Doug Nichols tells of his experience in missions:
When I finished Bible school, the school had to put me in special tutoring class. They tutored me through school because I could not read well, or study well, and then could not do things. I applied to 30 different missions. I wanted to be a missionary. I felt God calling me to Him and people would say, "Ah, forget it, you'll never be able to be a missionary." I applied to 30 different missions, finally one accepted me on a trial basis.
For two years, I went to India with the group called Operation Mobilization and I was so excited on being with these Indian believers, these leaders because Indians taught me, train me in ministry. Indians did train me, and as we were down south in India, they would teach me how to preach and how to give gospel tracts and how to share the gospel. I was so excited. And I was preaching one day, I began to cough, cough and it got worse and worse and they discovered that I had tuberculosis, very serious tuberculosis.
We had no money so I had to go into a government TB center, and I was so discouraged. The only reason they let me in was because someone died that day and they let me have his bed. They didn't even change the sheets. I'm in a corner and I'm discouraged at that filthy, smelly, people dying all around, no money, only one meal a day. So I thought at least I can go from bed to bed and distribute gospel tracts.
I started going from bed to bed and people would look at this tract and look at me and they tear it up and they throw it back in my face. Because they didn't like this American taking the place of an Indian in the TB sanctuary. So nobody would talk to me, everybody would treat me badly, I couldn't even give out tracts. Most people can at least give out tracts. I couldn't even do that effectively. So I went to sleep that night very discouraged.
About 2:30 in the morning, I woke up, coughing. Do you think that God has anything to do with our sickness? Do you believe in the sovereignty of God? I woke up at 2:30 coughing and as I was coughing trying to catch my breath from the tuberculosis. I looked across on the other side of the room and one of the patients was trying to get out of bed. He would get out of bed, he'd take a few steps and had fall back in bed. He get out of bed, take a few steps and fall back. He was so weak he could not walk that he laid down in bed and I heard him cry. I didn't know what's going on, I couldn't speak the language, I couldn't ask what's wrong, I'm sick, he's sick. But he begin to cry, well, I went back to sleep.
I woke up the next morning and I knew what had happened. He was simply trying to get up to go to the toilet. But because he was so weak, he couldn't get to the toilet. So he went to the toilet in his bed and the stench was so bad and people were upset and the other people were yelling at him. One threw a tea cup and threw it at him. When the nurses come in to change the bed, one of them slapped him in the top of the head. Terrible!
That night we went to bed again. And again, at 2:30 in the morning, I woke up coughing. As I coughed, I looked across the aisle and there was the old man and he was trying to get out of bed again. I knew now what was happening. But I did the same thing that many of you would, I began to reason. This was not my responsibility. Why don't the Indians take care of themselves? Let the Indians take care of themselves! Besides, where are the nurses? Where are the doctors? How come they're not taking care of this old man? But he was still trying to get out of bed to go to the toilet and nobody was helping him and I remembered a verse.
I memorized it a year before, "He that knows the right thing to do and does not do it to him it is sin." And so I knew I had to do something, reluctantly, not with any joy, I walked across to the other side of the room, he'd already laid back in bed and he was crying. He knew what was going to happen and I tap him on the shoulder and his eyes came to open and with fear and I said something you know, I smiled at him and I just put this arm under his back and this arm under his legs and I picked him up. I was weak but I was not weak like him. And I stumbled down the hallway and into the corner and to this filthy, filthy toilet. And then, I'm sensitive to bad smells and filthy and I held him and he relieved himself. And when he finished, I picked him up and took him into my arms again and took him back to his bed and as I lay him down on his bed, my face was near his and he kissed right here, kissed me right there. He said something in Maliala that I didn't understand.
I went back to my bed and collapsed with fatigue and immediately went to sleep. About 5:00 in the morning, I felt a tap on my shoulder and I opened my eyes and there was a man with a cup of steaming hot chai. I thought, what is this? Breakfast in bed? He gave me the tea and stepped back and opened his hands like a book. He indicated he wanted a gospel tract. Now, isn't that something? The day before they're tearing it up, now, they're coming to my bed with tea and asking for a gospel tract. Wow, I wonder what happened? And I gave him a gospel tract, I was so excited.
About a few minutes later, another patient came to my bed, and another patient, and another patient. By 10:00 that day, 350 patients either came to my bed asking for my tract or sending someone else to get one for them. And for the next several weeks or months, I'm not sure how many of those people turn from sin to the Savior because of the gospel. But you know what opened the door? Something that any of you could have done, simply taking an old man to the bathroom, open the door to all these people to come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ and you could do the very same thing.
