 And although this key is clearly presented throughout the Bible from the Old Testament and right through the New, I think the majority of Christians are unaware that it exists. And I think the failure to use this key that I'm going to be speaking about is one main source of ineffectiveness in the body of Christ. No doubt you're wondering what the key is. And let me say that when you hear it, you're not likely to say praise the Lord. I want to turn again to the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus is giving instruction about how to pray. And I want to take two parallel passages. The first one is in Matthew chapter 6 verses 5 and 6. And Jesus says, And when you pray, you shall not be like the hypocrites. And then he describes how the hypocrites act. And then he says in verse 6, But when you pray, pray in this way. So he uses the phrase when you pray twice. The first time he starts with a negative. Don't pray like the hypocrites. But he doesn't finish there. He ends with a positive. This is how you ought to pray. And we have actually devoted the last session to analyzing the pattern that he gave us. But now I want to move on in that same sixth chapter to verses 16 and 17. And here he introduces another dimension of prayer. And he says, Moreover, when you fast, do not be like the hypocrites. But he doesn't stop with the negatives. A lot of people think that's where he ends. But he goes on the next verse, But when you fast, And then he tells us how to do it in a way that's acceptable to God. Now I think you can see there's a close parallel between what Jesus says about praying and what he says about fasting. First of all, he says when you fast, Then he says don't do it this way, do it that way. But to my way of thinking, the phrase when you fast indicates that Jesus expects his disciples. Did I say fast? When you pray, Jesus expects his disciples to pray. How many of you would agree that those words indicate Jesus takes it for granted that we as his disciples will pray? He doesn't say if you pray, But he says when you pray. And I imagine that most of us here tonight would agree that the Lord expects us as Christians to pray regularly. Is that right? Okay, now, We go on to the next stage And he doesn't say if you fast, He says when you fast, What does that indicate? It indicates that he expects us to fast in just the same way as he expects us to pray. Is that logical? Are you with me? Even maybe reluctantly? But still you're with me? Well, don't be reluctant. I agree that the subject of fasting is not easy to say praise the Lord about, But I want to tell you when you discover what's in this subject, You will say praise the Lord. You will say thank you God for giving us this key. See, Jesus' words about praying and about fasting are exactly parallel. When you pray, don't pray this way, but pray that way. When you fast, don't fast this way, but fast that way. So Jesus puts praying and fasting on exactly the same level. My conclusion is that if he expects us to pray, He also expects us to fast. And I'm so glad that I have one great predecessor in the ministry That arrived at the same conclusion. Actually, there were many of them. Luther arrived at that conclusion. But the one I have in mind is John Wesley. And I read John Wesley's journals years ago and they stirred me and stimulated me. And he said something to this effect. I am persuaded that if a Christian has understood the need to fast and does not practice fasting, He will backslide just as surely as a Christian who has understood the need to pray and does not pray. And John Wesley would not ordain to the Methodist ministry any man who did not commit himself to fast every Wednesday and Friday till 4 p.m. That was a basic requirement for being ordained to the Methodist ministry. You might say, well, what's the purpose of fasting? Is it just to make life hard for me, to deny me pleasure? My answer would be no. Doubtless there are a number of purposes. But I'm going to deal with only one. And that is, it is a God appointed way to humble ourselves. And I will show you this very, very clearly, our description. See, the greatest single specific barrier to getting an answer to our prayers is pride. And anything that will get that barrier out of the way will facilitate the answer to our prayers. God has been speaking to me personally just lately about the awful dangers of pride. And Ruth picked up a little book while she owned it, but we really not paid much attention to it by Andrew Murray, who is one of those preachers of a previous generation who's still feeding the people of God today. How many of you have read at least one book by Andrew Murray? That's most of the people here. That's remarkable. I don't know whether you know this little book. It's entitled in the original, The Humility of Our Lord. It's been republished with a simpler title, I think, Simply Humility. And I read this just a few weeks ago, and it really spoke to me personally about my own life. I've hated pride for years, but I got a new vision of how vicious and how evil pride is and how it keeps us back from all the blessings that God intends for us. This message runs through the Bible. It's a universal truth. It was not demonstrated first on earth. You know the first demonstration of the evil of pride? What was the first sin in the history of the universe? Tell me. Pride, yes. Who committed the sin? Lucifer, that's right. An angel in heaven. And if that pride as a sin could break out in heaven and cause an angel to lose his place, how much more susceptible are we likely to pride as sinners here on earth? Let me give you just three passages of Scripture that deal with pride and with humility. The first is in Luke 14 and verse 11. And it's the end of a parable where Jesus speaks about how to act when you're invited to a banquet in Luke 14. And I mean, we get to invite it to banquets nowadays. Sometimes, in fact, I was at one yesterday. And Jesus said, oh, he's so practical. He gets such simple illustrations. First of all, I want to point out to you that God never says he'll humble us. He always tells us to humble ourselves. I tell people, God can humiliate you, but only you can make yourself humble. Don't pray God make me humble, because it's not a scriptural prayer. And furthermore, you'll probably regret the results of that prayer. A few weeks or months later, when you find yourself in the most humiliating situation, you think, God, how did I get here? God said, you prayed. You prayed. So Jesus says, when you're invited to a banquet, don't walk up to the head table and sit at the chief place, because he'll be embarrassed when somebody comes along and says, but the speaker's going to sit here. You take a place over there in the corner. Jesus says, when you go, take the lowest place, very wise. When you're at the bottom, there's only one way you can go. That's up. I don't know whether you know that prayer by John Bunyan. What's his name? John Bunyan. This has been with me for years. He that is down, need fear no fall. He that is low, no pride. He that is humble, ever shall have God to be his God. See, when you're on the floor, you're safe. There's no lower you can go. Very rarely do I minister in a large public gathering like this, without first taking my place on the floor, on my face, before God. And I can tell you, before this meeting, Ruth and I were there for quite a long while. That's where I feel really safe is on the floor. So Jesus said at the end of that parable, if you don't want to be embarrassed, avoid the situation. Don't sit at the top table, sit in the lowest place, and there's only one way you can be asked to go, and that is up. And then he sums it up with these words in Luke 14 and 11. For whoever exalts himself will be abased, but he who humbles himself will be exalted. That's universal. In other words, it applies throughout the universe. It applies in heaven, applies on earth. The great demonstration of this truth is Lucifer and Jesus. Lucifer was a created being, but he reached for equality with God, he slipped and fell. Jesus had equality with God. He humbled himself even to the death of the cross. And the scripture says God highly exalted him. It says in Philippians 2 9, therefore God highly exalted him. Why did God exalt him? Because he humbled himself. And everyone who humbles himself will be exalted. I can promise you exaltation if you'll humble yourself. There are no exceptions. I have a series of messages which has this title. The way up is down. The lower down you go, the higher up you'll end. There's no exceptions to that. But I want to speak about humility as an essential condition for effective prayer. And I want to take a number of statements to this effect. Let's look first of all before we do that in James chapter 4. Okay, yeah, we'll stop there. Then he goes on, the introduction itself is like 15 minutes long. So looking at his life and ministry and the teaching, a wonderful teacher of the word takes his time though. And really tests the patience of the hearers. But it's really line by line, line upon line. And really inspiring. At the same time, one gets exposed to the truth in a very systematic manner. And on certain topics as well. So your thoughts, I just want to hear from you. What do you think? What is it that really touched you? What is it that was highlighted through these videos about Derek Prince? And I think maybe some of you would have listened to many of his messages and so on. So I just want to hear from you. Go ahead Charles. Thank you. Excuse me. I was moved by the way God got him. The way he got him in his, and knowing he didn't know the Pentecost, he didn't know the Baptist. But God drew him. That one pierced more, more, more, more. He drew him until he, now he is saying, a miracle happened. Someone raised it up in my heart. And I was like, God. So it's touched my heart in a way that God is the one who draws us. He looks for us. He takes us to places that we did not expect him to take us. To take us and then he uses us for his ministry. Thank you. Right Charles. Thank you. Anyone else? Anyone else? You can just share your thoughts. For me, I got, you know, it got me when he said, you better be careful when you, when you pray about humbleness. You know, when you pray that God should, you know, make you humble. Because I know that I have a pretty kind of prayer. And there are some situations, you know, that come for me. And I'm like, you know, asking myself, you know, questions. Even finding myself and asking God questions. So when he made that statement, I laughed. Because in those moments, you know, you want to give it a lot. And that is where the test, you know, comes. And it's very important for us as Christians or ministers or pastors to know what it means, you know, to be humble. Not just humble before God, but humble before every situation that comes our way. That's my take for this. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. So Rose shares here. You could see that very friends really wants to connect with the listeners, humor, practical experiences, humility. Yeah. And wanting to lift others to the knowledge of the ways of the Lord. Yeah. That's true. Yeah. Anyone else? Yeah. I think the knowledge of Greek and Latin, which he studied has, you know, helped him really give us the very good interpretation of the word. The way he depicts is very sound because he says that he has a very good hold on these languages. And understanding this gives a gives him this edge and the way he speaks. I've been listening to him exactly like what you shared, Pastor was born again. Accidentally, I came across and I bought two or three of his books that time. We didn't have the technology to hear the word on YouTube or something. But those books I just scan through and I read through and his books had really helped me understand things so beautifully. All right. Since then after YouTube came and we started hearing him and I still have a book on my table, Power of Proclamation every day. Yeah. Always on my screen and I love to read and go through situations whenever, you know, he has some very good way of helping us understand the Power of Proclamation. Right. Thank you so much Pastor for such beautiful words. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. So like I only said, you know, of course, the knowledge or the understanding of the of the Hebrew and the Greek definitely helps helps us to, you know, go back to the root and look at, you know, what the language is actually saying and it gives so much richness to the same as the same verse. Like I remember mentioning it before like Psalm 23 surely goodness and mercy will follow you the rest of your, you know, all the days of your life and and that word used there in Hebrew actually talks about a lion coming after its prey, you know. So we, it's not a, you know, reluctantly following or, you know, that kind of grace and surely goodness and mercy following you know from a distance, but it's like a hungry lion, which is going after its prey. Right. So that's the picture that we have in the Hebrew. So definitely knowing that now whenever when you read that was when you every time you encounter that was already declare that was you know that a race in goodness and mercy will follow me. It's like hunting me down, you know, and so yeah, that definitely helps. But also another thing that I noticed like, you know, a man of prayer, of course, and man of reading the word and also because, you know, he is intimate with the Lord. Right. He was also listening to the word of God, listening to God's spirit speaking to him. So, you know, he talks about that in incident when he prayed that prayer for leaders and then, you know, Montgomery saying, you know, making that reference. We will look to the Lord and and the Holy Spirit speaking to him and saying, you know, this is the answer to the prayer that you pray event. So, you know, and and that is that in itself is a revelation right in that interaction with the Holy Spirit and God revealing and connecting the dots and saying, you know, this is this is an answer. So, you know, both, both this, you know, both the academic and, you know, the rigor of researching and being sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit and when he speaks and makes that connection and both put together, you know, a powerful teaching ministry. Right. Okay. Anyone else wants to share any thoughts. Follow the prompting of the Holy Spirit kept renewing his mind on the word. Yes. Thank you, Kennedy. Anyone else. So I'm just amazed, you know, when I when we look at the different, the five-fold ministry, the way each ministry functions or the ministry gift functions. You know, people of different temperament and so I was wondering, you know, Jesus is an example. So how wonderful it will be to encounter Jesus, right? He is the the perfect teacher, the perfect evangelist, the the perfect pastor, the perfect man, right? And when we see him face to face, it must be it must be really truly wonderful, right? And we have an encounter with him when we and we'll never want to leave his side, you know, leave his presence and we can do that today, right? We can we can continue to be in the presence of God because he has made a way for us to come to him and we can be in his presence. So the more we encounter the presence of God, the presence of Jesus, you know, is so beautiful, so wonderful. If a human being can be, you know, if you look at someone who's intellectual, if you look at someone who's, you know, who's accomplished much or, you know, who has these special abilities and how much more Jesus, right? And we are created in his image and because that image is broken by sin, you know, we see those glimpses, though that image is marred and but, you know, brought back to restoration and redemption because of the cross of Christ, right? So, yeah, I was just thinking about that must be truly, truly amazing to sit at the feet of Jesus to hear him speak and to hear him teach and just to be in his presence, right? Yeah, I was just thinking about that. Okay, let's look at the life of a pastor. So I was thinking, you know, which pastor and I just thought maybe the pastor who made a big difference in my life. There have been many pastors who made, you know, many wonderful women who led me and nurtured me and made, you know, contributed so much in my life. But I just thought, you know, the one who has done it consistently and that's, you know, Pastor Ashish, of course. And I think all of us know him and to some extent. So I just thought, okay, maybe I'll make it a quiz. I'll make it a trivia and I'll ask you, okay, some questions so maybe you can answer the first part of it. Okay, so first, again, a disclaimer, this is in no way to exalt the man, right? This is no way to put him on a pedestal. But just to look at the pastoral ministry to look at what happens when a person is obedient to the call. So that's the thing. So I hope you get my heart behind this. It's just that, right? Okay, so what is Pastor Ashish's full name, anyone? So no Googling, okay? No going to the website, no Googling. So if you know it, you put it here. Okay, anyone? You put it on the chat or you can let me know. Tarun, okay. Pastor Ashish, right? Ashish, right? It's not his full name, actually. Anyone else? Okay, let me full. Okay, his name is Ashish Srikant. Right? No, I don't know the history behind the Srikant bit, but that's his full name. Okay, I happen to see, I think is, I don't know, some ID card of his which had the full name. So I know that his name is Ashish Srikant. Okay, so Pastor Ashish came to know the Lord. Okay, when, how old was he when he came to know the Lord? Okay, 12 full points and he's 12 years old. I think he was just entering, it was just as, you know, preteen years, just about to enter into his teen years, I think. Tarun, I think 12 is the correct answer, right? So he's 12 years old, came to know the Lord and he was a student in Bishop Cotton Boys High School here in Bangalore, came to know the Lord. Immediately there was a great hunger in his, in him to know more about him. So he would spend a lot of time reading the word, understanding the word. And also they came to know the Lord in a very, you know, in a very, very, very simple manner, but God ordained manner. There was a teacher in his school who would conduct the chapel. Every afternoon, post lunch, they would go and they would sing a few songs, hear a scripture being read and that was it. So that particular afternoon, this teacher, I think he taught English and science, right? So he would, he asked that question, you know, do you, have you received Jesus into your heart? So to all the students and then led them to the Lord. And one of the persons who responded to the altar call was Pastor Ashish. And he testified saying, okay, something different happened and there was a great hunger to know more about the Lord. Now, about his family, they were church going, right? They used to go to the Methodist church, which was nearby. They were church going, but for him, you know, he hadn't received Jesus and he did so at school. And God put in him a great desire to learn and also to preach, you know, to share the word. And it came out in very, very interesting ways, like he started to share the gospel at the chapel with the students. And also he would go to another school, which was the Baldwin Boy School, which was about, I think, a 20-minute walk or a 15-minute walk from his school. So he started going there in the afternoons and started conducting, you know, this is 12 years where, you know, normally a boy of that age would be playing sport and not thinking anything about preaching or teaching, but then there was so much of hunger and desire to go preach. So he would go there and I think some of his friends were there. So I forget the details, but he would share the gospel, teach from the word, whatever the Lord was teaching him, he would teach. So he was doing this during his lunch break. And some interesting things happened there. I think somebody had a problem with a knee, with some pain in the knee. And then since he read in the word that Jesus did that and we could also do that. So he laid hands and prayed and the person got healed, no pain and testified to that. So those were the early years where God was leading him to do it. So he also apparently went to the pastor in the Methodist Church. By this time he would go there to the Methodist Church every Saturday and spend the whole day in prayer. Like there was a hall which was there, which was people didn't use it and people were not there. So he had the time so he would go in and lock himself up and just pray in the spirit and then spend the whole day in prayer, reading the word, etc. So he would do that. So one day he went to the pastor of the church and said, I want to preach in church. So the pastor, I don't know what went through his young man and he wants to come and young boy and wants to preach. So the pastor said, I'll think about it and then again he said, I'll let you preach in the evening service. But it is not during the service but after the service or something like that. So he did that and then he got to preach there and he gave an altar call. So this was after the service, after the service was done, then he could share the word. Surprisingly, there were a lot of students who would come. I think this was at, I think a lot of students from the hostel of Baldwin Boys would come to that particular church in the evening. So came there and he shared the gospel with them, gave an altar call and many of the students received Jesus. So those were the early days of ministry where the Lord encouraged. He was encouraged by what he saw and there was a call early on in his life for bigger things to plant a church and so on. So he did his schooling and an interesting event in his life is after he finished schooling, he said, he is thinking like, why should I study further? I just want to go into ministry and Jesus is coming soon, the world is going to end. So it's better that I go about preaching the gospel and doing ministry. So he told his parents that I don't want to study any further. So the parents didn't know what to do. So his father took him and to meet another pastor who was quite a senior experienced person in ministry. So he took him to meet him to probably talk some sense into him. And so this pastor asked, okay, what do you want to do? And then said, I want to do this. So he said, the Lord Jesus spent time preparing. Before he started his earthly ministry, there was this season. By the time he started his ministry, it was probably around 29 or 30. So why don't you also wait? Why don't you prepare yourself? If Jesus could do it, why can't you? So then he thought about it and he said he was convinced, okay, I'll wait. So that's how he went on to do his studies. He went on to do his engineering in a place called Manipal, which is coastal Karnataka, the state in which Bangalore is. It's on the coast. So he went on to this West Coast of India. So he went on to study there, did his engineering there. And while he was, you see the pattern, right? While he was doing his engineering there, he started again a fellowship. He had a desire to start a student's fellowship. So started a student's Bible study and fellowship. And so invited students. And this is like, you know, very, very early days. So invited students and took a step of faith and hired a hall in the hotel. There was a hotel there. So a lot of international students would come to Manipal to do their engineering, management studies, medical studies and so on, medicine and so on. So it's really an education hub, Manipal, Mangalore, these cities. So he wanted to start a Bible study. So took a step of faith, hired a hall. Wasn't sure how many will show up, but did it anyway. And students started coming. He felt that he wanted to have a like a spirit-filled church and teaching. So he would teach. I think this was in the evenings. So they would come and at one point it was almost like 100 plus students coming. And by the time he had finished his four years of engineering studies, it had grown to be, I think it was supported by the students themselves of the offerings and everything. And they used to meet there and he handed off the work to another student. And that work continued and became a fully fledged church with a pastor and so on. And then it went into some rough weather, ministry kind of changed. There were some transitions and so on, but the church still continues. So that was that. And then we went on to the U.S. to do his engineering postgraduate studies and spend some time there. He again started an international students fellowship where he was studying. I think Rutgers University did biomedical engineering there and there also. I remember the first students fellowship that he started there, the first one for again for international students. And he invited a lot of students. I think the students fellowship when you come on campus invited, they got permission from the invited everyone. And he says, you know, on the day of the meeting, the first meeting, the attendance was zero. No one showed up. Absolutely no one showed up. But then, you know, there he was for the time came. So he started, you know, he had a tape recorder. So he put the cassette and then he pressed record and preached. And he says he preached as if the hall was full. There were thousands of students. So he went on to preach the full message. I forget the length of the sermon and also the title. I don't know. But then he, you know, preached the full length of the sermon as if the place was full of people filled with people. Just preached it, stopped the machine and that was day one. So the next day people asked, hey, so how was the study? Sorry, I couldn't come. So how was it? You know, how did it go? So he said, yeah, you know, you want to listen to the message. Here's the message. So they, you know, he made copies of the tape and gave it to people and then they got to hear the message. And they're also, you know, like the work group. So, so whatever season of life, you know, as a student, as a, as a school student, as a, as a, you know, as someone in campus, you know, as a college postgraduate. So there was always the thing to, to start a work where there was no work, you know, a very apostolic call, right? A pioneering work. At the same time, a pastoral call to gather the people to nurture and you see the teaching also, you know, to teach them the word and get them grounded in the word and so on. So then there was this strong call of God in his heart to come back to India, you know, he knew that he would always come back to India and start a church and start a work in Bangalore, India and also, you know, do work from India based in India in the nation and also something that will touch the nation's worldwide. So there was always the, always the stirring, always the call. And so he always knew that he was not going to be there, even though, you know, a lot of people are moving to the U.S. and, you know, studying there, working there, settling down. He knew that he will always come back. Right. So he started off with biomedical engineering and then he shifted on to, I think, software work there for, I forget how many years, but he used to serve in an Afro-Amenikid church and also in a Latin Latino church. I don't know if that's the acceptable term, but, you know, basically Spanish-speaking congregation with the translation, right? So there were these two churches that he was serving and also, you know, like preaching and teaching there, initially, you know, just being there, just being of help. And then the leadership just invited him to preach and teach and he would do that. And from there, you know, went on to do some missions work in Europe as well, you know, Albania and some of the nations which were actually communists in nature in government during that time, Eastern Europe. So missions, you know, work and also come down to India to do some missions work. So that's, so that was happening. And then finally in 2000, the year 2000, or by this time, he had also married, got married to Amy. And Amy was, he came to know Amy through the fellowship, which was happening, the same fellowship which he had started. Amy was part of that in Manipal. But he hadn't met her when he was in India. And he came to know of her through, he used to send these, I think, letters of teaching, you know. So whatever he used to learn, he used to send letters to the students whom he knew and, you know, and of course, I don't know too many of the details of that, but, you know, that's how they corresponded and then they, you know, later on got married and she moved to the U.S. and they had two children there in the U.S., son and a daughter. And the plan was always to come back, of course. And so they moved back to India in 2000 and started the work. The work started with 12 people. It was in the year 2001, February 18, 12 in the living room of his father. And that's how it started. And one of the songs which they sang was We Have a Vision, which was sung at the 20th anniversary of the church Thanksgiving service also. So that was one of the songs. We Have a Vision for this Nation. We Have a Vision for this Land. And I remember going through one of the old notebooks which was there, which was used for, you know, writing, what was the, you know, what was the attendance, how many people were there, and then what was the, you know, what was the spending, you know, what did we spend on tea, coffee, whatever. And then what is the, you know, offer tree. And in one of the notebooks, it was very clearly the first meeting itself, you know, this is our vision. This is, we want to be a boy of the nation and to the nations. And these are the ministries that we are planning. And if you look at the list, you know, there's a few, there's hospital, there's, you know, there's a very, very first meeting. So I wonder what the 12 people, you know, what was going on in the, you know, the minds of the 12 who were listening, you know, here we are, 12 people, then here is this, you know, here is this big vision and here are these things shared. But that's how it's, you know, that's how it started. And, you know, I had the privilege of visiting ABC right then in 2001 itself, 2001, towards the end of 2001, I think it was in September. And it was a very, very small place, you know, less than 20, less than 15, I think people meeting. So I went for, you know, I was part of the Methodist Church, part of the worship team there. And then we went there to lead worship. And so that's our common friend that called and then we went and saw the first time meeting Pastor Hashish, meeting Amy in 2001. And, and seeing, you know, oh, this is a very different place. They were meeting at a, you know, there was a go-karting place and it had an outhouse, you know, all thatched roof. So that's where the church was meeting at that time, that moved from the living room of the Father's House to this place. And from then on we used to go there, you know, every ever so often, probably once a month. And every time we would hear, oh, APC is meeting here, APC is meeting here because they had grown. And, and, and then so we, you know, we saw the kind of God's faithfulness in, and also people being drawn to the vision of the, of the ministry and the church and, and so on. So church growing, we saw that. And I think this was in 90, I forget the year now, 2000, sorry, 2003 or 2004 is when we, we invited, you know, me and my wife, my wife and I, we were actually youth advisors in the church where we were meeting. So we invited them to be the speaker, the guest speaker as a, for the youth camp. Right. So Pastor Ashish and the team came from APC. They shared and, and our, you know, our desire was that the people be filled with the spirit, be baptized in the spirit and so on, because we had experienced ourselves and we wanted the same thing for young people. So the team came and Pastor preached, you know, all those, I think two and a half days and, you know, many of them were baptized as spirit and filled with spirit and breathing tongues and so on. So we, you know, we started visiting the church and, and eventually I started, started volunteering at the church. We, we moved from this church. We gave up our position here. We explained to the leadership, moved to this church, moved to, I mean, started attending APC. One of the locations, by then church had two locations, right. So we saw that we used to go to another location in the south of Bangalore, go there and just help, just attend initially and then serve as a volunteer. So as a volunteer, I used to handle sound, lead worship and do that kind of thing, those kind of things, arrange the chairs and all those. And then there was a position to, I'm just sharing a little bit of my story as well. There was a position to serve as an administrator as staff full of the church had grown. The reason I'm sharing is that the church had grown from 12 to having two locations and, and wanting a person to handle the administrative, you know, functioning. So, and the church had plans to start a Bible college. Okay, so I, I, you know, I was there at that time, right. So, so then I thought, okay, why not apply? But before that, I don't know about having a conversation with the pastor, you know, people say that I have a call to be a pastor and I know that I have a call for ministry, but I don't know what to do about it. What do you think I should do? So I don't have a pastor saying, you know, why don't you just, you know, read some books on pastoring and what it did, what it means to be a pastor and so on. So, you know, get yourself, you know, be knowledgeable about what it is, what the role and action is and anyway, this was not pastor, but then it was more to do with the administrative side. So that's how I came to be in the ministry. So 2004 is when I, you know, when all this happened 2005 is when I joined the staff full-time. So by then church, we were sharing space, the church office was sharing space with the company. Pastor was also having the community. Pastor was also growing. And so we shared the space and the phone lines of the company. Right. So, so there were about four full-time staff. Myself, there was a children's pastor, there was a life group pastor and there was an administrator. So four of us. And of course, Pastor Ashish was there. So, so that's how, you know, I remember becoming a staff of ABC. Yeah. I'll, I'll come to that in two minutes. I just want to share about, you know, one, one simple, one, one main truth that I saw and learned was that a few things actually, you know, four or five things. I want to quickly share that. One is that don't despise the day of small beginnings. Okay. Maybe you have a pastoral call. Don't despise the day of small beginnings. Maybe it's so small that the church attendance is zero. You know, that's something that I learned from the life of this pastor and the journey. Don't despise the day of small beginnings. There will be days when, you know, maybe you have inaugural service and everybody comes, friends, family, you know, visitors, but then maybe the next Sunday, you know, it might be zero attendance. It could be one person. Don't despise the day of small beginnings. Okay. It's time to stop here . Maybe we need to continue later. Okay. With the pastoral ministry, we will continue with, you know, the journey that APC has made and there are several things, very important things that we can learn about pastor, about the pastoral ministry. So we will look at it in the next class. So Abram, very quickly, how did I explain to my former, for the former church above before leaving? Yeah, we decided to explain to them and tell them that we were attending this church and that we wanted to move to this church, this particular church, and that was it, you know, very, very clearly. We explained to them, you know, we wanted to grow spiritually. Because by then, we had actually, we were attending this church, the church that we were part of, and we were also visiting other churches. We were, you know, really hungry for more of the word, more of the work of the spirit. And so we explained to the leadership, we explained to the pastors. Of course, they took their time and a lot of people were not very happy about it, but eventually we left with their blessing. They prayed over us and released us. So I'm glad we did that. What work did I do as an administrator and as a staff? Okay, a lot of things. I handled accounts. I did the administration. I was also handling the administration of the Bible college. We had no clue. I had no clue how to do it, but then, you know, every day was a learning thing. So starting the Bible college, what goes into it, you know, I was handling accounts, I was making payments. I was looking at all the vendors, bookings, booking of venues. If we had an event, registration of that, arranging for the caterer, the food. So, yeah, so basically all these things. Yeah. Okay. Okay, so we'll stop here. I think it's a quite exciting, interesting topic. So we will, we will continue in the next class. Okay. Right. Okay. Bye-bye. Take care. We'll stop. God bless. Bye-bye. Okay. Bye-bye. Okay. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.