Colossians 1:9-13 – “For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives,so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light.For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”

This week’s Fierce Love message is titled “At the Master’s Feet”, in which we showcased the life of Sadhu Sundar Singh.Sundar Singh was a Christian leader/missionary in India, and he did most of his ministry in his homeland of India, and also as a missionary to Tibet. The inspiring aspect of his life was that once he had an encounter with Jesus, nothing was ever the same again, for that salvation experience was immediately translated into surrender, and love for others. During his ministry, Sundar was known to have had incredible moments of prayer, where the Lord Jesus would engage him and give him visions, and also filled his heart with a love for the lost.Sundar also experienced miraculous interventions from the Lord, where the Lord would save him from physical harm, and also perform wonderful healing miracles during his ministry.One account that is particularly fascinating is during one of his evangelistic trips, he was thrown into a well by the local Tibetan Lama who was determined to put Sundar to death.Here’s the account of this miraculous rescue:

With a deep determination to make the name of Christ known in this hostile country the Sadhu continued his work, knowing that sooner or later bitter persecution would be his lot. At a town called Rasar he was arrested and arraigned before the head Lama on the charge of entering the country and preaching the Gospel of Christ. He was found guilty, and amidst a crowd of evil-disposed persons he was led away to the place of execution. The two favorite forms of capital punishment are being sewn up in a wet yak skin and put out in the sun until death ends the torment, or being cast into the depths of a dry well, the top being firmly fastened over the head of the culprit. The latter was chosen for the Sadhu.

Arrived at the place he was stripped of his clothes, and cast into the dark depths of this ghastly charnel-house with such violence that his right arm was injured. Many others had gone down this same well before him never to return, and he alighted on a mass of human bones and rotting flesh. Any death seemed preferable to this. Wherever he laid his hands they met putrid flesh, while the odor almost poisoned him. In the words of his Savior he cried, “Why hast Thou forsaken me?”

Day passed into night, making no change in the darkness of this awful place and bringing no relief by sleep. Without food or even water the hours grew into days, and Sundar felt he could not last much longer. On the third night, just when he had been crying to God in prayer he heard a grating sound overhead. Someone was opening the locked lid of his dismal prison. He heard the key turned and the rattle of the iron covering as it was drawn away. Then a voice reached him from the top of the well, telling him to take hold of the rope that was being let down for his rescue. As the rope reached him he grasped it with all his remaining strength, and was strongly but gently pulled up from the evil place into the fresh air above.

Arrived at the top of the well the lid was drawn over again and locked. When he looked round his deliverer was nowhere to be seen, but the pain in his arm was gone, and the clean air filled him with new life. All that the Sadhu felt able to do was to praise God for his wonderful deliverance, and when morning came he struggled back to the town, where he rested in the serai [a fortified or walled village] until he was able to start preaching again. His return to the city and his old work was cause for a great commotion. The news was quickly taken to the Lama that the man they all thought dead was well and preaching again. (Adapted from the book “Sadhu Sundar Singh” by Mrs. Parker)

Sundar was made captive by Christ’s love for the people, and he had this longing to see the people of India and Tibet come to know Jesus as he had.

Today, read and pray through the passage in Colossians 1, asking that the Lord would fill you so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord, who has rescued us from the dominion of darkness into the kingdom of the son.

-GK