Amy Carmichael December 16, 1867- January 18, 1951

Amy Beatrice (a.k.a. Wilson) Carmichael (December 16, 1867–January 18, 1951) was a Protestant Christian missionary in India, who opened an orphanage and founded a mission in Dohnavur. She served in India for fifty-six years without furlough and authored many books about the missionary work.

She was born in the small village of Millisle in Northern Ireland to devout Presbyterians, David and Catherine Carmichael and was the oldest of seven children. After her father's death, she was adopted and tutored by Robert Wilson, cofounder of the Keswick Convention. In many ways she was an unlikely candidate for missionary work. She suffered neuralgia, a disease of the nerves that made her whole body weak and achy and often put her in bed for weeks on end. It was at the Keswick Convention of 1887 that she heard Hudson Taylor speak about missionary life. Soon afterward, she became convinced of her calling to the same labour.

Initially Amy travelled to Japan for fifteen months, but she later found her lifelong vocation in India. She was commissioned by the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society. Much of her work was with young ladies, some of whom were saved from forced prostitution. The organization she founded was known as the Dohnavur Fellowship. Dohnavur is situated in Tamil Nadu, just thirty miles from the southern tip of India. Under her loving guidance, the fellowship would become a place of sanctuary for more than one thousand children who would otherwise have faced a bleak future. In an effort to respect Indian culture, members of the organization wore Indian dress and the children were given Indian names. She herself dressed in Indian clothes, dyed her skin with coffee, and often travelled long distances on India's hot, dusty roads to save just one child from suffering.

In 1931, Carmichael was badly injured in a fall, which left her bedridden much of the time until her death. Amy Carmichael died in India in 1951 at the age of 83. She asked that no stone be put over her grave; instead, the children she had cared for put a bird bath over it with the single inscription "Amma", which means mother in the Tamil.

Amy Carmichael's work also extended to the printed page. She was a prolific writer, producing thirty-five published books including His Thoughts Said . . . His Father Said (1951), If (1953), and Edges of His Ways (1955). Best known, perhaps, is an early historical account, Things as They Are: Mission Work in Southern India (1903).



Quotes by — Amy Carmichael

"Bare heights of loneliness...a wilderness whose burning winds sweep over glowing sands, what are they to HIM? Even there He can refresh us, even there He can renew us."

"Can we follow the Savior far, who have no wound or scar? "

"Thou art the Lord who slept upon the pillow, Thou art the Lord who soothed the furious sea, What matters beating wind and tossing billow If only we are in the boat with Thee? Hold us quiet through the age-long minute While Thou art silent and the wind is shrill : Can the boat sink while Thou, dear Lord, are in it; Can the heart faint that waiteth on Thy will?"

"I wish thy way. And when in me myself should rise, and long for something otherwise, Then Lord, take sword and spear And slay."

"Blessed are the single-hearted, for they shall enjoy much peace. If you refuse to be hurried and pressed, if you stay your soul on God, nothing can keep you from that clearness of spirit which is life and peace. In that stillness you will know what His will is."

"You can give without loving, but you cannot love without giving."

"It is a safe thing to trust Him to fulfill the desires which He creates"

"We profess to be strangers and pilgrims, seeking after a country of our own, yet we settle down in the most un-stranger-like fashion, exactly as if we were quite at home and meant to stay as long as we could. I don't wonder apostolic miracles have died. Apostolic living certainly has."

"Give me the Love that leads the way The Faith that nothing can dismay The Hope no disappointments tire The Passion that'll burn like fire Let me not sink to be a clod Make me Thy fuel, Flame of God"



BY AMY CARMICHAEL (many reprinted by Christian Literature Crusade, Fort Washington, PA):

1895 From Sunrise Land
1901 From the Fight
1901 Raisins
1903 Things As They Are
1906 Overweights of Joy
1908 Beginning of a Story
1909 Lotus Buds
1914 Continuation of a Story
1916 Walker of Tinnevelly
1917 Made in the Pans
1918 Ponnammal: Her Story
1920 From the Forest
1921 Dohnavur Songs
1922 Nor Scrip
1922 Ragland, Spiritual Pioneer
1923 Tables in the Wilderness
1924 The Valley of Vision
1924 Mimosa
1926 Raj
1928 The Widow of the Jewels
1929 Meal in a Barrel
1932 Gold Cord
1933 Rose from Brier
1934 Ploughed Under
1935 Gold by Moonlight
1936 Toward Jerusalem
1937 Windows1938
1938 Figures of the True
1938 Pools and the Valley of Vision
1939 Kohila
1941 His Thoughts Said...His Father Said
1943 Though the Mountains Shake
1948 Before the Door Shuts
1950 This One Thing
1955 Edges of his Ways


Various compilations:

1982 Candles in the Dark
1982 Thou Givest…They Gather
1986 Learning From God
1991 You Are My Hiding Place
1992 Mountain Breezes
1993 Whispers of His Power
1996 A Very Present Help
1997 God's Missionary (revised edition)


ABOUT THE LIFE AND TIMES OF AMY CARMICHAEL:

Elliot, Elizabeth, A Chance to Die: the Life and Legacy of Amy Carmichael. Grand Rapids, MI: Fleming H. Revell