We were passing through another small, dusty village the seemed to just be in the middle of nowhere for no apparent reason. It might have been totally unremarkable - just another collection of huts, rice granaries, and buffalo sheds – except for the Temple.
An ancient Hindu Temple stood as the center of the community. Maybe it was why the community had grown up at this particular bend in the road. It was certainly the most commanding structure for many miles in any direction.
I called for our driver to stop and let me get pictures. Despite all the pagan darkness it represented, the buildings and even the walls of this Hindu Shrine compound were brightly colorful and incredibly ornate. It stood in utter contrast to all the bleak huts and impoverished houses that surrounded it.
What caught my eye and then my heart, was the single attendant I saw in the Temple area. A slight wisp of a woman squatted in the gateway to this splendid shrine. She wore no ornaments. Her head was uncovered and her hair unkempt.
She was dirty. She was sitting in dirt. Everything about her indicated extreme poverty and misery – physical, mental, and spiritual.
Was she a beggar? A temple woman? A weary wanderer passing by? Or was she just another, not untypical, parishioner in this culture of polytheistic heathenism?
I don't know. I may never know in this world. I only stepped out of the van for three minutes to snap a dozen pictures and continue on up the road. I had no tract in her language. It is unlikely she could read anyway. It was next to impossible to cross, in a chance meeting, all the racial, cultural, and linguistic barriers that separated us.
She needs a Spirit-filled man or woman of her own people, who can connect with her and share the Gospel. She needs to meet someone who was once like her but has been transformed by the power of Christ. That community needs a pastor and a fellowship of true believers to be salt and light in this region.
I cannot be any of those things to the dark natives of S. India. But I know Indians who can and are all of that! And I am working to help them penetrate the darkness of such communities with the Gospel Light through evangelism and church planting.
Barnabas Ministries partners with a zealous band of preachers to bring the Water of Life to famishing multitudes in S. India. They go out into the streets and by-ways of rural communities throughout Andhra Pradesh passing out tracts, preaching in the square or by the well, talking and praying with inquirers.
Please pray much for them and us as we partner together to reach those like the woman in the temple ga. Pray that God will give us souls, use us to encourage and equip the church, and build up His Kingdom in this very needy world area.