Neighborhood Church

Amy Wilson Carmichael

God’s story is not about me but I play a vital role in God’s story.

What is my role in God’s story?

Joseph Campbell's The Hero's Journey

Ordinary World →
Call to Adventure →
Refusal of the Call →
Meeting the Mentor →
Crossing the Threshold →
Tests, Allies, and Enemies →
Inmost Cave →
Ordeal →
Reward →
The Return →
Resurrection →

in every story, the main character (or “hero”) follows a path of transformation that changes them and changes the world around them.

She let God use people and circumstances to change her and then God used her to change people and circumstances.

Dark Night of the Soul

One day we took the children to see a goldsmith refine gold after the ancient manner of the East. He was sitting beside his little charcoal fire. (A goldsmith never leaves his crucible once it is on the fire.)… In the crucible was the medicine made of salt, tamarind fruit and burnt brick dust, and embedded in it was the gold. The medicine does its appointed work on the gold, "then the fire eats it," and the goldsmith lifts the gold out with a pair of tongs, lets it cool, rubs it between his fingers, and if not satisfied puts it back again in fresh medicine. This time he blows the fire hotter than it was before, and each time he puts the gold into the crucible, the heat of the fire is increased; "it could not bear it so hot at first, but it can bear it now; what would have destroyed it then helps it now." "How do you know when the gold is purified?" we asked him, and he answered, "When I can see my face in it, then it is pure.
Amy Carmichael, Gold Cord

The word “comfort” is from two Latin words meaning “with” and “strong” – He is with us to make us strong. Comfort is not soft, weakening commiseration; it is true, strengthening love.
Amy Carmichael, Kohila: the shaping of an Indian nurse

God’s comfort doesn’t make us comfortable; God’s comfort gives us strength to keep going.

It took 55 years but Amy got to see her biggest prayer answered.

Sometimes when we read the words of those who have been more than conquerors, we feel almost despondent. I feel that I shall never be like that. But they won through step by step, by little bits of wills, little denials of self, little inward victories, by faithfulness in very little things. They became what they are. No one sees these little hidden steps. They only see the accomplishment, but even so, those small steps were taken.
Amy Carmichael