During this semester, at Christ for the Nations, I was required to read a missionary biography for a missionary class called God’s Global Purpose. Out of a selection of 24 or so books, I felt I should read about Hudson Taylor and chose the book To China With Love. Discernment on which book would be best really came in handy as this book impacted me greatly, especially with the direction I am headed.
As I am headed to be a missionary, I had a seed planted in my heart to be like Mr. Taylor in several areas. Written by Taylor himself, the book communicates a message of enduring, steadfast, persevering faith in God for all that He does. Taylor’s reliance on God for just about everything was astounding. Taylor did not hesitate to believe that all God did was good. He scribbled these small poems in his book:
Ill that God blesses is our good,
And unblest good is ill;
And all is right that seems most wrong
If it be His sweet will.
They who trust Him wholly
Will find Him wholly true,
Oh Lord, how happy should we be
If we would cast our care on Thee
If we from self would rest;
And feel that heart at One above,
In perfect wisdom, perfect love,
Is working for the best!
He knew there was provision for whatever God told him to do. He believed that God would never let him go without the things he needed to survive and preach the Gospel. Taylor was also a mobilizer for missions. He knew that many people just had this selfishness about them to stay home and live the life they so long to, sprinkling God wherever they want to. Now this is nothing against people who necessarily stay at home and never see the mission field in their lifetime, but more-so the people who don’t want to go on the mission field or support missions with their own finances. The truth is that more people are needed to stay back in their own homes to support missionaries than the need for missionaries themselves. However, many people do not even support missions altogether, missing one of the biggest things God wanted us to do, go to all the people groups of the world and preach the Truth. Hudson’s point comes across:
On Sunday, June 25th, 1865, unable to bear the sight of a congregation of a thousand or more Christian people rejoicing in their own security, while millions were perishing for lack of knowledge, I wandered out on the sands alone, in great spiritual agony; and there the Lord conquered my unbelief, and I surrendered myself to God for this service.
After Hudson’s spent many a year in China doing Kingdom work, he came back to his home country of England to start mobilizing people.
We need to get ourselves up and go! Whether we support people or physically go ourselves, we need to help spread the word in some form or fashion. Nearing the end of this telling of Taylor’s life, a remark by an at-the-time new converted Christian, who was previously a Buddhist, rings out in my soul. He simply asked how long the Christians knew of this Good News before coming to him.
“What?!” Said he, amazed. “Is it possible that for hundreds of years you have had the knowledge of these glad tidings in your possession, and yet have only now to come to preach it to us? My father sought after the truth for more than twenty years, and died without finding it. Oh, why did you not come sooner?”
A whole generation has passed away since that mournful inquiry was made; but how many, alas, might repeat the same question today? More than two hundred millions in the meanwhile have been swept into eternity, without an offer of salvation. How long shall this continue, and the Master’s words, “to every creature,” remain unheeded?
This number of two hundred million souls was attained over one hundred years ago. Imagine how many more have perished since then and are perishing today? And what are we doing about it all? Things need to change regarding missions in the church. There’s no doubt that if we all helped out in this, we could do more than we imagined.
The harvest here indeed is great, and the laborers are few, and imperfectly fitted without much grace for such a work. And yet grace can make the few and feeble instruments the means of accomplishing great things—things greater than we can even conceive.
Something needs to be done. I am willing to lay down my life to do that something.