NORTHEAST INDIA
RIPE FOR HARVEST, IOWA PASTOR SAYS

By Mark Ellis
Senior Correspondent, ASSIST News Service

MARION, IOWA  (ANS) -- Pastor Daniel Hurt stands in front of an Iowa corn crop that rises above his head, talking about fields that are ready for harvest. But the fields he points to are tended by Hindus thousands of miles away in the northeast corner of India, close to the border with China.

“Right now the hearts of the Hindus are open in Northeast India,” says Hurt, founding director of Fire Around The World, an evangelistic and humanitarian aid organization active in 12 countries. “It’s their time to receive the Good News,” he says. “Their hearts are open and they are responding tremendously to this.”

Hurt recently returned from a crusade in the state of Assam among 13 villages where only two families had ever heard about Jesus. Under a makeshift tent fashioned from bamboo poles and blue plastic tarps, several thousand gathered for a four-day crusade. “When we pray for the sick, the sick are getting healed,” Hurt says. “We have on video blind eyes that were healed, deaf ears that were opened,” he says.

“One very old woman came up to me who was blind in one eye,” Hurt says. “I really didn’t feel like I had faith for her,” he says, “because people get old and go blind. The next day she comes up in front of the tent and says, ‘My eye is healed!’

For confirmation, the woman was told to cover her good eye, and she was asked how many fingers were held up in front of her. “She told us how many fingers were held up,” Hurt says.

“When God does these things they sound too wondrous,” Hurt says. “If you couldn’t catch some of them on video you would think a person was lying,” he adds.

Hurt was also struck by the sight of an older woman dancing during the worship. “This old woman was dancing like she just came from Pensacola,” Hurt says. “This looked like a Pentecostal church in America,” he adds. Hurt asked for the woman to come forward, wondering if she had previously received Christ.

“I’m a Hindu woman,” she said, “and my body was crippled and I couldn’t move. During the worship I felt God’s presence so strong my body began to move and work properly.” As she danced, her friends from the village were cheering her on.

“I felt so joyful,” she exclaimed.

Some wonder why God seems to move so dramatically in the developing world. “We’re content and happy and entertained here in America,” Hurt says. “I think why we see more happen in India is it’s the first time the gospel has been preached among these Hindus,” he says. “It’s a big part of them receiving the Good News.”

Hurt also credits intercessory prayer by the Nagas, who are assisting their evangelistic crusades. While the state of Assam is considered one of the great spiritual challenges in northeast India, with only 3 percent of the population considered believers, Nagaland is a different story.

Over 87 percent of neighboring Nagaland is Christian, the result of missionary efforts by the Baptists during the last century. In fact, Nagaland has the highest percentage of Baptists of any state in the world, as well as eight theological colleges.

“The Nagas have a desire to evangelize those around them and reach the lost,” Hurt says. “They are committed to sending out 10,000 missionaries,” he says. “They are planning to send them out everywhere, even to Jerusalem.”

Young missionaries in their twenties are being sent to neighboring states from Nagaland, sustaining themselves by any means possible to further the spread of the gospel. “They raise vegetables or whatever they have to do to live, and they just start preaching the gospel,” Hurt says.

“They sent two young guys to Bomdilla who have already led 60 to Christ,” he says. Bomdilla is a stronghold of Buddhist influence in India, with the largest Buddhist temple and monastery located there.

Fire Around the World, Hurt’s organization, is often invited to visit after the Nagas have plowed the fallow ground. “They bring us in after they get an initial group of people,” Hurt says. “They ask if they would like to hear some Americans preach and pray for the sick, and they get 2,000 to 5,000 into this raggedy old tent,” he says. “I can’t go anywhere in Iowa, set up a tent, and get 5,000 non-believers to come.”

Hurt and his wife first developed a passion for missions during a time of awakening in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. “While we were taking a break from ministry, there was a revival going on,” Hurt says. “What God imparted to us during the revival was intimacy with God,” he says. “We just soaked in that for a couple of years.”

“One night He divinely imparted a burden and love for missions into my heart,” he says. On a trip to the West Coast, Hurt and his wife visited Che Ahn’s church. “He gave us a word that the ‘Fire of the Lord’ would go with us wherever we minister.” This became the name of Hurt’s organization, which he started with co-director Tim Phillips.

“This is the first time I’ve known Him as the lover of my soul,” Hurt says. “That was never part of my makeup or understanding,” he says. Hurt says he is drawn by “the beauty of His holiness,” when he ministers. “Instead of preaching a sermon, all I want to do is impart a deeper love for God in people.”

No matter what the background or denomination, people seem to respond. “When we go out to preach, people begin to weep,” he says. “The presence of God shows up. When I got invited to go overseas, I saw this is happening among the Hindus who have no preconceived idea of what church is like.”

“The hearts of the Hindus are open,” Hurt says. He is concerned that if the church doesn’t move quickly, others may fill the gap. “Four counties in Assam have already turned Muslim,” he says. “At the rate they have been converting to Islam, all of Assam will be converted by 2020 if we don’t get in.”

Hurt uses a small construction company he owns to provide funds for his missions trips. “All the money we receive we give directly to missions,” Hurt says. “We keep nothing for overhead,” he says. “I don’t know how long I can do construction-- my body aches.”

“I ask the Lord if I can do His work,” he says. “We want to take the concept of the fire of God and the love of God around the world.”
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Mark Ellis is a Senior Correspondent for ASSIST News Service. He is also an assistant pastor in Laguna Beach, CA. Contact Ellis at marsalis@fea.net.
 
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