My hands were on their bowed heads, on numb and failing feet, on gnarled stumps of hands that cannot even dress some of them. They sat there with primitive crutches and grubby artificial legs, eyes blinded by deadened blinking reflex, noses rotting away in withered faces. Some in their sixties had the disease since they were 8 or ten years old. Outcastes in the midst of the crowds of India.
Unclean! Unclean! echoing down through the ages. Shunned by a society where extended family is the supporting fabric of life. Refused access to water--in a hot and tropical land--lest their touch on the pump "pollute" the entire well.
We gave out 10 lb bags of rice, some spending money, and little plastic bags of water. The water packets were torn open greedily, thirsty throats gratefully slaked. Water! Johnpaul told them that Jesus was the Water of Life....then Russ spoke to them from Psalm 31, teaching them that God is with them even in their struggle and pain. Fingerless hands raised as "Allelujah" rose to the heavens.
Matthew 8:3 has a new meaning for me today. When Jesus touched the leper to heal him, it may have been the first human touch he had felt for years. When I knelt down to pray for Susilla's numb feet--and touched them--she burst into tears. When I rose and took her stumpy hands in mine, I couldn't stop myself from embracing her frail and shaking body to my heart.God uses the unlikely--and sometimes unwilling--to do His work. He uses the weak, the poor, the fearful to show His power. And, He brings the outcastes--all of us crippled, maimed and blinded by sin--into the Marriage Banquet of His glorious Son. Praise God! Daivuniki stotrum!
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