John read some verses—Matthew 25:21, II Timothy 4:6-8, and Philippians 1:19-21—then, after thanksgiving and prayer, we moved slowly to God’s Garden, singing all the time. It was a very long stream of people, mostly clad in white, with children among them, waving ferns instead of palms as a sign of victory.
By the graveside Devabakti read I Corinthians 15:50-58 in a gloriously clear and steady voice, though his eyes were full of tears. When Amma had been laid to rest, the boys led the way round the Garden, which we encircled, coming back to the huge old tamarind tree at the entrance, and pausing there for the end of the service.
It was Tara who led the unaccompanied singing, helped by a younger sister. Neither of them faltered. God’s grace was seen in all those who are women now (some of them grey-haired)—Chellalu, Lola, and Leela, Preena, Suseela, Rukma, and too many more to mention.
At seven o’clock we gathered once more in the House of Prayer to sing of the Heavenly Country, where many of our Family are now, safe at Home forever.
None of the graves in God’s Garden is marked by a headstone. Only one is marked at all. Under the old tamarind is a stone table for the pleasure of some of Amma’s friends, the dear birds. On the pedestal is inscribed a single word, AMMAI. It is the polite form of her mother-name. Beneath it is the date when they laid her there under the tamarind.
Bird table marking Amy’s grave.
1. Toward Jerusalem, p. 39.
2. Ibid, p. 116.
Epilogue
So she finished her course—Amy Carmichael, one of the tens of thousands of lovers of the Lord who staked everything on His faithfulness. Her life is another case in point of how grace goes to work on the raw material of individual nature. Was she a fool? Yes, for the same reason the apostle Paul was: for Christ’s sake. Were all her geese swans? Did she see stars where the rest of us see nothing but mud? Yes, they were and she did. Was she therefore deluded? Our answer must take into account that some are able to see the image of Christ in ordinary people and radiance in common things, while others cannot see either (His loved children or that pervasive radiance) as anything but common. Which are the more deluded?
“The unspiritual man simply cannot accept the matters which the Spirit deals with—they just don’t make sense to him, for, after all, you must be spiritual to see spiritual things. The spiritual man, on the other hand, has an insight into the meaning of everything, though his insight may baffle the man of the world.”1
Our enemy and God’s is always busily at work distorting our vision, throwing confusion into our minds lest we see the glory that God is waiting to show us in everything that makes up our lives—the people we love, our homes, our work, our sufferings. Deep things he makes us believe are shallow, high things low, our deep hunger for the transcendent a will-o-the-wisp. Look for proofs, he whispers. Where are the proofs? Let’s have statistics. Did it work? Was she real? Is it true? The questions are valid ones. They cannot be ignored, nor can they be answered finally except in the realm where faith operates, the Unseen. We may and we must look at the visible, but let us remember that there is far more to be taken into account. We may not always insist on visible corroborations, for they don’t tell the whole story. The gold, silver, and precious stones may be in safe deposit where we can’t get at them.
Often as I sat at her writing table in the Room of Peace, studying the carved mottoes on the walls, fingering the tattered and stained logbooks, I wondered about these things. I heard the bells from the House of Prayer, the distant voices of children, the jingle of a bullock bandy. In front of me on the tiled floor were four marks where her bed had stood. Amy had been in the presence of the Lord for more than thirty years. The room was not a museum, the compound had not been turned into a memorial park. The place was alive. Work was being done.
Will “the work” last? In Dohnavur, no. The logbooks will crumble. The House of Prayer can’t be everlasting. The children grow up and go. There will be an end to it. We may draw up a list of known results, but our criteria are restricted. What were the longterm effects in the lives of India and around the world? Some are visible. God knows the rest. None but He knows the steadiness of her obedience, the unseen struggle, the hidden offerings, the quality of faith.
If there should appear in the twentieth century one who was truly holy, a missionary who actually believed in the word of the Master and the worth of the assigned task, a Christian who never served Mammon, who, though human and failing, nevertheless kept a sense of the glory and dignity of having been redeemed and called by God—if such a person should appear, would we say “Away with him! Crucify him!”? Not out loud. There are other ways of banishing those who, because they live out the Truth, make us uncomfortable. We can deny the possibility of purity. We can refuse to tolerate superiority. If we are tempted to recognize them as true heroes, we can bolster our self-esteem by pulling them down to our level.
Was Amma “more human” when she sinned (or was sick or lonely or Victorian) than when she prayed, wrote a poem, rescued a child? All are human, the latter perhaps essentially more so in that she therein fulfilled her God-given destiny.
Make us Thy labourers,
Let us not dream of ever looking back,
Let not our knees be feeble, hands be slack,
O make us strong to labour, strong to bear,
From the rising of the morning till the stars
