ATAMA, one of India’s little children, was dead. Suwartha, her mother, was heartbroken, for she loved her little one as dearly as any mother in Christian lands ever loved her child. She had never heard the gospel message, of how Jesus died for sinners and that He had risen again from the dead. She was a Hiu, and in her grief she went to the temple for some word of comfort.
The priest, seeing her, spoke roughly to her.
“Where is your child?” he asked, contemptuously.
“Most noble ruler,” said Suwartha, “my little Atama is dead. Yesterday I carried her in my arms to the burning ghat and —.”
“Aha!” laughed the old priest. “One less woman to plague men.”
“It must be as you say,” murmured Suwartha, meekly, “but my arms are empty, and my heart is full of sorrow because she is gone. And I wonder where her gentle spirit .19
“Her spirit, her soul?” interrupted the priest. “Who knows if she has a soul?”
“Oh, do not say so,” wailed Sartha. “Tell me, is she happy? Is her soul at rest?”
The priest appeared to reflect seriously for a moment. “Is a toad hay?” he asked. Then he told her: “More than likely already the soul of your child has passed into one of these. Be careful and avoid every form of creeping thing lest you crush your child.”
“And when will her soul be freed from this bondage?”
“Oh,” yawned the priest, “perhaps in ten thousand years.”
Slowly Suwartha arose and left the temple. She went to the outskirts of the city where the day bore she had witnessed the burning of the body of her child. There lay a heap of ashes. Suddenly, it seemed, they stirred, and slowly there glid from them a hideous cobra snake. “Palmur! Tat! Palmur!” shrieked Suwartha. “Atama, my darling,” and fell to the ground, overcome with grief, for she believed that the soul of Atama had passed into the serpent.
A little later Suwartha started home. On the way she met a band of little children, and they were singing:
“There’s a home for little children,
Above the bright blue sky;
Where Jesus reigns in glory
A home of peace and joy.
No home on earth is like it,
Nor can with it compare;
For everyone is happy
Nor could be happier there.”
What could this mean? Was there hope after all? Was little Atama not in the body of the snake, but happy somewhere? She rembembered that one of her neighbors, Chettu, was no longer a Hindu, but a believer in the Jesus gospel. Going to her, she said: “Oh, Chettu, I have just come from the burning ghat where I carried my little Atama yesterday, and out of the heap of ashes where her body was burned I saw a dreadful cobra writhe; and if what the priest told me was true, the spirit of my darling Atama has entered that hideous snake.”
“Oh no!” interrupted Chettu early. “It is not true; it is a lie. The soul of Atama is in the bosom of Jesus, the risen Saviour, who loved little children, and took them in His arms and blessed them.”
For a while they talked together, and Chettu told her friend the Won: derful story of how Jesus, the Son of God, had died for sinners, little ones as well as older ones, and that all who put their trust in Him as their Saviour go to be with Him in heaven. Even little babes like Atama, who die before they are old enough to confess His name, are under the shelter of His precious blood. Suwartha drank it all in eagerly and then went home comforted, That night Suwartha could scarce. ly sleep. The strange new message of life after death seemed too good to be true, but what comfort and peace it brought to her soul! Then she herself believed that Jesus came to save Suwartha, and her little Ata ma too! The next morning, when the first glimmer of sunlight stole into the room, and rested upon the face of Suwartha, it revealed there the light that shines wherever a soul receives eternal life through faith in Christ Jesus. Life and immortality have been brought to light through the gospel.
What a Saviour Jesus is!
O what grace, what love is His!
He alone the Saviour is!
Everlasting praise be His!
Come along, come along, come along!
Come and join our cheerful throng!
Come, boys and girls and grown-ups, too
Joyful news we bring to you,
That Christ Who died is risen again
To be our Prince and Saviour.
“I WILL TRUST, AND NOT BE AFRAID: FOR THE LORD JEHOVAH IS MY STRENGTH AND MY SONG.” lsa. 12:2.
ML-10/19/1969