Blood sisters become twin sisters

Exciting to see 2 blood sisters becoming twin sisters in the faith - Many months of perseverance has borne fruit and the sisters are finally 'spiritual sisters' - Appreciate all those who gave their heart, mind and soul. To God be the glory...

Marc - Swapna finally engaged!!

Marc-Andre (a brother from Canada baptized in the Montreal church) finally got engaged today to Swapna, a sister who is an FGL in Hyderabad. God does make miracles in the 21st century!

All India Youth & Campus Conference - AIYCC

AIYCC - The All India Youth & Campus Conference at Chennai was a great opportunity for many of the singles of the church to revive. Around 850 singles and about 50 Volunteers gathered for this historic first-of-its-kind retreat - the title being "Dream among the Lions". Many of their dreams got revived and most of them had new dreams.

We are truly grateful to God for his hand in the retreat.

Immanuel Engaged!!

God blessed Immanuel to be engaged in his first year of Christian life. He had been to many places but he finally found his future wife in Delhi. Mani is a hardworking family group leader in Delhi church. We pray God uses both of them to do great things for him in the years to come.

Leader's Retreat at Vizag & Araku

It was fun and adventurous being in Vizag and Araku on the long weekend. Thank you God for refining our hearts and making it a success

The link to the pictures at leader's Retreat is as below:

http://picasaweb.google.com/117345343775913725037/LeaderSRetreatAtVizagAraku?authkey=Gv1sRgCM3fq82Xxo_BHw&feat=directlink

Bhaskar Paddala said, "Had Great time Andhra Pradesh Leadership Conference. Title was Rekindle your First Love, it was great learning time Fun as well".

Singles & Marrieds Services

It's encouraging to see all the exciting singles/marrieds services for the church in the month of July & August - the services have been very effective as the separate needs of singles and marrieds have been met.

The marrieds have been learning a series from the book "His needs Her needs". They have been learning the concept of love bank and learning about their spouses' basic needs.

The singles have been hearing testimonies and messages about singlehood and later have been engaging in exciting games run by Bonni Francis who is a admin for the church here in Hyderabad.

Singles are having fun after service while married service is going on. Its encouraging to see everybody is so fired up to have special messages and fun time.

God's plan for Kanchana

It is exciting to see how God worked in Kanchana's life. She went to work in a place called Vikarabad 3 years ago. Later she became a disciple and has been fired up for the Lord. God worked miraculously and got her engaged today (20th August 2010) to a brother who is doing his Ph. D. from IIT Guwahati but hails from a house in Vikarabad less than 1 km from where she worked. It was an amazing twist for her life. Jer 29:11 says, God loves us and has great plans for our lives. Let Him alone have all the glory!

Twins in the faith

God helped the Hyderabad church witness 2 men baptisms from different background.

Maheedhar was in the US just a few years ago pursuing Masters program in Mech Engg in Bridgeport, Connecticut. After completion, he was pursuing a training at which time due to recession he had to come back to India. He was sick physically and discouraged in life when he came back but his friend Johny continued to reach out to him. Johny is a brother in the church in Hyderabad but who was a roommate of Maheedhar in Bridgeport who has been reaching out to him for almost 3 years now.



Initially, there was a lot of reluctance. But over time when he regularly came to church, he understood many things from the Bible and he had a change of heart. Though the Hebron church he previously went to had different ways to worship God (they had to remove their footwear outside before they came into the hall to worship God), he soon fell in love with the true God rather that majoring in minors and surrendered his life to the one true loving and compassionate God.


David was a teen who has been coming to the church for more than 1 year. He was introduced to the church by his uncle Anil who is a brother in the church. Initially the church was not very interesting compared to the friends he had in the world but as he kept coming his heart changed. Initially, Anil had to literally drag David to church but over time David had convictions where he was pushing Anil to come to church when Anil was sick. In his relationship with God David had to fight his battle in getting close to God. The expectation with David has been to be a fired-up disciple as it has been with other new baptisms in the church.

TO GOD BE THE GLORY.

Mini-Olympics - Hyderabad Church

August 15th is celebrated in India as our independence day - the day the British gave us our independence. Since it happened to be sunday, the

church celebrated it with a mini-Olympics. We had games for marrieds, singles, oldies and kids. The lunch on this day was subsidized and the whole church had a great time of fun food and fellowship. Tug-of-war between marrieds and singles and 7-round long distance run were much competed events. Many couples who sometimes rushed back after church stayed back to enjoy the event. It was truly a bonding time for the whole church.

Perseverence does Pay!!

It was so exciting to see that after several years of perseverance by Prem, a brother in the Musheerabad ministry, his sister Jyotsna became our sister in the Lord, on 8th of August 2010.

In his own words, "I never imagined this would happen - this is truly a miracle." God has been working in the Hyderabad church and after some drought we will hopefully have three souls being baptized this month with two more men close to baptism. To God be the glory!!!

Leaders Retreat @ Srinidhi Resorts

All the leaders of Indian Church of Christ at Hyderabad had a lot of fun playing at the Srinidhi resorts - we played plenty of Volleyball and played some games blindfold and otherwise. We hung out till late playing anthyakshari (a fun game with local movie songs). The response was great from the leaders even though we could have gone there earlier