Mamita

V. Raymond Edman was a missionary to the Quichua Indians of Ecuador from 1923 to 1928. Later he was president of Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois, until his death in 1965. He tells this story of an angel encounter.

After our marriage in the capital city of Quito, we were given our first assignment in a city whose environs had thousands of Quichua-speaking Indians. We lived on the outskirts of that city where we could reach both the Spanish-speaking citizens on the streets and in the marketplaces, and also the shy, suspicious Indians who passed our doorway on the way to market.

Our assignment was a difficult one. The people were quite unfriendly; some were fanatical in their bitter opposition to our presence in their city. On occasion, small crowds would gather to hurl insults, punctuated by stones both large and small. As a result it was often difficult to get the bare necessities of life--fruits and vegetables or charcoal for the kitchen stove. Added to these physical factors was an inward sense of human loneliness.

Whenever we were not in the front part of the house, we kept the gate locked with an iron chain and padlock. There was constant danger that some bare-footed stranger would tiptoe into an unoccupied room and depart with more than he had come with.

One day as we were eating our mid-day meal, we heard a rattling at the gate as though someone were asking for admission. I excused myself from the table and went to the porch. I saw an Indian woman standing outside the gate. She had reached one hand inside through the bars and was knocking on the chain with the padlock. Quickly I went down to inquire what she might want. She was no one I had ever seen before.

As I approached the inside of the gate she began to speak softly in the mixture of Spanish and Quichua that was typical of the Indians who lived fairly close to the town. Pointing to a Gospel verse we had put on the porch she inquired, "Are you the people who have come to tell us about the living God?"

Her question startled me. No one had ever made that query before. Therefore with surprise I answered, "Mamita (little mother, the customary term for a woman of her years), yes, we are."

Then she raised the hand that was still inside the locked gate, and began to pray. She prayed for the blessing of God upon the inhabitants of this home. She asked that we have courage for the service committed to us, that we have joy in doing God's bidding, and prayed that many would hear and obey the words of the Gospel. Then she pronounced a blessing from God upon me.

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