobs. But otherwise, generally, it’s okay.
What Do You Consider When Speaking to a Church in India?
Jonathan Leeman:
It’s not a great sound effect. Excellent. Those buttons are amazing. Cool, refreshing.
So you’re preparing a sermon. You’re thinking about the members of your church and you’re thinking about applying it to the encouragements, the promises, and the hope of scripture and the gospel.
What kind of problems in the life of your congregation are you speaking about? What are you thinking about?
Pastor Harshit:
Thankfully, most of the people that come to a church I think are there because they want to take the gospel seriously. I think they have understood that Jesus is the only way and they’re not coming there for some material or for benefit, most of them.
Jonathan Leeman:
There are plenty of churches that would give them that.
Pastor Harshit:
The majority of the churches would do that.
Jonathan Leeman:
There are going to be prosperity gospel churches.
Pastor Harshit:
Some shades of prosperity gospel for sure. Even those who would say, we’re not into prosperity would inevitably in some ways peddle soft prosperity or something like that.
Jonathan Leeman:
But I remember one time I was teaching in South Africa and I remember a young man raised his hand, a young pastor, and he said, hey, I struggle with fearing what people think of me. And I remember thinking, yeah, you sound just like so many people in America, right?
Like the problems aren’t that different. In some ways, they’re very different in some ways. So I guess I’m trying to locate, what are you speaking about. What do you?
Fear of Man in the Church in India
Pastor Harshit:
So I think fear of man, I think it’s a very real thing, but fear of man, particularly family. In a way, strangers, and family end up being the main aspect or component that opposes people and their real true commitment to working with the Lord.
So I’m just like, often when I’m thinking of someone, I’m thinking, are we willing to pay a price, you know, carry the cross, deny ourselves in every possible manner that the Lord would call us to? I think those are the things that I’ll constantly…
What if our neighbors reject us? What if our family rejects us? What if… Would we compromise? Would we walk away from faith? Would we deny Christ?
I think there’s constant pressure in different ways, whether it’s not necessarily physical persecution, but just mockery and constant pressure from family and neighbors. What kind of, I think one big thing is every time a believer is going to the community, they are constantly mocked for following a foreign God and a foreign religion. And it wears you down in some ways if you’re constantly being sneered at.
Jonathan Leeman:
So as you’re preaching, you’re assuming that the people sitting there live inside of weeks in which they’re constantly being sneered at for being Christians.
Pastor Harshit:
A lot of them.
Mark Dever:
And is that different than it is in South India because of the long tradition of St. Thomas?
Life as a Christian in India
Pastor Harshit:
That is true. That is true. So South India, North East India, slightly different, but a lot of people. And again, I’m talking about people who are first-generation Christians. I think for them, it is very different than me.
I am from a Christian family. For me, it is much easier. I mean people assume, oh your dad was a Christian so you’re a Christian, not a problem, fine. But somebody else, I mean why did you convert?
Conversion is a terrible thing. You’ve sold your soul, you’ve betrayed your country, you’re in cahoots with people in the West. It just keeps going on and on.
Jonathan Leeman:
So you’re spending a lot of time encouraging with the hope of the gospel.
Pastor Harshit:
Yeah, and yeah, just keep pressing on, just keep pressing on.
Mark Dever:
Is there more concern in your non-Christian neighbors, your Hindu neighbors, and your Muslim
neighbors? Is there more concern about the Chinese or about the Americans?
Pastor Harshit:
I think –
Mark Dever:
Or are the concerns different?
Pastor Harshit:
Different. Chinese, have a little physical military danger. They’re on the borders. They’re trying, constantly trying to come inside.
Mark Dever:
The pearl necklace.
Pastor Harshit:
They are, yeah.
Mark Dever:
Around India.
Pastor Harshit:
Yeah. With America, I think with the West, they put all the Western countries, America, and Europe together. It’s more like Western imperialism colonization once over again all over again I think with culture and with economy and Religion religion and in their mind they use religion to come back and just control us again. It’s crazy.
Jonathan Leeman:
Now does the presence of your church the church building the gatherings ever receive opposition
Pastor Harshit:
where we are now by God’s Christmas slightly safer place But the church that was part of earlier five years ago We did have people attack a building and there are many churches around the country particularly in the North, are regularly receiving some of the other kinds of opposition in different forms.
Mark Dever:
What you said attacked, what does attacked mean?
Pastor Harshit:
Some people, miscreants came over on a motorcycle in the middle of the night through some country-made, handmade grenades at a building. And I think it was an intimidation tactic. It’s actually the same week that we had visitors from Capitol Hill and the left and a couple of days after it happened.
How Common is Christianity in India?
Mark Dever:
If I’m the average person in your city, do I know a Christian?
Jonathan Leeman:
Five million people.
Pastor Harshit:
Probably not. More likely not than yes.
Mark Dever:
Yeah. And then how many people in your city would probably know someone who has converted to Christianity?
Pastor Harshit:
That’s a hard question to say.
Mark Dever:
Very few.
Pastor Harshit:
Very few, yeah. Which is why, I mean, the Lord is working. There are many more people who profess to be Christian, but there’s a lot of who-ha around this conversion.
There’s much more it is made to be than it is. And then the people on the right wing, conservative, they just go crazy about it. They think that the whole of India is becoming Christian, which is not true at all.
Mark Dever:
The thing you do in ministry other than your church mainly is try to train other pastors.
How Does Evangelism Look in India?
Jonathan Leeman:
Well, Mark, I want to stay on this theme for one second. I wanted to go there too. So how does this impact your evangelism? How do you encourage your church members to evangelize?
You have a city that people don’t know, a Christian, and the need is great. Yet they know they’re gonna receive a whole lot of social opposition. What do you do to equip and train for evangelism?
Pastor Harshit:
I mean, I think be very realistic about the opposition. This is going to happen. Expect it. Don’t be surprised by it.
Don’t think that the unbelievers are going to garland you for bringing good news to them. So I think expect opposition and it’s okay. That’s one thing.
So don’t be like terribly disappointed with what happened. I’m just trying to do good to them and this is how they respond. That’s one.
Remember what happened, geez. Jesus is the ultimate example model. What happened to us?
Mark Dever:
First Peter seems so clearly written about this.
Pastor Harshit:
Peter, yeah. I mean, the whole of the New Testament for that. And then just live a life of a faithful life. Any opportunity you get, you meet with people, and talk to people. You’re not embarrassed about your identity.
So when people ask me what I do, I’m very quick to say I’m a pastor and I’m hoping that they’re going to ask me what that means as I teach the Bible. And if I’m very willing, so I’d never hide that. So I think saying that with a church member, I think like befriend your neighbors, talk to them.
Jonathan Leeman:
Any encouraging evangelism stories from your church?
Pastor Harshit:
Just last year I was talking to a few, two weeks ago I was talking to a few young guys from a church and they were saying they went for a, for the haircut to a saloon and they were talking to a guy there. The guy who was cutting their hair and in the process they shared the gospel with him. And by the time they were done, he gave them a discount.
Jonathan Leeman:
Discounts for evangelism.
Pastor Harshit:
Yeah, I know it works sometimes. Yeah, it’s just like we have I know a few guys who drive Uber in our church and a community and They intentionally keep the New Testament of the Bible on the dashboard.
Jonathan Leeman:
Oh, yeah to provoke questions
Pastor Harshit:
Yeah, yeah, and one of them so they clearly by name are not Christian and that gives them a lot of opportunity or they’ll be listening to sermons or listening to Christian songs I know another guy who’s done it for like for years, and has shared the gospel with many people.
Jonathan Leeman:
Praise God.
Hindi Christian Authors
Mark Dever:
Who would be some of your favorite Hindi Christian authors?
Pastor Harshit:
It doesn’t exist, sorry.
Jonathan Leeman:
At all?
Pastor Harshit:
No, unfortunately.
Mark Dever:
Did we talk earlier about you publishing your sermons?
Pastor Harshit:
Just a while ago, yes.
How Do You Raise Up Pastors?
Mark Dever:
The other thing you do, and aside from pastoring, as Mark asked, is raising up other pastors or working to raise up other pastors. How do you do that?
Pastor Harshit:
Very simple, I think. Again, something that I learned from my own dad, who invested a lot in young people, and then from good men, and good pastors that the Lord brought in my life.
but it was the guy that I worked with in England or then being here in DC with Mark. Just finding young men, identifying guys who show potential, who have the desire to learn scripture, who would then be willing to take it out to the other people, and then having a long-term view and just life on life, bringing them on.
Jonathan Leeman:
Do you have a training program or an internship program?
Pastor Harshit:
To facilitate that. So we’ve put in a few structures and we have, again, it’s just a need because we don’t have any seminary in the north that we could trust in Hindi. So a couple of years ago, we just put together a program to train pastors formally over a long term.
So three years, an empty program based out of a church, bringing guys who have already spent a couple of years with us. So we vet them, we know them, we’ve seen their life and we think that they would use this resource well and then just prepare, invest time, and pray with them. teach them over several years and then, yes, in different ways and also a small pastorate internship along with them.
Jonathan Leeman:
Harshit, one thing that I think this conversation with you will provoke in many people who are listening is an interest in the gospel’s progress among people in your city and people who don’t know the gospel. That’s just a basic Christian instinct for the last 2000 years. It’s nothing modern or American or it’s just a Christian instinct.
If a pastor is listening in the West somewhere, and they hear this interview in English, what can they do to help? They can certainly pray. Is there anything else you would tell them to do to try to help the gospel in Northeast India or Northwest India, in the Ganges Valley, in the Indus Valley?
Pastor Harshit:
I think you’re right. I think they, first of all, can pray. I think second if they want to directly get involved in anything that we are doing. They can talk to Nine Marks folks and Nine Marks folks will get in touch with us.
I think one of the ways they can do this is if they’re interested in the work in India and if they are raising men and women among themselves in their own churches, I think they need to think about it carefully, have a long-term view, invest in them.
Mark Dever:
Maybe read a book on India? Get to know India better?
Pastor Harshit:
Maybe read a book on India, meet Indians, and have a long-term view.
Mark Dever:
Have some Indian food?
Pastor Harshit:
Certainly, that would help.
Mark Dever:
That helps everything.
Pastor Harshit:
Yes.
Mark Dever:
Do you know what I had lunch for lunch today?
Pastor Harshit:
Indian?
Jonathan Leeman:
Butter chicken.
Jonathan Leeman:
Me too.
Pastor Harshit:
With naan?
Mark Dever:
Yes.
Jonathan Leeman:
Naan.
Pastor Harshit:
Butter naan?
Mark Dever:
Over Bombay food, Bombay door on 8th.
Jonathan Leeman:
Bombay kitchen.
Mark Dever:
Bombay kitchen. So good.
Jonathan Leeman:
On a more reverent note, Mark, we don’t usually close in prayer. We close though in praying for the gospel in India.
Mark Dever:
Yeah. Lord, we thank you for this time to visit with our brother. We thank you for saving him. Thank you for his father’s ministry. Thank you for the way the gospel has been preached. Where Harshit is.
We pray that it will continue to go forth. We pray that many men and women will come to know you. We pray Lord that you would make it a center of life and we pray this all in Jesus’ name amen
Jonathan Leeman:
Amen. Thank you, Harshit.
Pastor Harshit:
Thank you, Brother.
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Pastors Talk
A weekly conversation between Jonathan Leeman and Mark Dever about practical aspects of the Christian life and pastoral ministry.
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