{"id":12369,"date":"2023-09-20T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-09-20T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/?p=12369"},"modified":"2023-09-19T13:39:55","modified_gmt":"2023-09-19T20:39:55","slug":"south-asia-shiva-devotee-has-a-change-of-heart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/?p=12369","title":{"rendered":"South Asia: Shiva Devotee Has a Change of Heart"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Source: East-West Ministries International, September 2023<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Meera was a devout follower of Shiva as well as other [Hindu gods and] goddesses. Daily, she would pray to the gods and regularly provided animal sacrifices and fasted. She would even cut her fingers to offer her blood as a sacrifice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Being a devoted Hindu was Meera\u2019s entire identity, and she renounced other beliefs. She hated Christians and would sometimes join others to persecute them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One day, Meera became sick and discovered she had a tumor in her stomach. She immediately turned to her Hindu gods for healing. She built a temple at her home to worship them and performed even more rituals. But her illness only became worse. She became bedridden and could no longer get up to perform her sacrifices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When she had lost all hope to live, Meera invited a Christian neighbor named Rohan to her home. Rohan shared the gospel with Meera and prayed that Jesus would heal her. But Meera\u2019s heart was hardened, and she refused to believe in Jesus. She stubbornly continued to worship her gods while her sickness ravaged her body.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>After several months, Meera was desperate. She invited Rohan to her home again. This time, Rohan brought other Christian friends to pray for her and share the gospel again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Eventually, Meera\u2019s heart softened, and she began to show signs of healing. Rohan and his friends continually visited Meera to pray, and Meera\u2019s condition improved day by day. The Christ-followers began meeting in Meera\u2019s home to teach her the Bible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then, Meera was able to get out of her bed. She was completely healed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/blog.eastwest.org\/field-story-a-change-of-heart\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The full story<\/a> reports that Meera was baptized and has led several people in her village to Christ.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Earlier this month, East-West published <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.eastwest.org\/what-is-ganesh-chaturthi\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">What Is Ganesh Chaturthi?<\/a> in reference to a festival celebrated this week. Let\u2019s pray for more \u201cchanges of heart.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>15 Days of Prayer for the Hindu World will be November 5-19. If you\u2019re interested, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mnnonline.org\/bibles-for-the-world-15-days-of-prayer-for-the-hindu-world\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">get a free copy of the booklet<\/a> (Bibles for the World\/Mission Network News). It\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/worldprayerguides.org\/15-days-of-prayer-for-the-hindu-world-2023\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">also for sale for US$3\/copy<\/a> (World Prayer Guides). The focus this year is Hindus in diaspora.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Source: East-West Ministries International, September 2023 Meera was a devout follower of Shiva as well as other [Hindu gods and] goddesses. Daily, she would pray to the gods and regularly provided animal sacrifices and fasted. She would even cut her fingers to offer her blood as a sacrifice. Being a devoted Hindu was Meera\u2019s entire &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/?p=12369\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">South Asia: Shiva Devotee Has a Change of Heart<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-briefs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12369"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12369\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12370,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12369\/revisions\/12370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}