Phaldaar

Phaldaar — پھل دار : “pal-daar”, adjective: fruitbearing, profitable, fruitful

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What makes something fruitful, or ‘bearing positive outcomes’? Obviously part of this depends on the context we are talking about — for example, a farmer is going to probably look more at grain yields, or a business owner at profit margins. But then there are many areas where it is grey — if you get a good grain yield, but compromise the soil in the process … is that really fruitful? Is the effectiveness of a teacher measured by the test outcomes of a student? Or their happiness and willingness to learn in class? Or is it the long-term outcome of a student going on to fulfil their purpose and vocation in life? The moment we start to try and quantify many of these things, it becomes complex and hard to judge for certain.

The Bible mentions fruitfulness a number of times — directly 31 times, but referencing indirectly many more times. Hosea 14:8 says, “your fruitfulness comes from me.” John 15:2 says that God prunes us like branches, “[so that] every branch that does bear fruit … will be even more fruitful.” Or, the classic image of a life lived for God is of a tree planted by the river: ““But blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.” (Jeremiah 17:7-8).

The area that I am in — Punjab — is one of the richest farming areas in the subcontinent, and is an agricultural powerhouse for both India and Pakistan. The soil by all measures is fruitful — it is able to sustain up to 3 crops in rotation during a year and even a small plot of land can sustain a simple village family. Some photos of the land — and of a very full grain truck — below.

My prayer is also is that God would make this time fruitful too. I have a range of things always happening at this end — some examples are below. But it’s easy to wonder, is this all worth it? Is it making any difference? Am I doing enough? Or too much? Or the wrong things? And it’s at these moments that I have to remember the gospel. That the message of Jesus is powerful, not me … that bringing the Kingdom of God, in Lahore as in heaven, is God’s work, not mine … that all is grace, and if any fruitfulness comes, it is simply as Hosea says above: your fruitfulness comes from me.

And so, this is my prayer for you too. That you would know that God never wastes a life surrendered to Him — He is taking what you have given Him, and is using it in just the right way. His work is often unseen, unclear … but we keep going, because “at just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up.” (Galatians 6:9).

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Some highlights over the last week:

Thankyou for those who prayed for my meeting with Shahryar, the person I knew from my last visit to Pakistan, who has converted from Christianity to Islam. Before this meeting I was a little nervous, because I wasn’t sure how it was going to go and what his intentions were. However, this was the time when I needed to preach the gospel to my own heart. I had to remind myself — Christ is Lord, even over Shahryar, even over any difficult conversations.

The conversation was very interesting — Shahryar came with his Muslim religious leader and friend (in the above photo on the right). And thankfully, most of the time my friend and student Cornelius was also there. I heard Shahryar’s arguments about why Islam is correct, and I also heard the Muslim leader’s story. After that I asked them some simple questions — “what is, in your understanding, the main message of Islam, and the main message of Christianity?” They gave their understandings (which in the process showed me that neither really understood the heart of either religion), and then I had an opportunity to summarise from my own understanding. I think it was a constructive discussion. We continued to have an interesting conversation and I fielded a number of common questions from Islam (the idea that the Bible has been changed, or that Jesus never claimed to be God, both of which points have lots of material to discuss).

Part way through the 3.5 hour conversation, Cornelius had to leave, and it was just me with Shahryar and his friend. At this point, they tried to pressure me a little more to convert to Islam myself. The Muslim leader was saying, “Noah, you don’t have clarity — if you study the Qur’an more, you will understand and become a Muslim.” I pushed back and said, “Humility and clarity are two very different things. I hope I have the humility to listen to others and be open to being challenged, because I want the truth more than I want to be right. However, this is not a clarity issue. I have absolute clarity that based on the evidence I have seen, Jesus is true.” I told them the story of when I went to Swat and someone (jokingly) threatened to kill me if I didn’t convert to Islam. So I told Shahryar and his friend, “At that point I realised — I am so convinced that this is true that I am ready to give my life for this.” That challenged them a little, I think!

The very sad part of this was that Shahryar said that one of the reasons he had started exploring Islam was because when he met me, he was intrigued by the fact that I was studying comparative religions, and was studying the Qur’an and Hadith even though I was a Christian. He said that he had this in mind when he started reading the Qur’an, and when I heard that it broke my heart. I studied these books for the opposite reason — to understand others’ perspectives so that I can more effectively persuade them! But sadly however, Shahryar had taken it the wrong way. However, Cornelius and I debriefed for another 1.5 hours after this interaction, and he pointed out, “I don’t think Shahryar was really a Christian before this — I don’t think he really understood about faith.” I think this is true. And so my prayer is that this would just be the start of the faith journey for Shahryar — that God would use this whole experience to lead him to the Truth. And the truth is a Person with a name — Jesus.

(Needless to say, at the end of that evening I was absolutely wrecked — talking about all these deep things, where the stakes are very high, is always intense … and even more intense the whole conversation is in Urdu (and Islamic Urdu, with a strong Arabic influence) and I’m having to pay more attention! So I praise God for his enablement, and it reminded me how completely unable I am to do anything without God leading it all).

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Following on from that intense meeting, the next evening was a meeting of a very different kind. Cornelius brought some of his friends around to meet me, and there was three of us who were Christians, and three of us who were Muslims. I was so impressed, that we had a wonderful conversation — the Muslims were curious and encouraging, the Christians were also willing to listen, I was still able to clearly explain the gospel, and I (and maybe all of us) left the conversation with a lot of hope. It was still challenging — multiple hours of discourse in Urdu, where once again, the stakes are high! However, it was one were everyone was working for unity and mutual understanding, and I left going, “If conversations like this happen, the future in Pakistan is bright, and God can do a lot.” 🙌

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Conversations have continued with Deepak, even though it is back to by-distance — we talk most days, and a couple of days ago Deepak and I had a wonderful 2.5hr conversation that got to the heart of the matter: “you have clearly experienced the living God (and acknowledged this yourself), and you are understanding things for yourself and reading the Bible… at what point are you going to submit your life to him?” I know that Deepak takes his time to make decisions, but I think he is now at the point where he basically has all the information he needs (and knows this). Pray that God would touch his heart in a way that “clicks” for him.

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The leaders of the church I visited, with Ps Abid in the pink shirt

Sunday was a real highlight for me — I had an opportunity to preach in a little village about 1.5hr’s drive away from here. The way there was an adventure in and of itself — I hired a car and drove the 3 hour’s trip … and while I have driven in the subcontinent before, it is always a roller-coaster ride as you never know what is going to happen! We made it safely (albeit a little late after I took a wrong turn right as we were about to arrive, and we were stuck trying to drive through a packed and crowded market, with people crowding around, vegetables piled up, and other vehicles still trying to squeeze through an impossibly small space. The last 500m took us half an hour!

A similar type of road to where I got stuck...

It was a real privilege to preach about the prodigal sons in this church, and here is a video below.

I was blown away by the fact that after the service, people stayed back for Bible study. Wow! I haven’t seen people genuinely trying to grow themselves like this in Pakistan until now. The pastor, Abid, is incredible, and I was super impressed. He is also keen to use the Alpha Course in Urdu, and I’m hoping that I can facilitate that for them — Cornelius and I found that he had a projector but didn’t know how to use it … so we set it up and got it ready for them to be able to use for videos. These are all simple village people who I suspect up until recently have been largely illiterate. (This is real grassroots level — while we visited one of the houses of a church family, a cow was giving birth to a calf and we all watched!! 😳) However, through Ps Abid’s work, they are making real discipleship progress. There is fruit. Praise God. 💯

Another mindblowing thing was in the Sunday afternoon after church, 17 young men gathered for a ‘youth training’ time. I had a brief message, but really wanted them to ask their questions. These are all simple village lads, but nevertheless they asked about 4-5 really great questions, and I was overjoyed. It was also so encouraging to see Cornelius, who came with me, sharing about the Alpha course with confidence and encouraging some of the other young people afterwards … and I can really see him growing.

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There are many other things I could write about… The driver’s bike breaking down while I was out and about, and being with him while things get fixed …

… or spending quality time with my host family …

… or having good conversations about faith with some of my english students over chicken tikka …

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But I obviously can’t write about them all. Nevertheless, here’s the joy. God is the one doing the work, bringing the fruit. We go along for the ride. And in the process, we see the humble confidence that we all can have in the gospel, when we realise that despite our unworthiness, He has chosen us and loved us … and it is His work, not ours. If that’s the case, God is always fruitful. And when God is at work in and through us, we can be too.