By Abby Aguilar –
When Jayasudha Kapoor fell into the water from the jet ski on her honeymoon, she cried out for divine intervention. Of the millions of gods in the Hindu pantheon that she could have invoked in that instant of extreme panic, which name came out? The one she didn’t know.
“I didn’t know how to swim. I involuntarily yelled out ‘Jesus’ though I was not a devotee at that time,” the Bollywood actor told The New India Express. “I had a vision of the Almighty. The next thing I knew, I was being dragged onto the jet ski by my husband.”
However, it wasn’t until 16 years later that Jayasudha embraced Jesus completely.
Jayasudha Kapoor was born into a South Indian family that was deeply entrenched in the movie industry. Her aunt was a star and director.
When she remarried in 1985 to Nitin Kapoor, they went on a honeymoon to Pattaya in Thailand. Her husband indulged in all the beach and water activities, but Jayasudha shied away because she didn’t know how to swim.
“I’m terrified of the water,” she admitted to The 700 Club.
On the last day, her husband begged her to join him on the last water sport he wanted to try, the jet ski. Reluctantly, she agreed.
There was only one life jacket, as it was a Sunday and the hotel was not fully staffed. She dutifully wore it.
As Nitin raced over the water, Jayasudha felt herself slipping off the back. She cried out to her husband, but he didn’t hear her over the din of the motor, the crash of the waves, and the whistling wind.
She slipped.
As the image of herself drowning flashed in her mind, Jayasudha could have cried out to any one of the hundreds of thousands of Hindu deities she knew.
“I thought, ‘I’m going to die,’” she recalls.
Instead, the name of the unknown-to-her Christian Savior came out of her mouth in that instant.
“When I cried out, it was Jesus Christ,” she says.
Her husband wheeled the jet ski around and picked her up.
It wasn’t until years later that Jayasudha fully came to Christ. Partly, she feared the rejection of her Hindu family.
But when she shared her plan to convert with her mom (her dad had passed away), Jayasudha was surprised by her response.
“He’s been waiting for you,” her mom told Jayasudha. “It’s time to go to the name of Jesus.”
Jayasudha won nine state Nandi Awards for her acting in works such as Jyothi (1976), Idi Katha Kaadu (1979), Premabhishekam (1981), Meghasandesam (1982), and Dharmaatmudu (1983).
She was elected to the Indian National Congress in 2009 and had a significant career as a politician. She doesn’t think it was God’s destiny for her to be a politician or an actor.
“Do you think God would have wanted me to perform song and dance sequences in films?” she told an interviewer. “God can only give us wisdom and help us when we are at a crossroads in our lives.
If you want to know more about a personal relationship with God, go here
About the writer of this article: Abby Aguilar lives in Los Angeles and studies at the Lighthouse Christian Academy.
