Life in Retirement
LIFE IN RETIREMENT
When the call to serve in Coimbatore came to me in 1950 we were at Palayamkottai.
We had been there for thirteen years.
I was the Archdeacon there.
We were comfortably settled in our family house.
My library was conveniently arranged for easy reference.
Our three children had just finished college or were going through it.
I was fifty-nine years of age.
I knew that my term of service in the Coimbatore Diocese would not be long.
But strangely enough the question of what would happen when I retired from service was never raised by me or by the family.
We booked two railway wagons, packed in them all our furniture, every stick and every scrap of paper '(so precious to a writer), and came to Coimbatore.
I began touring. the Diocese immediately and the family settled down.
During the eight and a half years of my service in Coimbatore, my daughter finished her training at the Christian Medical College,
Vellore as doctor, married another doctor practising in the city and both of them warmly welcomed me and my wife to live with them after my retirement.
The other two are working near Calcutta and in New Delhi; they come to Coimbatore whenever they get leave.
I am convinced that we see clear evidence of a Father's loving care in all this.
There was no argument as to where we should settle down and what we should do when we got there.
The doors opened gently but effectively to a new period of activity. Nothing else but a kindly Providence could have given us such joy and such usefulness.
We have come to realize that God will do the best for every one who fully*trusts Him.
St Paul says, "All things work together for good to them that love God'
(Romans 8:28).
As God does His best for us we should do the best for Him and for others.
I now plan only for a day at a time and even for that day I constantly ask, 'Am I doing my best for God as well as for others?'
Time is running fast.
On -what should I concentrate?
In this house in which we are now settled, there are four large glass windows facing the East.
Occasionally it is cloudy or there is
LIFE IN RETIREMENT
heavy dew but on normal days, after six in the morning, the eastern sky begins to glow with a lovely red tint and the sun slowly comes up filling the world with its glorious light. The sight of the rising sun stirs me to pray for guidance, for knowledge, for a clearer realization of God's presence in the world.
For one who is keen to write, such illumination is quite necessary.
A good deal of my time during these years of leisure is spent in praying that God might illumine my spirit; I shall then be able to help others to have a better understanding of Him and the wonderful way in which He directs the world.
I have been writing for sixty, years.
My files contain many notes and outlines of projected books.
It is a wonder they have survived my many transfers. These outlines have to be developed. *
A great deal has happened in the world during the past sixty years.
One has to keep up-to-date.
One has to know what is being thought and written today so that what one says may be of help.
Many of the books which I have accumulated through the years have become out of date.
New books have to be bought and they are so expensive.
So many thousands of them are being published every year.
I manage to read a few every month.
The arrival of the postman every day is a great event.
The material he brings keeps us in touch with the wide world and its many problems.
The papers and magazines are like so many windows through which we see the world.
The picture is most distressing and painful.
There are troubles in all parts of the world—political turmoil, economic crises, racial hatred, increase of crime, juvenile delinquency, lowering of moral standards, growing tendency to eat, drink and be happy today as tomorrow we die.
What is the Christian Church doing in the midst of these conflicts?
What are the other religions doing?
I am particularly interested to follow with care some of the powerful efforts which are being made to meet these critical conditions.
The vast evangelistic campaigns of Billy Graham and others calling for complete surrender to Christ as the beginning of a new life are certainly helping thousands of people. Our own experience in the Coimbatore Diocese on a small scale makes this clear to me.
But there are also Christian leaders who strongly feel that the message which is given by Billy Graham and Evangelists like him does not apply to the whole man.
Christianity, they say, must transform the
A. J. APPASAMY
individual as well as the Society in which he lives and works.
would like to know what is being done to implement this ideal.
Many leaders are at work re-shaping Christian thought so as to make it possible for men who believe in the scientiffe method to accept the truth of religion. The world has become much smaller than it was sixty years ago and our knowledge of other people, other religions and other cultures is becoming much clearer,
Is it possible to have one world government, one world religion? What is the significance of the various religions of the world?
What is the meaning of our Lord's commission to preach the Gospel to every creature, in the light of these new problems which have arisen?
When I began to write sixty years ago a number of us were very keen to re-think Christianity in India. Men like V. Chakkarai,
P. Chenchiah, G. V. Job, Eddy Asirvatham, S. Jesudason, R. C.
Das and others did a good deal of such thinking and writing.
Besides publishing books we wrote constantly in The Christian Patriot and in The Guardian.
As a young man I absorbed a good deal of their keenness to re-think Christianity.
After retirement I found that there had been a loss of interest in the books we had written.
There was great difficulty even in getting some of them.
Did it mean that people didn't want to part with them?
Two or three friends sent me their copies.
But now I see there is a revived interest in our efforts.
On the initiative of Dr Russell Chandran of the United Theological College, Bangalore, plans are being made to reprint some of the important books which were published with this objective.
We do not expect every reader to agree with us but we do expect him to do. some serious thinking along this line. In Theological Colleges our young men are being fed on the theology produced in Basle,
Zurich, Edinburgh, London or New York.
The theologians who write it are great men.
But the situation in which they write is quite different from the situation in India.
We need to face the problems and difficulties of people here in India.
In view of this revived interest in re-thinking Christianity my duty is to go on writing with this objective, remembering also the difficulties of the modern man.
As the years pass by I find that many of my friends are slowly passing away.
How many of them have already left us!
It seems
LIFE IN RETIREMENT
impossible to fill the gaps and yet other people are coming, some of them with a better outlook, some of them with greater energy.
I said the other day to my grand-daughter Sita, one of our five grand-children, "You are a lucky girl, you have a holiday today'.
She said, 'Why am I lucky?
You are on holiday all the time.
You don't have to go to school or office.'
In spite of what she said, my wife and I are always glad when we get the opportunity to go away to Kodaikanal every year for two or three months.
There is a complete change of occupation, with new faces and new interests, in pleasant climate.
I have been going there now for nearly seventy years during the hot weather except at the times when I have gone to other hill stations in India or to other countries.
The beauty of the mountains is my food and drink.
The Psalmist wrote: 'I will lift up my eyes unto the hills from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord which made heaven on earth' (Psalm 121:1-2).
These were favourite verses with my father and he often feasted his eyes on the lovely mountains in the spirit of the Psalmist.
The floating clouds, the tall eucalyptus trees, the many plants with lovely roses or dahlias in bloom, the fruit trees, all these take up a good deal of our time when we are there.
Friends spend more time with us when they too have their holidays.
Christian workers, particularly missionaries, from many parts of India, come there every year and so I get personal information as to what is happening in the different mission fields.
It is good to be in close touch with men and women who are actively engaged in the work of the Church and who are seeking to witness to God's love and power during the difficult conditions of today.