Who were the Auca Indians?
The name had not meant much to Brian before, but tonight the steaming rain forest of Ecuador was coming alive before his very eyes. He was actually seeing the dreaded Auca Indians and the five brave missionaries.
Brian leaned forward as he watched the pictures on the screen and listened to Ed McCully's father tell the story. It almost seemed that he, too, was flying with Nate Saint in that little yellow Piper, making the skillful landing on that narrow beach of the Curaray River. He watched the building of the tree house, and waited eagerly with Ed McCully, Jim Elliot, Pete Fleming, Nate Saint, and Roger Youdarian for the first Auca Indians to visit them.
Then he saw them!—dark skinned people with straight black hair and large circles of wood stretching their ear lobes almost to their shoulders. There were three of them, a man and two women. They seemed friendly, and very interested in all the fellows showed them.
Brian wondered how they liked their first hamburgers with mustard, and what the Indian called, George, thought of his airplane ride!
Darkness came, and the three Indians slipped away into the jungle. The rest of Mr. McCully's story was sad. There was the long hard waiting of the five wives for another radio message that never came. In a day or two the whole world learned of the speared bodies of the five brave fellows who had given their lives that the Auca Indians might be won to Christ.
The last picture was on the screen. It showed three of the fellows, Jim Elliot, Pete Fleming and Ed McCully up close. So close Brian felt he could almost reach out and touch them as they smiled down at him. Mr. McCully pointed to Ed and said, "My boy, Eddy, came to me one day when he was seven years old asking, `Dad, how can I be saved?' "
Brian turned quickly to his mother in the darkness and whispered, "Mother! he was just as old as I am!"
"I told Ed this story," Mr. McCully continued. "Years ago a school teacher felt he must punish five girls for their repeated misbehavior. With whip in hand he paused. Something prompted him to ask, 'Is there anyone who is willing to take the punishment these girls deserved'
"There was a long moment of silence, then a stir among the boys as slender Jimmy began to feel his way down the aisle. Jimmy was blind.
"A chair was brought, and as the blows began to fall across Jimmy's knees the giggles of the girls grew hushed. When the punishment was over they ran to Jimmy with tears to thank him, and to ask him why he had done this.
" 'It's all right, girls,' he answered, `if it will just help you to understand how the Lord Jesus took the punishment your sins deserved when He died on the cross for you!"
Eddy McCully understood that night what the Lord Jesus had done for him, and received Him as his own personal Savior. As the years went by Eddy grew to be a real fellow, tops in athletics and studies. He excelled in everything he did.
But Ed did not forget that Someone had died that he might live! When God began to show him the great need of many Indians in Ecuador who had never heard of the Savior who loved them, his heart answered, "I will go and tell them! You died for these Auca Indians, too, I will follow wherever You lead me."
That night Brian knelt and prayed aloud, as perhaps Eddy prayed years ago after his father's story, "Thank you, Lord Jesus, for dying on the cross and taking the punishment for my sins so that now I won't have to be punished for them!"
Have you ever sincerely thanked Him in this way? "He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement (punishment) of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed." (Isaiah 53:66All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53:6))