Thoughts From Amy Carmichael

Dear Friends,

Today I share the true story of a humble but strong-willed woman who profoundly influenced the lives of a whole generation of Christian people (especially women), who followed her example in pursuing missionary ministry overseas. Her name was Amy Carmichael – and lest any forget her story, I offer this semi-short blend of fact from many sources. I trust it might inspire you as well. Enjoy. 


“Amy Carmichael was born in 1867 into a devout and well-to-do Christian family in Ireland. In her teen years, she was educated at a Wesleyan Methodist boarding school, where at age 13 she trusted Christ as Savior and Lord. At 18 her father died, leaving her family in difficult financial circumstances. The family moved to Belfast, where she became involved in a ministry in the slums where she witnessed the horrendous conditions in the factories where many women and young girls worked. In conjunction with a church in the city, the ministry grew to the point of needing to construct a larger building for all the women who attended.

On one occasion she heard evangelist Dwight L. Moody preach a message on The Prodigal Son, and afterwards overheard Moody talking with a gentleman when he stopped mid-sentence. He repeated some of the words he had just preached, where the father had said to the older son, "Son, thou art ever with me and all that I have is thine." Mr. Moody said, "I never saw it before. Oh, the love of God's love. Oh, the love. God's love." Tears rained down his cheeks. Amy never forgot that spiritual truth—"All that I have is thine." It reinforced her faith that God knew her needs before she asked and wanted to supply them by faith. 

Amy received her call from God to go overseas in 1892 at the age of 24. The following year, as the first appointee of the Keswick missions committee, she went to Japan. Yet the Japanese language seemed impossible to her, and the missionary community was not the picture of harmony she had envisioned. Likewise, her health was also a problem. So, after 15 months as a missionary, Amy became convinced that Japan was not where God wanted her, so without notifying the Keswick Convention, she sailed for Ceylon. She was there only a few months when she was urgently called back to England to care for a loved one who was in critical condition.

After about one year in England, she returned overseas, this time to India, where she arrived in Madras in November of 1895, a discouraged, confused, ill, twenty-eight year old Irish woman. Soon after her arrival, she contracted dengue fever, and was sent to Bangalore since it was a healthier place to recuperate. She saw the missionary community there was very active, but there were no changed lives, and she detested meetings with the other missionary ladies who drank tea while gossiping, and showed very little concern for the eternal souls of those all around them. She felt so alone, and in her frustration she penned the following lines about the missionary community there:

“Onward Christian soldiers, 
Sitting on the mats; 
Nice and warm and cozy, 
Like little pussy-cats.

Onward Christian soldiers,
Oh, how brave are we,
Don't we do our fighting
So very comfortably?”

Amy simply did not fit into the stiff, staid, British missionary community in Bangalore and subsequently went to the very south end of India to live with another missionary family, the Walkers. They were a godly family that really understood the Hindu religion and the tremendous need of reaching out to these people. For several years Amy, along with a daughter of the Walkers and several Christian Indian ladies, began an itinerant ministry in the southern tip of India, reading the Bible to women in the scattered villages. They were dubbed the "starry cluster," for the Indians recognized the sincerity and light that shone forth from them. It was during this period of time that Amy took on the habit of wearing Indian dress, dye her skin a shade darker, and thanking God he did not answer her childhood plea that he would turn her eyes from their dark brown to blue!

In 1901 a life-changing experience took place. A little five-year-old girl, Preena (named ‘Pearl Eyes’ by Amy), was brought to her by an Indian woman. The child had been sold by the mother to the temple, and there she was being prepared and taught all the degradation of temple prostitution. Twice she had run away only to be caught, carried back, beaten, and subjected to the terrible perversion of that Hindu temple. Finally, as she was running away again at night, she met with this understanding woman who brought her to Amy, who gathered the child up into her lap and picked up a rag doll and gave it to the child to play with. It was then that she really truly understood the evil of the temple practice. Little ‘Pearl Eyes’ talked freely as she played with the doll. She told Amy things that they did to her in the temple, demonstrating them using the doll. The date was March 7, 1901. Amy never forgot that day. It was terrible beyond imagination. 

This was the beginning of her rescue of these children who had been dedicated to the temple gods, and led to the founding of the Dohnavur Fellowship. Over the years a thousand temple children were rescued and other ministries established there by the Dohnavur Fellowship in South India. In 1918, they began to rescue baby boys as well, since they likewise were dedicated to the temple gods and goddesses. Other ministries were added over the years – a hospital, schools, printing press, etc. 

Economic woes struck the world with the crash of the stock market in 1929 and support dwindled. The ministry struggled to bring in funds and Amy prayed for God to supply (just as she had read of George Mueller doing in his orphanages in England; a man she greatly admired). Not long afterward, in 1931 (at 64 years of age) Amy fell into a hole that broke her leg and severely injured her back. It left her an invalid for the remainder of her life, and she seldom left her bed following that. Yet, it was during this period of her life that she was most prolific in writing, the sales of which brought in the funds needed to keep the ministry running.

The British officials who governed India knew temple prostitution played a major part in Hinduism, and had spoken against it, but nothing ever happened. However, through the "campaigning" of Amy and some other concerned people, temple prostitution was banned toward the end of Amy's life and before her death in 1951. Amy is buried on the grounds of the mission in the garden she looked out at. From the moment Amy set foot on Indian soil, she never returned to her homeland. She labored for 55 years without a furlough. It was part of who she was; very self-effacing. In the same way she rarely ever allowed her photograph to be taken and never referred to herself by name, or even by personal pronoun, in any of her writings.” 

Oh, for more Jesus-followers with the same spirit as Amy, Pastor Jeff