The dying Hindu boy - Jacob’s Story
I was born in a strong Hindu traditional family in 1971. When I was 21 days old, my parents took me to the Hindu priest and named me after a Hindu god. On the same day my mother took a very hot needle and she burned my forehead and dedicated me to a Hindu god. Every Friday, we used to worship 120 idols in our home.In 1978, when I was 7 years old, I was dying with leukaemia. My parents spent all the money they had trying to get me cured. Eventually they joined me in the government hospital. After 48 days, the head doctor of the hospital came to my bed. After seeing all the medical reports, he said to my mother, “You son is going to die within two or three days. So you better leave the hospital.”
So the doctor sent us away from the hospital. My parents took me to the bus station and we tried to go home. But by then we didn’t have enough money for the journey home. So we only travelled half way and stopped at a village where we have some relatives.
That night we heard the sound of some preachers at a Christian gospel meeting in the village. When my mother heard the sound of the gospel meeting she asked, “Who is this they are speaking about? I’ve never heard this name, ‘Jesus’, before.”
My mother took me to the Christian’s meeting. She was holding me wrapped in her sarong because I was too weak to walk. At the end of the meeting the Christians prayed for me. After the meeting my mother took me back home and laid me on my bed. She slept beside me because I was on my death bed and about to die.
That night I was struggling to breathe. I laid my hands on my chest and I was breathing heavily. I felt I was about to die. I tried to speak, to tell my mother I was about to die but I could not speak. I was took weak even to open my mouth.
Then I saw a man come into the room. At first, I thought it was my father. The man came to my side and took my hand. He got me out of bed and we walked a little way. He sat on a rock and then asked me, “Son, what is your name?”
I told him my name and told him that my parents gave me the name of a Hindu god. Then he laughed and said, “Son, this is not your name. Then he opened a book and showed me three letters in our language - Ja-Co-Bo. I read it to mean “Jacob”.
Then he took a glass and poured something in it and gave it to me to drink. I took the glass and I drank it. Then he laid his hand on my shoulder and he said, “Son, you will not die. Go back.”
I turned from him to go back to my bed. As I did I turned back to him and said, “Sir, would you please tell me your name so I can tell my parents who you are?”
Then he look me in the eyes and said, “I am Jesus.”
The next thing I remember, I opened my eyes and my mother was sleeping at the side of my bed. I forgot about my blood cancer. I jumped up from my bed and began shouting, “Mum! Mum! Jesus came to my bed! Jesus came to my bed!”
My parents woke up and were shocked that I could move. They thought I would die the very next moment. They said, “What is happening with you? Are you dying?”
I said, “Mum, no! I am not dying! Jesus came to my bed.” They began touching me, checking my temperature. They said, “What has happened to you? You haven’t walked for the last six months. You were just skin and bone but now you’re walking like a healthy boy!”
Then I told them about how I met Jesus in the night. That very night, we all walked down to the Christian Pastor’s house. The Pastor told us all about Jesus from the gospel of John. After he told us about Jesus the three of us knelt down in front of the Pastor. We told him we repent of our sin and we want to receive Jesus into our hearts. We went back home and told our relatives. But they were very angry and they rejected us from our caste.
In India we have a very strong caste system. They beat us up and punched us and excommunicated us from the caste for 12 years. All our relatives left us but Jesus never left our family.
Today, Jacob travels across India telling people about Jesus. In the early days, he would walk hundreds of miles, barefoot, to remote villages to tell people about the Jesus who came into his life.
He is often beaten for being a Christian but nothing stops him.
He is now the director of a thriving organisation that shows the love of Jesus through orphanages, leper colonies, schools for poor children. His organisation has dug hundreds of wells across India to bring clean water to suffering people.
He has founded a Bible college and sends Indian missionaries across his homeland to tell of the God he found that night as a boy. Countless lives have been touched and saved physically and spiritually through the life of Jesus in this one man.