The Prey of the Terrible
"I believe we are in the midst of a great battle.
We are not ourselves fighting, we are simply
accepting everything that comes; but the Powers of
Light are fighting against the Powers of Darkness,
and they will certainly prevail. The Holy Spirit
is working, but the people do not as yet know it
is the Spirit."
_Hester Needham, Sumatra._
THE devil's favourite device just now is to move interested people to
far-away places. We have had several who seemed very near to the
Kingdom. Then suddenly they have disappeared.
There was Wreath, of the Village of the Temple. She used to listen in
the shadow of the door while we sat on the outside verandah. Then she
got bolder, and openly asked to see Golden, and talk with her. One day,
unexpectedly, Golden was led to the Red Lake Village, and to her
surprise found Wreath there. She had been sent away from the Village of
the Temple, and was now with some other relations, under even stricter
guard. But God led Golden, all unknowingly, to go straight to the very
house where she was. So she heard again.
Next time Golden went she could not see her alone, but somehow Wreath
got her to understand that if she went to a certain tree near the
women's bathing-place, at a certain time next week, she would try to
meet her there. Golden went, and they met. Wreath told her she believed
it all, but she could not then face breaking Caste and destroying her
family's name. They had been good to her, how could she disgrace them?
Still, she eagerly wanted to go on hearing, and we felt that if she did,
the love of God would win. So we were full of hope.
Next time Golden went she could find no trace of her. She has never seen
her since. There is a rumour that she has been carried off over the
mountains, hundreds of miles away.
In another village a bright, keen boy of seventeen listened one day when
we taught the women, and, becoming greatly interested, openly took the
Gospel's part when the village elders attacked it. After some weeks he
gathered courage to come and see the Iyer. He was a very intelligent
boy, well known all over the countryside, because he had studied the
Tamil classics, and also because of his connection with one of the chief
temples of the district.
A fortnight after his visit here, our Band went to his village. They
heard that he was married and gone, where, no one would say. The
relations must have heard of his coming to us (of course he was urged to
tell them), and they rushed him through a marriage, and sent him off
post haste. So now there is another key turned, locking him into
Hinduism.
In the Village of the Wind a young girl became known as an inquirer. Her
Caste passed the word along from village to village wherever its members
were found, and all these relations and connections were speedily
leagued in a compact to keep her from hearing more. When we went to see
her, we found she had been posted off somewhere else. When we went to
the somewhere else (always freely mentioned to us, with invitations to
go), we found she had been there, but had been forwarded elsewhere. For
weeks she was tossed about like this; then we traced her, and found her.
But she was thoroughly cowed, and dared not show the least interest in
us. It is often like that. Just at the point where the soul-poise is so
delicate that the lightest touch affects it, something, someone, pushes
it roughly, and it trembles a moment, then falls--on the wrong side.
The reason for all this alertness of opposition is, that scattered about
the five thousand square miles we call our field, here and there seeds
are beginning to grow. Some of the sowers are in England now, and some
are in heaven--sowers and reapers, English and Tamil, rejoice together!
This is known everywhere, for the news spreads from town to town, and
then out to the villages, and the result is opposition. Sometimes the
little patch of ground which looked so hopeful is trampled, and the
young seedlings killed; sometimes they seem to be rooted up. When we go
to our Master and tell Him, He explains it: "An Enemy hath done this."
But as the measure of the Enemy's activity is in direct proportion to
the measure of God's working, we take it as a sign of encouragement,
however hindering it may be. Satan would not trouble to fight if he saw
nothing worth attacking; he does not seem to mind the spread of a head
knowledge of the Doctrine, or even a cordial appreciation of it. Often
we hear the people say how excellent it is, and how they never worship
idols now, but only the true God; and even a heathen mother will make
her child repeat its texts to you, and a father will tell you how it
tells him Bible stories; and if you are quite new to the work you put it
in the _Magazine_, and at home it sounds like conversion. All this goes
on most peacefully; there is not the slightest stir, till something
happens to show the people that the Doctrine is not just a Creed, but
contains a living Power. And then, and not till then, there is
opposition.
This opposition is sufficiently strong in the case of a boy or young man
(older Caste men and women rarely "change their religion" in this part
of South India), but if a girl is in question, the Caste is touched at
its most sensitive point, and the feeling is simply intense. Men and
demons seem to conspire to hold such a one in the clutch of the
Terrible.
There is a young girl in Cupid's Lake Village whose heart the Lord
opened some weeks ago. She is a gentle, timid girl, and devoted to her
mother. "Can it be right to break my mother's heart?" she used to ask us
pitifully. We urged her to try to win her mother, but the mother was
just furious. The moment she understood that her daughter wanted to
follow Jesus, or "join the Way," as she would express it, she gathered
the girl's books and burnt them, and forbade her ever to mention the
subject; and she went all round the villages trying to stop our work.
At last things came to a crisis. The girl was told to do what she felt
would be sin against God. She refused. They tried force, sheer brute
force. She nerved herself for the leap in the dark, and tried to escape
to us. But in the dark night she lost the way, and had to run back to
her home. Next morning the village priest spread a story to the effect
that his god had appeared to him, told him of her attempt to escape, and
that she would try twice again, "but each time I will stand in the way
and turn her back," he said.
This naturally startled the girl. "Is his god stronger than Jesus?" she
asked in real perplexity. We told her we thought the tale was concocted
to frighten her; the priest had seen her, and made up the rest. But
twice since then, driven by dire danger, that girl has tried to get to
us, and each time she has been turned back. And now she is kept in
rigorous guard, as her determination to be a Christian is well known to
all in the place.
Do you say, "Tell her to stay at home and bear it patiently"? We do tell
her so, when we can see her, but we add, "till God makes a way of
escape"; and if you knew all there is to be known about a Hindu home,
and what may happen in it, you would not tell her otherwise.
But supposing there is nothing more than negative difficulty to be
feared, have you ever tried in thought to change places with such a
girl? Have you ever considered how impossible it is for such a one to
grow? The simple grace of continuance is in danger of withering when all
help of every sort is absolutely cut off, and the soul is, to begin
with, not deeply rooted in God. Plants, even when they have life, need
water and sunshine and air. Babes need milk.
You find it hard enough to grow, if one may judge from the constant
wails about "leanness," and yet you are surrounded by every possible
help to growth. You have a whole Bible, not just a scrap of it; and you
can read it all, and understand at least most of it. You have endless
good books, hymn-books, and spiritual papers; you have sermons every
week, numerous meetings for edification, and perhaps an annual
Convention. Now strip yourself of all this. Shut your Bible, and forget
as completely as if you had never known it all you ever read or heard,
except the main facts of the Gospel. Forget all those strengthening
verses, all those beautiful hymns, all those inspiring addresses.
Likewise, of course, entirely forget all the loving dealings of God with
yourself and with others--a Hindu has no such memories to help her. Then
go and live in a devil's den and develop saintliness. The truth is, even
you would find it difficult; but this Hindu girl's case is worse than
that, a million times worse. Think of the life, and then, if you can,
tell her she must be quite satisfied with it, that it is the will of
God. You could not say that it is His will! It is the will of the
Terrible, who holds on to his prey, and would rather rend it limb from
limb than ever let it go.
We are often asked to tell converts' stories; and certainly they would
thrill, for the way of escape God opens sometimes is, like Peter's from
prison, miraculous; and truth is stranger than fiction, and far more
interesting. But we who work in the Terrible's lair, and know how he
fights to get back his prey, even after it has escaped from him, are
afraid to tell these stories too much, and feel that silence is safest,
and, strange as it may seem to some, for the present most glorifies God.
For a certain connection has been observed between publicity and peril.
And we have learned by experience to fear any attempt to photograph
spiritual fruit. The old Greek artist turned away the face that held too
much for him to paint; and that turned-away face had power in it, they
say, to touch men's hearts. We turn these faces away from you; may the
very fact that we do it teach some at home to realise how much more lies
in each of them than we can say, how great a need there is to pray that
each may be kept safe. The names of one and another occur, because they
came in the letters so often that I could not cross them all out without
altering the character of the whole; they are part of one's very life.
But as even a passing mention may mean danger, unless a counteracting
influence of real prayer protects them, we ask you to pray that the
tender protection of God may be folded round each one of them; and then
when we meet where no sin can creep into the telling, and no harm can
follow it, they will tell you their stories themselves, and God will
give you your share in the joy, comrades by prayer at home! But let us
press it on you now--pray, oh, pray for the converts! Pray that they may
grow in Christ. Pray that He may see of the travail of His soul, and be
satisfied with each of them. And pray that we may enter into that
travail of soul with Him. Nothing less is any good. Spiritual children
mean travail of soul--spiritual agony. I wonder who among those who read
this will realise what I mean. Some will, I think; so I write it. It is
a solemn thing to find oneself drawn out in prayer which knows no relief
till the soul it is burdened with is born. It is no less solemn
afterwards, until Christ is formed in them. Converts are a responsible
joy.
And now we have told you a little of what is going on. There are days
when nothing seems to be done, and then again there are days when the
Terrible seems almost visible, as he gathers up his strength, and tears
and mauls his prey. And so it is true we have to fight a separate fight
for each soul. But another view of the case is a strength to us many a
time. "We are not ourselves fighting, but the Powers of Light are
fighting against the Powers of Darkness," and the coming of the victory
is only a question of time. "Shall the prey be taken from the Mighty or
the captives of the Terrible be delivered? But thus saith the Lord,
=Even the captives of the Mighty shall be taken away and the prey of the
Terrible shall be delivered=."