James Hudson Taylor (1832 – 1905)
Christian missionary to China in the Methodist tradition, and founder of the China Inland Mission (renamed as Overseas Missionary Fellowship, OMF International in 1964).
I am in great straits for funds. I am happy about it. The Lord may take away all our troublesome people through it and give us true-hearted ones instead.
There is great danger of not, in happiness, finding our delight in the Lord.
Consider six or eight hours a day sacred to the Lord and His work, and let nothing hinder your giving this time (to language study and practice) till you can preach fluently and intelligibly.
I . . . know how much easier it is to lean on an arm of flesh than on the Lord; but I have learned too how much less safe it is.
On September 13, 1888, Jonathan Goforth, famed Canadian pioneer Presbyterian missionary to China, made his first exploration tour of North Honan. Honan was considered one of the most anti-foreign and dangerous parts of China. Yet God had called Goforth to it. Hudson Taylor wrote him, “We have been trying, unsuccessfully, for ten years, to get into Honan. We’ve been beaten, stoned, and turned back time and again. Brother, if you would enter that province, you must go forward on your knees!
I said, ‘You are now placed in a position to help the Chinese as you have never been before. They see that your being a foreigner is now no protection, but increases your danger. Let them see that you are rejoicing in God . . . that you do not need any other protection and that you do not go away, although you might; that you put your trust in God, and are prepared either to suffer or be delivered as He sees best, will learn that there is something in the Gospel worth risking life for.’ What was the result? In almost every place where there were native Christians they grew (in spiritual maturity) as never before.
We wish to see churches and Christian Chinese presided over by pastors and officers of their own countrymen, worshipping the true God in the land of their fathers, in the costume of their fathers, in their own tongue wherein they were born, and in edifices of a thoroughly Chinese style of architecture.
And he who in all things recognises himself as the servant of GOD may count on a sufficiency from GOD for all manner of need, and look with confident expectation to GOD to really prosper him in whatever he does.
You do not need a great faith, but faith in a great God.
We may fail, do fail continually, but He never fails.
China is not to be won for Christ by quiet ease-loving men and women.
I could not think that GOD was poor, that He was short of resources, or unwilling to supply any want of whatever work was really His. It seemed to me that if there were lack of funds to carry on work, then to that degree, in that special development, or at that time, it could not be the work of GOD.
I almost wish I had a hundred bodies; they should all be devoted to my Savior in the missionary cause.
Let us give up our work, our thoughts, our plans, ourselves, our lives, our loved ones, our influence, our all, right into His hand, and then, when we have given all over to Him, there will be nothing left for us to be troubled about, or to make trouble about.
How important, therefore, to learn before leaving England to move man through God by prayer alone.
It was no vain or unintelligent act when, knowing the land, its people and climate, I laid my dear wife and the darling children with myself on the altar for this service.
But God makes no mistakes; according to their service He divides the help, and those who are called to the holiest service are those who can have least assistance.
It needs the presence of special difficulties to manifest to all the workings of God’s mighty power, and for such difficulties we may and should be grateful, and not cast down.
If we are faithful to GOD in little things, we shall gain experience and strength that will be helpful to us in the more serious trials of life.
The highest service demands the greatest sacrifice, but it secures the fullest blessing and the greatest fruitfulness.