A Bible for Everyone

“You have been given freely, so give freely.” — from Matthew 10

In 1905 Ramabai asked the girls at Mukti to pray every morning that God would bring many people in India close to him, “including ourselves.” About seventy girls came. Soon hundreds were praying! One day in June, God answered in a wonderful way. Girls began to weep and pray and say sorry for things they had done wrong. Some gave back things they had taken. They were filled with joy. Teams of girls went out to pray for people all over India. Ramabai taught them that the most important sign of God’s Spirit is love.

Ramabai had one more big job. The Bible in her language, Marathi, used long, hard words. Many women in the villages could not understand it. So Ramabai began to make a new Bible, in the simple words that ordinary people spoke. She learned Hebrew and Greek, the languages the Bible was first written in. The girls at Mukti set the letters on their own printing press. She would never let her Bible be sold. It must be given away, she said, just as it had been given to her.

In 1921 something very sad happened. Manorama, her daughter, who had worked beside her for many years, became ill and died. Ramabai said, “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away, Blessed be the name of the Lord.”

Ramabai finished her Bible shortly before she died. Early in the morning of 5 April 1922, she died quietly in her sleep. She was sixty-three. A thousand girls followed as the young women of Mukti carried her coffin. People of every caste stood side by side, and an old widow cried, “O, Great Mother, Great Mother!” Mukti is still there today, caring for women and children.

Ramabai was given God’s love freely, so she gave it freely to everyone. You have been given good gifts too. Who could you share God’s love with today?

Dear God, thank you for the Bible, and for people like Ramabai who shared it. Help me to share your love freely with others. Amen.