THE UNSCHOOLED MEN OF GOD
"Men of Galilee," they said, "why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven." Acts1:11. In India today, Christians, like in the rest of the world, can perhaps be divided into two groups - the first, bewildered, and standing and gazing into the sky; and the second, strictly following Christ's mandate of being his witnesses "to the ends of the earth," and preparing the world for the second coming of Christ. In Acts 1:6-10, we are given a very graphic picture of what exactly happened during the last few moments when the risen Lord was still with the Apostles before his ascension: 6 "Then they gathered around him and asked him, 'Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?' 7 He said to them: 'It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." 9 After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight. 10 They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them and said the above words.We know that St. Thomas, one of the 12 Apostles of Christ, came to India in the very first century long before Christianity spread to Europe, including Rome. Also he died a martyr while being a witness to Christ in Madras, the present Chennai. But even after more than 2000 years of its inception here Christianity still seems to be in its initial stages of growth if we go by the number. Christians in India today number less than 3 per cent of the total population of 1.2 billion. Why? Every follower of Christ here needs to make an examination of his conscience and try to find an answer to this painful question always staring in his or her face.
The great citadels of power and positions of Christianity in India, its educational institutions, hospitals and monumental churches with their vast properties, owned and manned mostly by the mainline churches, no doubt, are a matter of great pride for us that Christianity has played its role in the overall development and progress of this nation to a creditable extent. But unfortunately for us the very same establishments have also become the subject of envy, jealousy and perhaps even hatred among the non-Christians in modern India, only reminding them of the days of the British Raj. Perhaps we have never been clear in our public relations policy or forthright enough to fearlessly stick to Christ's mandate of spreading his message. Also perhaps our equivocating expressions and compromising stands that we often take, conveniently forgetting the very words of Christ, "say yes for yes; and no for no," in order to be "pragmatic" and survive in this country, could be the main reason for our mediocre performance in carrying the message of Christ. We also do not seem to have dared and faced persecutions as done by great many peoples of the world where Christianity has thrived and has made a mark of its own down the centuries in the world.
However, there is every reason for us today hopefully to look forward without having to weep over our tardy progress in the past, as things have begun to change in the recent years in this country too. A new generation of Christians cutting across all strata of the society fearlessly coming forward to be witnesses to Christ and willing to make any sacrifice including that of sacrificing their very lives for Christ is emerging everywhere. This new trend in India today is quite reminiscent of what exactly transpired during the early years of Christianity in Palestine, in Asia Minor and then in Rome itself. These people can be proudly called as the unschooled men of God who never take their foot off the pedal, men, very much like the first disciples of Christ- "not wise men, but that know how to read the language, and such were the disciples, in every sense of the word; they were mean and abject, poor fishermen, men of no name and figure, that were in no office, and exalted station of life, nor versed in Jewish learning, but common private men."
It is these "private men," simple, poor evangelists and pastors, who can be found in any nook and corner of India today with their little bags hanging around their shoulders with a Bible and some Christian literature, trudging down the hard meandering stony paths or pedaling up the long distances on their rickety old bicycles, deep into the yet-to-be-civilized villages, to convey the good news of salvation to the last and the least among us. What is the reward for all their hard work of carrying the message of good news? They get often beaten up, their heads and legs broken, their little houses and places of worship burnt down or destroyed again and again. Though they never raise their hands or speak a single rude word against their adversaries, they get arrested and locked up behind bars, often forced to spend days on end in prisons, while their wives and children starving and anxious, wait for their bread-earner's safe return home. There have been quite a number of instances where they also had to lay down their lives for their unflinching love for Christ.
It is these men of courage and sacrifice who have accepted Jesus in the recent years, also catering to the spiritual needs of their congregations, in their little house churches, which serve them both as a place of worship and also as a dwelling place, to as small a congregation as just 15 believers, indeed gives us great hope that things are changing for the better for the Christian community in the country today ever reminding us of Peter and John, the two disciples of Christ about whom we hear such inspiring words as, "Then they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus." And then, "with what courage and intrepidity they stood before them, the presence of mind they had, and the freedom of speech they used, as the word properly signifies: they observed their elocution, the justness of their diction, the propriety of their language, and the strength and nervousness of their reasoning; as well as their great resolution, constancy, and firmness of mind; not being afraid to profess the name of Christ."
Of course, nobody can ever forget the great evangelical work done by scores of Christians, men and women - priests, nuns, pastors, evangelists and dedicated laymen, toiling in the hot sun, with a minimum of creature comforts, often laying down their lives for Christ, in unknown corners of our vast country during all these 2000 years. However, it is here that we also cannot afford to overlook an important fact that men of great learning among us, men who spend greater part of their lives in hair-splitting theological and doctrinal analysis, who need to have a sincere look at our failure in our work of evangelization in the second largest country in the world. They also need to cast a benevolent look of appreciation at these simple souls that fearlessly trudge across the country carrying the good news for the unlettered and the spiritually starving millions of our fellow citizens of India.
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