Category Archives: Missionary Anecdotes

The Conversion of Adoniram Judson

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This is something I wrote for our ladies’ ministry booklet. I thought you might enjoy it, too.

I have been rereading To The Golden Shore by Courtney Anderson, a biography of Adoniram Judson, America’s first missionary. He has one of the most…I hate to use the word “thrilling” salvation stories, because every saved sinner’s story is thrilling, and a conversion isn’t more or less genuine based on the drama involved. However, the way the Lord brought this young man to Himself has me on the edge of my seat even though I know the story well. Plus, I have known people in much the same situation as Adoniram, and the obvious hand of God in his life gives hope and encouragement that He is at work drawing them as well, bringing them to the influences and people through whom He can work in their lives.

Adoniram had been raised in a strict Congregationalist pastor’s home in the late 1700s. There was never any indication that he didn’t believe: everything outwardly indicated his lifestyle was in line with what he had been taught all his life. When it was time for him to go to college, his father chose one where he was sure his son wouldn’t be led away from sound doctrine.

Adoniram had a brilliant mind which evidenced itself early in life and which God later used in translation work. He did excellently at college. He fell in with some friends who were Deists, who “rejected all revealed religion…. All the Deist admitted was the existence of a personal God.” They believed the Bible as well as other religions’ texts were only the work of men and that Jesus “was not the Son of God except in the sense that all men are” (p. 33. 38). One of his best friends who had much influence on him was free-thinking Jacob Eames.

When he graduated and came home, he felt he could not just quietly go along with the family’s beliefs and practices any more. He broke the news to his parents that he had chosen a different way. His father tried to reason with him. “Very shortly he realized with dismay that every argument he advanced was being met by two better ones. Not for nothing had Adoniram been valedictorian of his class. Exposing the fallacies of his father’s syllogisms was child’s play. Point by point, with crushing finality, he demolished every thesis his father set out to prove…So far as logics and evidence went, Mr. Judson had to concede…He still knew he was right, but he could not prove it” (p. 38). His mother’s tears seemingly had little effect, either.

Adoniram had decided he wanted to go into the theater and perhaps become a playwright, so he left home and made his way to New York.

He happened to arrive during a very quiet time for the theater, He couldn’t find work, and then when he did find a theater troupe that hired him, the morals of the group appalled him.

He left to travel some more and ended up at an uncle’s home during the time a visiting young preacher was filling in for him. He and this young man of God “spent several hours in conversation. Adoniram was struck by the fact that, although his host was as pious as his father, there was a warmth, ‘a solemn but gentle earnestness,’ in his speech which kindled an answering warmth in the heart. To be a devoted minister it was not necessary, it seemed, to be austere and dictatorial like the Reverend Mr. Judson. Adoniram rode away in the morning deeply impressed. …The young minister…would [not] experience the pain of Adoniram’s inner conflict. He was at peace with himself” (p. 42).

Later in Adoniram’s travels, he came to a country inn, looking for a room for the night. The only available room, the innkeeper explained apologetically, was next to a young man who was dying. Adoniram assured the innkeeper that was all right, but through the night, he heard the sounds from the next room, and his thoughts were greatly disturbed considering what might happen after death.

The next morning as Adoniram checked out, he asked about the young man and learned that he had indeed passed away. For some reason he asked the young man’s name, and was startled to hear it was Jacob Eames.

Adoniram was stunned. Though shocked and saddened at the loss of a dear friend , especially one so young, even more disturbing were the thoughts that his beliefs could possibly be wrong. Was his friend even now experiencing “the unimaginable torments of the flames of hell — any chance of remedy, of going back, of correcting, lost, eternally lost?” “For already, this moment, Eames knew his error — too late for repentance” (p.44).

He wasn’t converted immediately, but he did realize that no one but God could have orchestrated all of the events since he left home, that they weren’t mere coincidence: the unexpected conversation with young preacher, the failure and disappointment of his plans in New York, and his ending up in a room in an inn next door to his dying friend. He felt he must learn more.

He went home where, soon afterward, two leading Congregationalist pastors came to visit his father to discuss a new theological seminary. They spent several hours talking with Adoniram. He “made an instant impression on [them]. His personality was ingratiating, yet without false humility. His mind was of the finest order. He already knew more theology than many theological students. He was open to conviction. He understood that he must undergo inner regeneration before he could look forward to faith and personal salvation. But clearly this was not to be accomplished in a few hours of argument. The very qualities that made the boy so worth saving made him hard to save. Yet the visitors felt almost at once that if he could find conviction he could become a minister such as had not been seen since the days of Whitefield and Jonathan Edwards” (pp. 47-48).

Eventually “they suggested that Adoniram enroll in the new seminary, where he would have the materials he needed to study to make up his own mind, and the counsel of some of the best theologians in the country” (p. 48). He was enrolled “as a special student — not as a candidate for the ministry” (p. 48). He began his studies: “under Dr. Pearson, he began to read the sacred literature in the original [languages]. At the same time he began to thrash out his theological doubts with Professor Woods, who turned out to be fully his match as a dialectician” (pp. 49-50).

He “felt no blinding flash of insight,” but by November he “began to entertain a hope of having received the regenerating influences of the Holy Spirit,” and December 2 “made a solemn dedication of himself to God” (p. 50).

Peace Child

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I first encountered Peace Child by Don Richardson several years ago in the Reader’s Digest Book Section. I cut it out and kept it, but the pages aren’t stamped with the month and year like some magazine pages are now. When I was in college I also saw a film based on the book at Mission Prayer Band. I bought a new copy of the book after learning that these events took place in Indonesia, “next door” to where a missionary worked whom we supported.This missionary knew Don and some of the people he ministered to.

In the early 1950s, many tribes in the jungles of Indonesia were totally unevangelized and virtually untouched by the modern world. Though “primitive,” they were not at all unintelligent: they had developed many skills for living in the jungle and had many legends and elaborate rituals ripe with meaning that had developed over the years. The Sawi, whom Don Richardson came to work with, were headhunters and cannibals, as were many of the other tribes. The Lord opened the doors for these people to accept the missionaries through their thinking at first that white people (whom they called Tuan) weren’t quite human, though they knew they were different from the spirits; through rumor that the Tuan could “shoot fire” (with guns), and through gifts the missionaries brought of such things as axes, which could fell a tree in four strokes, whereas the hand-made stone axes required about 40 strokes.

Three communities or villages settled around the new Tuan. Don spent hours listening to them, learning their language and their customs, and trying to tell them of God’s truth about creation, the entrance of sin, the promise of Deliverer, and the life of Christ. But the Sawi weren’t used to listening to tales about other cultures and grew bored…until Don’s narrative got to Judas. They listened intently to the story of Judas’s close relationship with Christ and his betrayal. They whistled with admiration. In their culture treachery and deception were virtues, the admirable stuff of legends. They valued not just cold murder, but the “fattening with friendship” of an unsuspecting victim, then delighted in telling about the look of astonishment on his face when he realized they were about to kill and eat him. They thought Judas was the hero of the story. Don was astonished and chilled and tried to explain that the betrayal was evil, that Jesus was the Son of God. But he couldn’t get through. Don and his wife Carol knew that God had some way to reach this culture and “set [themselves] to hope for some revelation.”

The next day fighting broke out between the different villages. That day and in the days to come, Don urged peace. Sawi villages usually kept some distance from each other, and Don realized that by having three villages come together to settle near him, the villagers were constantly being provoked to battle. Finally he felt that he should leave and settle somewhere else so that the Sawi would not end up destroying themselves. The Sawi protested they did not want Don to leave. Discussions were touched off and leaders from both factions came to Don to assure him they would make peace.

The next day, the Sawi groups solemnly gathered. Don witnessed, to his amazement, a man from each of the warring groups bring one of his own children, with the mothers weeping, and exchange the children. Those in one group who would accept the child as a basis for peace were called to come and lay hands upon him, and the process was repeated in the other group. Then each child was taken to his new adoptive home. In a culture of violence and treachery, “at some point the Sawi had found a way to prove sincerity and establish peace…If a man would actually give his own son to his enemies, that man could be trusted.”

Don was horrified that his call for peace had caused this to happen, but soon began to see the parallels between the Sawi “peace child” and God’s sacrifice of His own Son. He began to tell them that Jesus was God’s own Peace Child to all men. Judas lost his status as hero because harming a peace child was one of the worst things someone could do. They began to see the inadequacy of their “best,” because peace in their culture only held as long as the peace child lived. When he died, old animosities could revive. But because Jesus rose again and was eternal, the peace He gave could never die.

It took many months for understanding and conviction to sink in, and even then they were afraid of angering the demons by departing from tradition. But when God enabled Don and Carol to revive a Sawi tribesman who was near death, the Sawi took this “as proof that the tuan’s God was powerful” and many began to believe.

Eventually more than half of the Sawi became believers, their language was reduced to writing, they were taught to read, the New Testament was translated, and some of the Sawi became teachers to their own people. Praise the Lord!!

As I have written before, some will criticize any attempt of other cultures to contact or influence primitive tribes. But, really, just as in the case of the Waodani, if no one had stepped in, the Sawi would most likely have eventually ceased to exist, because each treacherous act of one group against another would set off a series of revenge battles with many more being killed. The Richardsons were careful not to try to impose a Western church upon the Sawi culture.

Recently I searched for a copy of the film I saw of Peace Child so many years ago. I found and ordered a DVD of it and just rewatched it. I am amazed at how much of the story they packed into a 30-minute film. I can’t express what it does to my heart to see former cannibals at the end of the film singing gospel songs.

I would warn that the first several pages of the book describes a pretty ghastly deception and murder of one man to show by example what the Sawi culture was like. It is not gratuitous but it is graphic. I think this book would be perfectly suited for reading as a family or a class as well as for personal reading, but parents and teachers might want to preview that chapter to determine its appropriateness for the age level and personalities of their children. But I think anyone who reads it will get a glimpse into a missionary’s journey through adjustment to a different culture, perplexity in determining how best to share the gospel, the darkness of a culture without the Lord, and the amazing way God opens hearts and understanding to His truth. Stories like this are a part of the glorious fulfillment of the day John prophesies in Revelation 7:9-10: “After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands; And cried with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb.”

Booking Through Thursday: Gold Medal Reading

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I haven’t done a Booking Through Thursday for a while, but today’s question intrigued me:

First:

  • Do you or have you ever read books about the Olympics? About sports in general?
  • Fictional ones? Or non-fiction? Or both?

And, Second:

  • Do you consider yourself a sports fan?
  • Because, of course, if you’re a rabid fan and read about sports constantly, there’s a logic there; if you hate sports and never read anything sports-related, that, too … but you don’t have to love sports to enjoy a good sports story.
  • (Or a good sports movie, for that matter. Feel free to expand this into a discussion about “Friday Night Lights” or “The Natural” or whatever…)

To answer the second question first, I am not a sports fan in general. In fact, I have had to wrestle through some negative feelings about sports. I don’t have an athletic bone in my body and P.E. was always my valley of humiliation in school. Even in friendly church games I didn’t miss the rolling of eyes, sighs of exasperation, or the nearly knocking over of people (myself and others) by the more competitive who were trying to get the shot they were sure we’d miss (and then they’d wonder why I decided to just sit on the sidelines and watch…) And in small schools, sometimes the athletes and their fans form the “in crowd” and everyone else is just “out.” And any involvement in sports these days just seems to take over a family’s time and life.

But I did come to see that there could be many benefits to sports. There are the obvious physical benefits, of course, and the learning to work together in team dynamics, learning to win or lose with grace, learning to stretch yourself in various ways. My oldest son’s very first baseball coach was a teddy bear of a man with an encouraging style who always brought home spiritual illustrations: I can remember his giving out team trophies and reminding them that, as special as those trophies were now, someday they would gather dust in the attic, and encouraging them to “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Matthew 6:19-21).

And there is just something about the Olympics that draws me, particularly the gymnastics and swimming at the summer games and the ice skating at the winter ones.

And, as the question indicated, I can enjoy a good sports story even though I am not generally a sports fan. One of the first I specifically sought out was the story of Pete Maravich after seeing clips of an interview with him on 20/20 that were being replayed after his death. I had heard several celebrities who professed to some kind of faith but whose lives didn’t reflect it, and my first impression of Pete was that he seemed thoroughly genuine. I found his auto-biography, Heir to a Dream, published about a year before he died. It told how he was groomed to be a basketball player (with a basketball tucked into his childhood bed at night rather than a teddy bear), his rise to fame, the realization that sports and glory don’t satisfy, and how he came to know the Lord.

Another favorite sports-related book was the biography of Eric Liddell, the runner made famous in the film Chariots of Fire. He was a believer and refused to run on Sunday during the 1924 Olympics in Paris. Because of that he missed the race he trained for and he was put into another — and won the gold medal and broke a world record. Just before the race, a masseur has passed to him a piece of paper on which was written 1 Samuel 2:30, “Those who honor me I will honor.” Eric later became a missionary to China. The Japanese took over the mission where he was stationed during WWII and he and other missionaries as well as children from the China Inland Mission Chefoo school were held at the Weihsien Internment Camp, where he later died of an inoperable brain tumor. The particular biography I read was not very well written, so I won’t mention it here as there are others which I am sure are better, but another book which tells of Eric in the prison camp is called A Boy’s War by David Michell, who was a child in the Chefoo school during this internment.

Other favorites were Comeback and When You Can’t Come Back by Dave Dravecky, the baseball player whose career came back but then ended after a tumor in his shoulder. I had seen an interview with him on 20/20 as well and was inspired to read more.

When it comes to sports films, one of my favorites is The Rookie with David Quaid based on the true story of pitcher Jim Morris.

Green Leaf in Drought

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In 1950, Arthur and Wilda Mathews and their 13 month old baby, Lilah, traveled to Hwangyuan, China. China had fallen to Communism, and other missionaries were leaving, yet the Chinese church had invited them to come, with the approval of the Communist government. They felt this was a miraculously opened door God would have them go through.. Yet, when they arrived, they could sense that all was not well. The Christians pastors who met them were strained, and they discerned that between the time of their invitation and arrival, the Chinese learned that association with the white people would be a liability under Communism, not a asset. The Mathews thought perhaps then that, if they could not be a help to the church, they could endeavor to evangelize the unreached Mongols in the area and nearby. They had a few weeks in which to minister, but soon found that they were restricted in ways they could help. They endeavored to set up an inn with which to reach the Mongols, but Chinese troops took it over the day before it was to open. Arthur protested, but soon found it would have been wiser to have said nothing. In two days a policeman came to the mission compound to announce that no one there could do village work without permission, and the white people were forbidden everything: they could not have meetings outside the compound, they could not give out tracts or dispense medicine. They were restricted to the mission compound.

They finally decided that since they were more of a hindrance than a help, they would apply for exit visas. They thought, since the government did not want them, they would be allowed to leave quickly, and so gave away or sold dishes, curtains, etc., keeping just the bare minimum to function until they could leave. Arthur was summoned to the police station and asked to sign a statement that he was for world peace. He had heard of another missionary having to sign some document before leaving, so he signed without thinking much of it. The government official then asked what contribution Arthur was then willing to make toward world peace, outlining a plan in which Arthur would go to India and essentially be a Communist spy. Arthur realized that the Communist definition of world peace was a world dominated by communism, and of course could not consent.

A government official called Arthur in and promised his exit visas if he would do something for them, like write a report of five other missionaries. At first Arthur did write glowing reports of the missionaries in question, but someone told him he dare not turn that in: the Communists would change what he had written but keep his signature. So Arthur threw his report in the fire and told the official he could not be a Judas. The official then told him that he could have given him a pass, if he had cooperated, but now a charge had been laid against him which must be investigated, and “investigations take a long time.”

Thus began a two and a half year ordeal. Their provisions from their mission were frozen by the government, which made Arthur submit a report of what he would need, and then they doled out to him much less than what the report said he needed. Every victory they mentioned in a letter seemed to be immediately challenged by the enemy of their souls: once when they wrote what a blessing Lilah was, she then came down with scarlet fever, and they almost lost her. All of them had turns being ill. Eventually they were told that no one could speak to them, and they could only leave home to draw water from the creek and get food.

They wrestled with the “what-ifs” and the frustration of what they called “second causes,” finally coming to the conclusion that they had to trust that the Lord was in control and had them there for a reason, though it was hard to discern that reason when they were so restricted. Yet the Lord did use them even when they could not speak to the people. The few weeks they had had to minister before restrictions set in, people knew their hearts and saw their love. When the Mathews could no longer speak openly, the people saw them in tattered clothes, persecuted, attacked by illness without much medical aid, laughed at, jeered, humiliated, doing menial, degrading work just to survive, tantalized by the government offering release and then not giving it or doling out money that was theirs in the first place. They saw the Lord provide miraculously for them in many ways. Yet more than that, they saw them endure graciously and joyfully until, finally, the Mathews became the last CIM missionaries to leave China.

How the Lord provided for them and ministered through them in unexpected ways are some of the most exciting parts of the book Isobel Kuhn wrote of their story titled Green Leaf in Drought. She says,

But most amazing of all was their spiritual vigour. Whence came it? Not from themselves: no human being could go through such sufferings and come out so sweet and cheerful. As I was in a small prayer meeting… one prayed thus: ‘O Lord, keep their leaf green in times of drought!’ I knew in a moment that this was the answer. Jeremiah 17:8: “He shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit.” That was it! There was an unseen Source of secret nourishment, which the Communists could not find and from which they could not cut them off…That is needed by all of us. Your drought may not be caused by Communism, but the cause of the drying up of life’s joys is incidental. When they dry up — is there, can we find, a secret Source of nourishment that the deadly drought cannot reach?…Is it possible for a Christian to put forth green leaves when all he enjoys in this life is drying up around him?

The answer, by God’s grace, is yes!

Poetry Friday: To a Waterfowl

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I have always enjoyed poetry, but I have neglected it in recent years. I have enjoyed seeing Poetry Friday selections at Findings and Semicolon, but this is my first time to participate.

I probably first read William Cullen Bryant’s poem “To a Waterfowl” in college, but the first time it really stood out to me was when Elisabeth Elliot quoted some of these stanzas in her book The Savage My Kinsman after her husband’s death.


Whither, ‘midst falling dew,
While glow the heavens with the last steps of day,
Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue
Thy solitary way?

There is a Power whose care
Teaches thy way along that pathless coast,–
The desert and illimitable air,–
Lone wandering, but not lost.

Thou’rt gone, the abyss of heaven
Hath swallowed up thy form; yet, on my heart
Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given,
And shall not soon depart.

He, who, from zone to zone,
Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,
In the long way that I must tread alone,
Will lead my steps aright.

As a young wife then I empathized with Elisabeth’s picking up and going forward in the comfort of God’s care after the loss of her husband and was comforted with the thought that, if the Lord should ever ask me to “tread alone,” He would lead me and care for me, too. Even within 28 years of marriage, there have been many days of treading alone while my husband traveled, and I have been comforted to know that I am never truly alone.

The rest of the poem, which describes Bryant’s observation and thoughts of the bird’s activity, can be found here along with some instructive links. Becky’s Book Reviews is hosting Poetry Friday today.

“Thy Calvary stills all our questions.”

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The following is excerpted from Rose From Brier by Amy Carmichael, a book compiled from letters she wrote to those in the hospital on the Dohnavure compound after she herself had been bedridden and in pain for many years. This is from the chapter “Thy Calvary Stills All Our Questions.”

Yet listen now,
Oh, listen with the wondering olive trees,
And the white moon that looked between the leaves,
And gentle earth that shuddered as she felt
Great drops of blood. All torturing questions find
Answer beneath those old grey olive trees.
There, only there, we can take heart to hope
For all lost lambs – Aye, even for ravening wolves.
Oh, there are things done in the world today
Would root up faith, but for Gethsemane,

For Calvary interprets human life;
No path of pain but there we meet our Lord;
And all the strain, the terror and the strife
Die down like waves before his peaceful word,
And nowhere but beside the awful Cross,
And where the olives grow along the hill,
Can we accept the unexplained, the loss,
The crushing agony – and hold us still.

Children who love their Father know that when He says, “All things work together for good to them that love God,” He must mean the best good, though how that can be they do not know. This is a Why? of a different order from that of the little mosquito. It is immeasurable greater. It strikes at the root of things. Why is pain at all, and such pain? Why did God ask Satan the question which (apparently) suggested to the Evil One to deal so cruelly with an innocent man? Why do the innocent so often suffer? Such questions generally choose a time when we are in keen physical or mental suffering, and may (the questioner hopes will) forget our comfort. They seize us like fierce living things and claw at our very souls.

Between us and a sense of the pain of the world there is usually a gate, a kind of sluice gate. In our unsuffering hours it may be shut fast. Thank God, it is shut fast for tens of millions. But let severe pain come, and it is as though the torture in us touched a secret spring, and the door opens suddenly, and straight upon us pour the lava floods of the woe of a Creation that groans and travails together….

O Lord, why?

…I have read many answers, but none satisfy me. One often given is our Lord’s to St. Peter: “What I do thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know hereafter.” And yet it is not an answer. He is speaking there of something which He Himself is doing, He is not doing this. “Ought not this woman whom Satan hath bound be loosed?” That was always His attitude toward suffering, and so that blessed word is not an answer to this question, and was not meant to be.

There are many poetical answers; one of them satisfied me for a time:

Then answered God to the cry of His world:
“Shall I take away pain,
And with it the power of the soul to endure,
Made strong by the strain?
Shall I take away pity that knits heart to heart,
And sacrifice high?
Will you lose all your heroes that lift from the fire
White brows to the sky?
Shall I take away love, that redeems with a price,
And smiles at its loss?
Can you spare from your lives that would climb unto mine
The Christ on His cross?”

But, though, indeed, we know that pain nobly born strengthens the soul, knits hearts together, leads to unselfish sacrifice (and we could not spare from our lives the Christ of the Cross), yet, when the raw nerve in our own flesh is touched, we know, with a knowledge that penetrates to a place which these words cannot reach, that our question is not answered. It is only pushed farther back, for why should that be the way of strength, and why need hearts be knit together by such sharp knitting needles, and who would not willingly choose relief rather than the pity of the pitiful?

No, beautiful words do not satisfy the soul that is confined in the cell whose very substance is pain. Nor have they any light to shed upon the suffering of the innocent. They are only words. They are not an answer.

What, then, is the answer? I do not know. I believe that it is one of the secret things of the Lord, which will not be opened to us till we see Him who endured the Cross, see the scars in His hands and feet and side, see Him, our Beloved, face to face. I believe that in that revelation of love, which is far past our understanding now, we shall “understand even as all along we have been understood.”

And till then? What does a child do whose mother or father allows something to be done which it cannot understand? There is only one way of peace. It is the child’s way. The loving child trusts.

I believe that we who know our God, and have proved Him good past telling, will find rest there. The faith of the child rests on the character it knows. So may ours, so shall ours. Our Father does not explain, nor does He assure us as we long to be assured… But we know our Father. We know His character. Somehow, somewhere, the wrong must be put right; how we do not know, only we know that, because He is what He is, anything else is inconceivable. For the word sent to the man whose soul was among lions and who was soon to be done to death, unsuccored, though the Lord of Daniel was so near, is fathomless: “And blessed is he whosoever shall not be offended in me.”

There is only one place we can receive, not an answer to our questions, but peace — that place is Calvary. An hour at the foot of the Cross steadies the soul as nothing else can. “O Christ beloved, Thy Calvary stills all our questions.” Love that loves like that can be trusted about this.

Does anyone know this poem?

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Some years ago I heard a dear older missionary read a poem about going back to the field, and it had the recurring line, “I’m going back. Are you?” I’ve tried googling that line and other search possibilities, but I can’t find it. Has anyone else heard of it or know any more about it?

With all our feebleness

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Two glad services are ours,
Both the Master loves to bless.
First we serve with all our powers —
Then with all our feebleness.

Nothing else the soul uplifts
Save to serve Him night and day,
Serve Him when He gives His gifts —
Serve Him when He takes away.

C. A. Fox

With my mother-in-law’s moving here plus my husband and I both reaching the half-century mark, I have been thinking a lot about aging and the decline of our strength and abilities. And though originally this post was just going to be about aging, I realized many of the principles also apply to those who are affected by illness or injury.

I discovered the above poem in Amy Carmichael of Dohnavur by Frank. L. Houghton preceding the last section of the book which told about Amy’s final years. After spending most of her adult life as a missionary in India, she suffered a fall which rendered her an invalid for twenty years. She remained in India. It is remarkable that these days most mission boards would send an invalid missionary home, yet Amy continued to have a ministry there.

In the early days after my TM diagnosis, though I wasn’t a complete invalid, in my “down” times I would think of the word “invalid,” meaning someone who is ill to the point of not being able to function, and change the accent to the second syllable to mean something that is not longer valid, or in other words, useless. Invalids can feel invalid. But they are not. God has a purpose for every person on the planet.

Our culture tends to glorify youth and vigor. But “God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty” (I Corinthians 1:27) and to showcase His strength (II Corinthians 12:8-10).

Elisabeth Elliot wrote in A Lamp For My Feet:

But my limitations, placing me in a different category from… anyone else’s, become, in the sovereignty of God, gifts. For it is with the equipment that I have been given that I am to glorify God. It is this job, not that one, that He gave me.

For some, the limitations are not intellectual but physical. The same truth applies. Within the context of their suffering, with whatever strength they have, be it ever so small, they are to glorify God. The apostle Paul actually claimed that he “gloried” in infirmities, because it was there that the power of Christ was made known to him.

If we regard each limitation which we are conscious of today as a gift–that is, as one of the terms of our particular service to the Master–we won’t complain or pity or excuse ourselves. We will rather offer up those gifts as a sacrifice, with thanksgiving.

I used to think, “Lord, I could serve you so much better without these problems.” But it’s as if He were saying, “No, this is what I am using to shape your service for Me.” As life changes, either through illness or aging, we need not lament what we can’t do any more. We can seek God’s will for what to do now.

As I wrote earlier, sometimes God’s purpose for our decline is that other people might learn and grow by ministering to us. This is hard to accept, because we don’t want to trouble them, we don’t want to be an inconvenience, we don’t want to need that kind of help. But graciously accepting that kind of help can be an example and a blessing to others.

My mother-in-law and I were discussing some of the…indignities of aging and wondering why the Lord allowed people to have to go through those kinds of things. Of course, our bodies are affected by the effects of the Fall of man and the entrance of sin in the world, one of those effects being decline and death. But years ago I heard one preacher say that our bodies fall apart as we age to make us willing to let loose of them. We have such a strong instinct of self-preservation, of wanting to live to see our children grow up, then our grandchildren, etc. But God can use the gradual decline of our bodies and their functions in order to wean us away from this world, to remind us that this body is just a temporary tabernacle, and to set our minds on getting ready for heaven.

Titus 2:3-5 tells us that older women are to teach the younger a multitude of things. I don’t think this always has to be in a classroom setting. It can be, in our culture, but at the time it was written there probably were not such things as seminars and retreats for women. But by their example and specific opportunities to say a word or give a testimony or share something learned along the way of life, older women can both teach and model those characteristics mentioned in Titus.

Psalm 71:16-18 says, “I will go in the strength of the Lord GOD: I will make mention of thy righteousness, even of thine only. O God, thou hast taught me from my youth: and hitherto have I declared thy wondrous works. Now also when I am old and greyheaded, O God, forsake me not; until I have shewed thy strength unto this generation, and thy power to every one that is to come.”

That’s our ultimate purpose: to show forth His strength and His power.

Psalm 78:2-8:

2 I will open my mouth in a parable: I will utter dark sayings of old:

3 Which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us.

4 We will not hide them from their children, shewing to the generation to come the praises of the LORD, and his strength, and his wonderful works that he hath done.

5 For he established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children:

6 That the generation to come might know them, even the children which should be born; who should arise and declare them to their children:

7 That they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments:

8 And might not be as their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation; a generation that set not their heart aright, and whose spirit was not stedfast with God.

Whom God Has Joined

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Next to reading the Bible, reading missionary books has had the greatest impact on my Christian life. Isobel Kuhn‘s books have been among the greatest of those to me. She has a very readable style and is quite honest and open about her faults and foibles, but her books are also laced with humor.

By Searching was subtitled My Journey Through Doubt Into Faith and describes just that. She had grown up in a Christian family yet wasn’t truly saved. When a professor at college condescendingly told her she only believed because that was what her parents told her, she realized he was right, and thoroughly let herself go into the “worldly” activities she hadn’t been allowed to pursue. This book traces her journey to true faith in Christ and her first steps in her walk with Him. In the Arena is not exactly a sequel, but it highlights certain experiences in her life that showcased God’s working.

kuhn.jpgBut the book of hers I want to talk about today is Whom God Has Joined. It was originally titled One Vision Only, and the main part of it was Isobel’s own writings of her relationship with her husband, John, and sandwiched in-between biographical remarks by Carolyn Canfield. It has been long out of print and was just reprinted not too long ago without Canfield’s part.

It begins with their first notices of each other and the attraction they felt despite their determination not to get “sidetracked” by the opposite sex.

As they got to know one another and grew in affection, John graduated from college first and went to China. At first they were interested in different areas of China, but the China Inland Mission assigned him to the area she was interested in. When he wrote to propose, she knew what her answer would be, yet she spread the “letter out before the Lord” with a problem. She wrote, “John and I are of very opposite dispositions, each rather strong minded. Science has never discovered what happens when the irresistible force collides with the immovable object. Whatever would happen if they married one another? ‘Lord, it must occur sooner or later. Are You sufficient even for that?’” The verse the Lord gave her was Matthew 6:33: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.”

Isobel was assigned and sent to China where they were to be married. One of the first problems they faced was that there were two ladies with very different personalities who each took charge of “helping” the young couple with their wedding plans — and neither plan was what the young couple wanted. God enabled them to very graciously navigate that situation without offending either party.

Isobel wrote in a very engaging way that lets us know missionaries are “of like passions” as we are. We feel like we are right there with her feeling what she is feeling. She not only had the adjustments of marriage but the adjustments of a new culture. Though she was ready and willing for both, sometimes it still threw her for a short while. One example was in her natural “nesting” as a new wife. The CIM way was to live directly with the people as they did, and Isobel was willing for that. She did have a few things to pretty up her home a little bit — nothing extravagant. She was excited to receive her first women guests, and as she began to talk with them, one blew her nose and wiped the stuff on a rug; the other’s baby was allowed to wet all over another rug. Isobel knew that they were not being deliberately offensive: those were just the customs of the country people in that time and place. Yet, naturally, resentment welled up and she had a battle in her heart. She wrote, “If possessions would in any way interfere with our hospitality, it would be better to consign them to the river. In other words, if your finery hinders your testimony, throw it out. In our Lord’s own words, if thine hand offend thee, cut it off. He was not against our possessing hands, but against our using them to holds on to sinful or hindering things.”

In their early marriage they had disagreements over the couple who were their servants (in primitive cultures it was not unusual for missionaries to employ helpers for the many tasks that would have taken up so much time). They were not only lazy, but helped themselves to some of the Kuhn’s own things. John was slower to see it because he had always gotten along fine with them before he was married. At one point when Isobel brought up something the man had not done, hoping for John to correct him, John instead sided with him against her. Angry and resentful, Isobel walked out of the house, not caring where she went, just to get away from it all. Gradually she came to herself and realized she was in a little village as darkness was nearing. In that time and culture that was not done: “good women were in their homes at such an hour.” She felt as if the Lord were saying to her, “You have not considered Me and My honor in all this, have you?” and then convicting her that she had not even invited Him into the situation. She confessed that was true, asked Him to work it out, and went home. And He did.

Isobel was more artistic and exuberant by nature, and once when she was telling a story she mentioned that it was “pouring rain.” John corrected her, saying it was “merely raining.” She was indignant that her story was being interrupted by such a minor detail and said, “I didn’t stop to count the raindrops.” He replied that that was just what she should do. He felt she exaggerated and wanted to break her of it. He began “correcting” her prayer letters and stories and began to use the catch-phrase, “Did you count the raindrops?” It was discouraging and distressing to her and she felt it had a stilted effect on her writing. She tells how over time the Lord used this to help her husband appreciate his wife’s gift of imagination and expression and helped her to be more accurate. She comments,

Similar situations are not uncommon among all young couples. If we will just be patient with one another, God will work for us…Until the Lord is able to work out in us a perfect adjustment to one another, we must bear with one another, in love…With novels and movies which teach false ideals of marriage, young people are not prepared to ‘bear and forbear.’ They are not taught to forgive. They are not taught to endure. Divorce is too quickly seized upon as the only way out. It is the worst way out! To pray to God to awaken the other person to where he or she is hurting us, to endure patiently until God does it: this is God’s way out. And it molds the two opposite natures into one invincible whole. The passion for accuracy plus a sympathetic imagination which relives another’s joys and sorrows—that is double effectiveness. Either quality working unrestrained by itself would never have been so effective. But it cost mutual forgiveness and endurance to weld these two opposites into one! Let’s be willing for the cost.

With humor and poignancy Isobel tells of further challenges and adjustments in the midst of ministry and growing love for each other and growth in the Lord.

Book Review: Never Say Can’t

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Some years ago I read a book called Never Say Can’t about a missionary who didn’t feel he had much natural ability but who determined that he would do whatever God called him to do and not make excuses, trusting God for the ability. In fact, he and his wife made a little ceremony of burying the word “can’t.” I couldn’t remember their names or the author’s, but I remembered that incident.

I was excited to find a used book by the same title and ordered it — but it’s not the same book. 🙂 It was an enjoyable read, though.

never-say-cant_.jpgThis Never Say Can’t by Jerry Ballard was about a missionary with the same motto, Thomas Willey, who ministered in Panama and Cuba. Rather than recapping the whole story, I want to just touch on a few things that stood out to me.

He had had to quit school,early to help take care of his family. Later when he felt called to preach he knew he needed to go to Bible college. He had been a hard worker and had saved money to go. But he was so out of touch academically that when the registrar asked him how many credits he had, he said, “How much do I need, sir? I have money in the bank and my credit is good as gold.” The ripple of laughter from the other students nearby caused him to realize he was missing something. Tom later wrote, “Who could forget the amazement on the dean’s face when he realized that he had an ignoramus on his hands, a young man past 20 who wanted to go to college yet couldn’t work fractions and had no knowledge of grammar or spelling.” The registrar asked to meet with him privately and told him he would have to take a lot of background courses in the academy before he could start college and that it would be a long, hard haul. Tom knew God had called him and settled in to work hard.

When Tom began missionary work with Indians in the jungles of Panama, “He knew civilization wasn’t their primary need. White man’s civilization without Christ would simply replace their primitive sins with more sophisticated ones. He only wanted to share his Savior.”

His first experience on the mission field came just after college, where the students had been experiencing a wonderful revival. He thought the mission field would be even more of a revival, but within just a few hours sensed “strange tensions” among the missionaries with whom he was assigned to work. He became a sounding board for both sides. “What shocked Tom was the inability of those involved to maintain spiritual victory over their emotions, to forgive in love and to forget.” After a few months “he became more sympathetic as he realized the strange drain which life in a continually threatening jungle environment could be to one’s spiritual resources. How easy it was to become so busy with mission affairs that prayer and Bible reading were neglected, and one became introverted and self-centered through the constant fight for survival.” After two years on that field he left 20 lbs. less, underweight, and “backslidden …himself due to his frustration in seeking to be a reconciling force among his co-workers.”

In the zealousness of youthful Christianity, when I first heard of missionaries having trouble getting along, I was similarly shocked. I thought surely any group of godly people shouldn’t have that problem. Well..after a little more maturity and experience, I’ve realized that any group of Christians can have trouble getting along. If that happens to us here, we shouldn’t be surprised it happens to people on the mission field, especially with the additional stresses they are under. That is an area we should pray for them more — grace and getting along with each other’s faults, foibles, differing ideas of how things should be done, etc.

Another area that stood out to me was the account of the rise of Communism in Cuba. Evidently Castro did not present himself as a Communist at first — there was none of the usual rhetoric or slogans. He was seen as a great liberator from an oppressive government. There is some disagreement as to whether he was really a Communist all along or whether he just chose that political line in order to “institutionalize his revolution.” The missionaries had been sympathetic to the revolutionaries, but had to make “late-hour course corrections to cope with another anti-Christian influence.” Though some of the soldiers themselves had originally seemed friendly to the missionaries, repression began.

Before repression became too bad however, Mr. Willey attended the trials of those deemed war criminals, then asked and was granted permission to visit those condemned to die before the firing squad. “The rebel authorities were impressed with Pop’s obvious concern for the spiritual needs of the condemned men.” Many of them had never heard the gospel. One told him, “Had we had this teaching, none of us would now be in this sad state. Please preach this in the streets, in the country, in the cities. This is the only hope for Cuba!”

Many believed. It was hard to see spiritual newborns put to death so soon after their conversion. “Pop,” as he was known, then took the dead men’s belongings to their families and was able to share the comfort of the gospel with them as well. Though God vitally used him in this way, the experience “took a heavy physical and emotional toll…He was never to be quite the same again.”

It wasn’t long before the missionaries had to leave Cuba. They found a ministry to exiled Cubans in Florida and in speaking to churches to stir up missionary interest. Eventually they ministered back in Panama.

Near the end of the book when the author recorded Tom’s death and the viewing and funeral, I thought he perfectly captured the mixed emotions one feels at the death of a Christian loved one: “Sorrowful because of earth’s loss. Joyful because of heaven’s gain. Awkward because of the paradox of extreme grief and extreme joy mingled in a single sensation.”

Even though this wasn’t the book I was originally looking for, I am glad I read of this servant of the Lord.