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TITLE: Uh-Oh! - A True Tale of India By Barni Feuerhaken 01/31/05 |
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"India needs to know about Jesus. We want to do everything we can to tell the people in our country Jesus loves them. What can we do to help spread the good news of the Gospel everywhere?"
These thoughts kept running through the minds of Ponraj and Raju, two young Indian men who loved God so much they wanted to share His love with everyone.
"But, what can we do? We don't have fancy educations or any special talents or a lot of money. We are just simple men who love God."
What could they do?
They asked God if He would give them a job to do so their country could learn about His love. God gave them a special job. He told them He wanted them to travel around the villages and count things.
What kind of things should they count?
They could count how many idol temples there were in the area, how many different gods were worshiped by the villagers and how many people lived there who had never heard about Jesus.
What could they do with all this information?
They could come back and tell the church planters about everything they had counted. These people would be happy to receive that information because it would help them know exactly where to start churches. The villagers would then have a place, right where they lived, to learn about God and His love for them.
Ponraj and Raju got an old pickup truck and traveled to all the villages in their area, writing down everything they counted.
One day as they bumped along a dusty dirt road going to a remote village their picup truck went 'thump thump, thump thump.'
"Uh-Oh! What was that?"
They stopped the truck and got out to see what happened. Had something fallen off the truck? Had they hit a rock or an animal? Had something terrible happened?
When they looked around Ponraj and Raju saw they had run over a nine-foot long cobra. The cobra lay smashed flat on the road in three pieces.
What could they do?
They pushed the dead snake off the road and went on to the village.
In the village the young men began to ask the people, "What are your beliefs around here? What do you worship?" The villagers were happy to them all about their god.
"We have a big, strong god. He is our snake god, and he is nine-feet long. Every day at 5:00 o'clock in the morning and again at 5:00 o'clock in the evening our cobra god comes out of his hole in the ground, and we give him someting to eat. Then he goes back to his home."
"Uh-Oh!"
Should Ponraj and Raju tell the villagers they had just run over and killed that cobra with their pickup truck?"
What should they do?
Should they go find the cobra and use their tire pump to plump him back up? Should they try to stuff him back in his hole? Should they run away? Should they pretend nothing had happened? If Ponraj and Raju told the villagers they had killed their god, they may become very angry and try to kill them!
What should they do?
They were afraid. But, they remembered how much God loved these villagers and said, "We are very sorry. We have accidentally run over and killed your god. But, let us tell you about a God who cannot be killed. He is greater than your cobra god. He is a God who loves you so much He paid the ultimate sacrifice for you." Ponraj and Raju told the people how they could know the real God for themselves.
What did the villagers do?
That very day people from the village asked Jesus to be their Savior, and the two young men who thought the only thing they could do for God was count, helped the village start a new church so everyone could worship the true God.
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