Safari Story- India

“Who shapes a God and casts an idol which can profit him nothing.”

Driving through the major streets of India numerous shops are displaying different gods for sale. Needless to say, it is a massive source of income for this country. These gods are in the form of grandiose artwork. Some are covered in gold in the form of people with animal heads or many arms, evocative sex goddesses, buddha statues, or grotesque monkeys and elephants.

Most of our time in India, however, was spent walking in a small neighborhood town or in rural villages. In the village, we encountered a simpler form of a god displayed outside of a home with a container of rice on a dish in front of it. In their homes, the people would display pictures of their god on the walls or have several carvings prominently displayed.

On a walk through a village with a local Christian leader, we had some unusual but wonderful experiences. On our way to make a home visit we were stopped by some friends we knew to pray for a lady who was blind. We explained our belief in Jesus to her and asked her to pray with us. This was explained in her language by our leader. He told us for years she daily worshipped the sun god.

Then we progressed on through the village to make our house visit. This family was so happy about our personal visit and began their preparations to serve us chai which is a spicy Indian tea. We conversed about their family with translation as we drank tea! We gave our individual stories of how we had come to know Christ and why we were in India short term. The husband had talked to our friend previously and was the reason for our visit. After affirming that Jesus was not another prophet but the only true God and sensing the husband understood, we prayed with him to receive Christ as his Lord. He was so excited and he began taking all the pictures of the Indian gods off his walls. When he completed that task he begged us to stay longer so he could invite a brother and friend to hear about Christ.

We talked with the brother and friend briefly making arrangements for our local leader to return the next day to talk at length and answer their questions. The Indian people are very aware of the persecution that can come when they confess Christ so they do not make their decisions casually. I am sure that this man had vetted his brother and friend beforehand, knowing they had a hunger to talk about Christianity. Sometime the next week, our leader informed us that the lady had confessed Christ, and her eyes were healed.

I will never forget these events of joy!