Little John wasn’t very big, but he had a man-sized job. As the oldest son in his family, he had to take his father’s twenty-five cows to the river to drink. Before he would let the cows into the water, it was his job to walk into the river and to scare any crocodiles away.
So far he had never even seen a crocodile near the cows, but one day that all changed. A six-foot crocodile “bit into his arm,” and, in crocodile and alligator fashion, tried to pull him under the water.
John never could say exactly how he was able to pull away from the crocodile, grab a tree limb and make it safely to shore. But he knows that God was caring for him that day! Far away from any help that might have been looked for, a lone driver was approaching. He saw John’s father frantically waving. He stopped and picked up the injured boy and drove three hours to get him to a hospital.
For five months Johnny was cared for in that hospital, and then he was returned to his home and his old job, but without his right arm. Later he was taken to the United Sates to be fitted with a prosthetic substitute for his own arm. Later there was another, and another. The man-made devices couldn’t grow but John did! Now at six feet and five inches tall, he uses English well and is using his language skills to tell of God’s love and care for him and for anyone else who will accept that love.
His father and mother have both died since that terrible day of the crocodile, and John could now step into his heritage as the witch doctor’s son: He is entitled to be the new witch doctor for the whole village. He refuses. As he says, “My father was the witch doctor, but he couldn’t even save me from the crocodile!”
Now he plans to enter a Christian college in Tanzania where he hopes to learn more of the God who saved him from the crocodile. He wants to tell them that His love is for everyone, yes, even the witch doctor’s son! He too can spread the “good news” that “God so loved the world” that He gave the most precious gift in the whole universe to save those who will accept that gift.
Will you?