During my nearly one week in India, I have been impressed that there is more than one India. In her architecture and old buildings, one sees an India that must have been magnificent. Now covered with soot and shrouded in smog are wonderful old buildings that take you back to another era. But crowded around this old India is the India of today. The masses of people lining the streets, crowding the intersections, pushing, shoving, and winding their way through the mobs.

In the drive from Delhi to Agra, I felt ricocheted back and forth from one India to the other. At one point in our journey, we stopping for a moment and were overtaken by a man with a trained monkey, hawkers selling trinkets, and beggars rapping on our windows. I looked to the side and a man with a turban came along, put his basket on the ground and began playing a flute. He asked me for money. I ignored him. After a few minutes, he took off the lid and a cobra sprang up looking at me. I tried my best to ignore him, but it's hard to ignore a cobra staring at you while a turbaned man sits on the ground in his pajamas and plays his flute. Sheila Massey was sitting beside me giving advice. "Just ignore them or you'll have to give them money. We don't want to encourage this kind of activity." I looked straight ahead, but sneaked a glance sideways periodically. Now the man is petting the cobra. "Don't worry," Sheila remarked calmly. "The cobra has no fangs or poison. It's all for show."

As we entered Agra, on our way to the Taj Mahal, I was completely overwhelmed by the masses of people. Having lived in Asia for so many years, I thought I was immune to feelings of being over-crowded. Every inch of space, it seemed, was filled with a person lying on a cot, squatting on the sidewalk, leaning against a tree, eating, talking, watching a child play in the dirt, or doing nothing at all. The roads were filled with bikes, cars, buses, rickshaws, and people trying to cross from one side to the other. It seemed there were thousands of them. We wound down a few narrow, dirty streets, onto a wider street, and entered into the gates of the Taj complex. After parking the car, walking past the camel carts



and approaching the entrance gate, I realized we were stepping into the other India. The India of legend, grace and grandeur. The India of magnificent history, art, and architecture.

I remember having the same feeling on Tuesday that I had when I first visited Rome, turned a corner and there was the Colosseum. Or when I was in China, driving up the road, coming around a mountain, and there was the Great Wall. My first glimpse of the Taj Mahal was through a large gate made of red sandstone. The contrast was striking.




Stepping through the gate, there it sits. A mute monument to one of the greatest love stories of all time. I looked for a few moments, thinking it felt strangely familiar, yet brand new all at the same time.


This is the India I wish I could have seen generations ago. One can only imagine what it was like. Remnants of another era stand in silent watch over the hordes of people just outside the gate.

Inside the walls, it's easy to suspend the reality of life beyond the gate. Driving home, this was the India that I was overwhelmed with. This is the India of today. The teeming masses looking helpless and hopeless. Looking into the crowds, I asked Sheila, "Does it ever overwhelm you?"

"Oh yes, everyday," she replied.

My mind was drawn to Matthew 9:36: "And seeing the multitudes He felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and downcast like sheep without a shepherd."

That's the feeling I was left with Tuesday night. Overwhelmed by the past. Overwhelmed by the present. Overwhelmed by the need. I was reminded yet again that only God could meet the needs of these people.

Two Indias . . . one past and one present. The past is for the history books. The present, however, is filled with need and opportunity to bring God's glory to a people who desperately need Him.