During the COVID years, the world shut down. Churches were not spared. Unable to gather as they used to, believers found themselves isolated and alone.

But for one pastor stuck in a corner of rural India, the pandemic opened an opportunity like never before to connect internationally.

Because people were meeting online, Ps Dinakaran Perli made friends with other pastors abroad on Facebook. They gathered online to pray for churches globally, specifically for India.

“During the time, Indians were dying by the thousands. Many well-known pastors also passed away.

“I got to know a Singaporean Indian man who had a heart for India,” said Ps Dina, 34.

Every Monday, his Singaporean friend Jagadeesh, an Indian national who had moved to Singapore and Ps Dina would gather with others to pray.

God would later use these ties to bring Ps Dina to Singapore in April this year to attend Archippus Awakening, a seminar that trains participants to serve.

(Left to right) Ps Dina’s wife Pavani, Singaporean Ang Khim Siong and Ps Dina at the Archippus Awakening seminar. Khim Siong met Ps Dina at lunch on the first day and decided to sponsor Pavani’s seminar fees.

“I had no money, no visa. I had never even been out of India before. But God provided,” Ps Dina told Salt&Light.

Ps Dina is no stranger to the miraculous. Before he was born, God told his father, also a pastor: “I am going to give you a son. He must minister to many nations.”

A future foretold, a life saved twice

Ps Dina’s father, Yesudasu, became a Christian after experiencing supernatural healing from God. He had been stung by a scorpion. For days, excruciating pain reduced the man – who once endured a cobra’s bite – to tears.

When he finally relented and allowed two pastors to carry him to church to get help, he found instantaneous relief and peace in his heart. So he returned home, but the pain started up again. He turned back and went to church, and the pain left.

Recognising that it was no coincidence, Yesudasu decided to give his life to Jesus.

Later, he would hear the audible voice of God calling him and would surrender his life to Him to become a pastor.

It was during a break from Bible school that Yesudasu had a dream in which God told him: “I am going to give you a son. He must minister to many nations.”

Yesudasu already had two daughters. The local belief was that if a family had two daughters, the third child would be a girl as well. But he held steadfastly to God’s promise. A year later, Dina was born.

When Dina was less than a month old, the whole family left their village for another so his father could start a church there. Two years before, God had given his father a vision that he was to start a church in a village with two canals and a banana plantation.

Ps Dina (centre) with his parents. His father was a pastor for three decades until he stepped down from ministry following a heart surgery.

This was in the days before Google Maps. Finding such a village for a man whose only means of transport was his two feet was near impossible. Shortly after Dina was born, a pastor from another village told Yesudasu about a place that fitted the description.

“My father went to see the place. When he entered the place, he felt peace in his heart. It felt like home,” said Dina.

So Yesudasu uprooted his entire family and moved there. In the new village, they had no roof over their heads. Being from a low caste, no one would rent them a place either.

In the end, a woman from a high caste took pity on the family and allowed them to move into her cowshed.

“The whole place was made of mud with leaves on top for a roof. If it rained, water would come in. Dogs and snakes would wander inside. But we never got hurt.

“Once a venomous snake came in to sleep with me when I was a child. The snake didn’t harm me. Instead, my father killed the snake.”

When Dina was two, he was playing by a pond when he fell in. No one saw the accident. A woman happened to pass by as Dina sank. She jumped in and hauled him out.

“I didn’t know how to swim or call out. That was a great miracle. Even though my father was not there, God was there.”

Failed attempts, thwarted ambition

Throughout his childhood, Dina was “ultra spiritual”. He went to Sunday School and even served in the worship ministry in church. If anyone asked what he wanted to be when he grew up, he would say: “Missionary.”

But as the teen years rolled in, a rebellious streak emerged. His family was very poor and the children had to be sent to live in orphanages. Dina realised then that being a pastor meant a life of abject poverty with no respect from the community.

He turned away from the faith and the wise counsel of his parents.

“I made many mistakes. I lived a totally wild life.”

To rise above his humble circumstances, Dina set his heart on being a police office. He trained daily to get himself fighting fit. But the night before the entrance exam, he caught the flu.

“My whole body couldn’t move. I couldn’t even raise my hands. When I wanted to go to the bathroom, my mother had to carry me. They even had to brush my teeth for me.”

Dina, then 20, had to give the exam a miss. The day after the exam, he was well again. An illness that severe should have had him laid up for at least a week, he reasoned.

“I told my father, ‘How did this happen?’

“My father told me, ‘My son, I told you before you were born, God has chosen you. Whatever you do will not be successful. You must be a pastor only.’”

Undeterred, Dina tried again the next year.

“My mind was corrupted. I just wanted to be powerful,” he admitted.

He ate more healthily, and stayed away from crowds and people who were not well. Two days before the entrance exam, he fell ill again. Again, he was so ill he could not walk.

He missed the exam again. Two days later, he recovered. 

“I am really upset. I was angry with God. My father always told me about the dreams he had from God and my mother would have visions. But I refused to believe them.

“I didn’t trust God. I was really far away from Him.”

Two dreams, one accident and a conviction

Dreams dashed, Dina was listless and purposeless. So he decided to help his father renovate the church. The plan was to replace the mud walls and banana leaf roof with cement.

His job was to carry stones to the church. As he did so, he cut his finger. There was hardly any blood but Dina fainted.

“I have been in fights before. Five times I sustained head injuries. Many times, I hurt my body. I was very strong. Yet I fainted.”

Out cold, Dina had a dream.

“I saw myself standing and preaching the Gospel very powerfully. I was dressed entirely in white like my father when he preaches.”

Ps Dina preaching in white, just like he saw in his dream.

When he awoke, he kept the dream to himself, certain that his father would send him straight to Bible school if he confided in him.

The next day, Dina returned to transporting stones. He had bandaged up the cut. When he unwrapped the bandage to check on his wound, he fainted. Again, he had the dream of himself preaching.

“This time I was terrified. It is not usual. It is beyond logic. This was either from God or an evil spirit.”

When he woke up, he ran away from the church – literally. He found a motorcycle nearby and sped away.

“I wanted to drink alcohol because I was so terrified. Where I come from, if you are happy, you drink. If you want to fight, you drink. Terrified? You drink. Alcohol was a medicine for all.”

In his haste, he lost control of his motorcycle and skidded along a road notorious for fatal accidents. He was flung some 80 metres and lost consciousness.

When he came to, he went in search of the motorcycle.

“My bike was very far away from me and many people were surrounding it. When I went to life up the bike, they told me ‘Don’t touch the bike.’

“They said they were looking for the body. They had searched the river on one side and the woods on the other.”

No one believed Dina when he said he was the rider because the motorcycle was totally damaged but he had not one scratch on him.

“I had no injuries. I was walking. I did not shed even a drop of blood. They asked me what did I do for a living. I told them, ‘Nothing.’

“Then they asked: ‘What does your father do?’ I told them my father was a pastor and they told me, ‘Because of your father, God saved you. Your God is a great God.’”

Dina, who had long since stopped talking to God, prayed: “I asked the Lord, ‘Lord if You really have chosen me as my parents say, tell me. Don’t tell my father, mother or church members.

“’If You talk to me, I will obey and trust You, and follow You.’”

God brought to his mind Psalm 91:11-12. Then He spoke to Dina’s heart: “You want to run away from Me. I won’t let you go. You are the chosen one.”

The next day, Dina went to his father and asked to go to Bible school.

“My father didn’t say anything. Instead he went to his prayer room. I was wondering why he was not excited. When I went to the prayer room, he was weeping, ‘Lord, finally You answered my prayers.’

“He wept. I also wept.”

From two people to four churches

After three years, Dina graduated from Bible college in 2016.

“God gave me a vison. He wanted me to establish seven churches. If I die, the churches won’t go away.”

Dina and his wife Pavani, whom he married after graduation moved to a village 40km away to begin their ministry. They were the only believers there.

To start off, they held an all-night prayer and worship session which they played to the whole village via a microphone.

Ps Dina (right) and his wife Pavani, 32. The couple serve God together.

The villagers did not speak Telugu, the language of Ps Dina and his wife. But two women who were demon-possessed heard the broadcasted prayers and went to his church. Both were delivered when Ps Dina prayed for them.

Migrant workers from a nearby prawn factory also streamed in, as did a man to whom Ps Dina gave a word.

Ps Dina ministering to migrant workers.

“I told him, ‘You will have a baby.’ He told me he could not have children for 18 years. Doctors told him so because there was something wrong with his wife’s womb. They told him, ‘Better to adopt.’”

Three months after Ps Dina prayed for him, his wife became pregnant.

“He rushed to me and touched my feet. And he said, ‘Please forgive me. We didn’t trust you. Now we need to be baptised.’”

Ps Dina protested because it was late at night. But the man and his wife would not wait. So at 11pm that night, Ps Dina baptised the couple.

The man was a contractor. The next week, he brought those who worked for him and who were interested in the Gospel to church. In the end, some 60 people were added to the church because of him.

Ps Dina now has two other churches in different villages in addition to the one he first started. Recently, his father, now 63, underwent a heart surgery, so Ps Dina has taken on his father’s church as well.

He travels from village to village conducting Gospel rallies. There are hundreds of villages scattered throughout the area, each with only up to about 200 people. Ps Dina aims to reach 100 villages. In the eight years since he became a pastor, he has preached to 15.

A Gospel rally at one of the villages.

“I travel around  and when I notice a village with no church, I go there to conduct Gospel rallies when I have raised enough money.

“Sharing the Gospel is not easy. They will attack us. But Jesus also faced persecution. ”

His ministry also reaches out to those in slums, the leper community, migrant workers, and those who are deaf and mute. A month before the Salt&Light interview, Ps Dina started a free tuition programme for the community. He, his wife and his sister-in-law who is a teacher serve in this ministry.

Husband and wife preaching to children.

There are plans to start a women’s ministry, too.

“About 85% of the people in the village are women. When their husbands are at work, I can’t go to the homes and share with the wives. I need women to do that.”

In the pipeline are also plans to start a youth ministry to encourage the next generation of believers, as well as to add more cell groups to the churches.

The youths Ps Dina hopes to mentor.

Meanwhile, there are needs aplenty in the churches. A member’s mother passed away in April. Her father is in prison and her brother is ill, so Ps Dina took her in.

Providence in due time, power in peace

Because the villages are poor, Ps Dina, who depends on the tithe of his members, is also not well off.

“But all that I need, God provides on time. Like daily manna.”

This year, for example, God gave him a promise.

“I was praying about this year when He told me, ‘I am going to open a door for you no one can shut.’”

Shortly after, Ps Dina was invited to Singapore by friends he had met through the Facebook prayer group. They sponsored the cost of his and his wife’s visas to the country. 

The cost of the seminar, Archippus Awakening, was paid for by Jagadeesh who also opened up his home to Ps Dina and his wife Pavani.

In Singapore, Pavani did not attend the seminar because they could not afford it. But on the first day of the seminar, Ps Dina met a man, Ang Khim Siong, during the lunch break. The pair got to talking and, by the end of the conversation, the man had offered to pay for Pavani to join the seminar.

Ps Dina, Pavani and their three daughters.

His old desire for money and wealth have been met in unexpected ways.

Ps Dina is not rich. But he always has what he needs at the right time. He may not have power in the traditional sense but “when I go to God, I feel peace and that is power, a different kind of power”.

RELATED STORIES:

On Singapore’s death row, yet this pastor’s son finds new purpose in life

Rebel-turned-pastor and parents whose children strayed: Salt&Light Family Night dives into the pain of having a prodigal child

“I offered to resign from my church”: The heartache Dr William Wan felt when his daughter strayed

Love them, just love them: The missionary couple who prayed their prodigal children home