Christ-Bearers

I have spent my life plumbing the depths of what it means to be a Christian. I am, as of this morning, still learning. One thing I learned a long time ago is that we have to receive the life of Christ ourselves before we can live it. We have to live it before we can give it to others. Receive, live, give. The theologians call this "incarnation," and it applies as much to us Christians as it does to our Lord Himself.

Before Jesus was born, a young virgin named Mary responded to a heavenly summons and allowed God's Spirit to become flesh. She gave her body to be the chalice into which the life of God was poured. What Mary did is what you and I are meant to do, every one of us, every day, no matter where we are or what the circumstances--to carry Christ into this world. We are like chalices, empty vessels willing and ready to be filled with the life of God. Cleaned out in the process, we are poured out for others. Our lives illustrate what God is like much more by what we are and do than by what we say. We incarnate Christ by taking up our crosses and following Him, doing exactly as Jesus did when He was obedient to the Father.

The word incarnation means "taking on flesh" or "being manifested in a human body." It comes directly from two words meaning "in the flesh" or "the enfleshing." God, who is the Spirit, took on visible form for thirty-three years in the person of Jesus Christ. When Jesus died, the world could no longer see Him or touch Him. But because He gave us His Spirit when He rose from the dead and returned to His Father, Jesus made sure that the world could continue to see God in the flesh. The same Spirit that is in Him is in us Christians, "Christ in you, the hope of glory" (Colossians 1:27). Even though Jesus may have become invisible to the eyes of people in the world, you and I are quite visible to them and to each other. In us, the world may in fact see God.

When the angel went to Mary, he said, "Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you." Mary was greatly troubled at his words (Luke 1:28-29). The angelic message was alarmingly clear and Mary's response was awe--and bewilderment. When something interrupts what we are doing, most of us fret. God's message to Mary would have seemed to most engaged girls an enormous inconvenience, even a disaster. For her, it caused a moment of puzzlement (how could this be?). Then, as far as we know, she raised no objections about what would happen to her or [Joseph]. Her answer came very simply, "Be it unto me according to Thy word." Like someone holding out a cup to be filled when a drink is offered, we need to put our hearts forward right when God offers to pour Himself into us for an assignment, large or small. It's the attitude of a Christ-bearer.

Our life may seem more complicated than Mary's, but the basics are the same. We live in a continuum of visible, tangible things. We live with the washing machines that break down and the dinner that burns and bills to pay and traffic jams. It is an act of obedient surrender as you tend your small child with all his mess and endure sleepless nights and juggle your responsibilities at work and at home.

The baby Jesus would not only be fed at Mary's breast and learn at her feet, but He would one day feel the blindfold, the ropes, the lash, the thorns, and finally the blood, nails, and splinters of the cross. The Lord of the universe had taken on the body of an ordinary, vulnerable, mortal man in order that He might suffer and be totally emptied and annihilated--to bring God's life into the world. "The bread which I will give is my own body and I shall give it for the life of the world" (John 6:51). What bread do you and I have to give to the world?

We are meant to be chalices, life-bearers. As God's expression of what He is like, we become broken bread and poured-out wine. There is no greater fullness.

~Be Still My Soul, by Elisabeth Elliot, pages 7-11

Beauty is Vain - Tim Conway

I know this sounds like something intended solely for all of the guys out there, but there is much more to it than that. This exhortation contains advice for ladies too, such as traits to look for in a godly man, and how to conduct yourself in a manner that is pleasing to God. It also has some good thoughts on the importance of seeking godly counsel. I hope you are encouraged as much as I was.

Being Led

Finishing the Race

"The last days of William Carey were the best. His sun went down in all the splendour of a glowing faith and a burning self-sacrifice. Blow succeeded blow, but only that the fine gold of his trust, his humility, and his love might be seen to be the purer."

~George Smith, biographer

"With respect to myself, I consider my race as nearly run. The days of our years are three score years and ten, and I am now only three months short of that age, and repeated [illness] has weakened my constitution. But I do not look forward to death with any painful anticipations. I cast myself on and plead the efficacy of that atonement, which will not fail me when I need it."

~William Carey

"At this time I paid him my last visit. He was seated near his desk in the study, dressed in his usual neat attire; his eyes were closed, and his hands clasped together. On his desk was the proof sheet of the last chapter of the [translated] New Testament, which he had revised a few days before. His appearance, as he sat there, filled me with awe; for he appeared as then listening to the Master's summons, and as waiting to depart. I sat, in his presence, for about half an hour, and not one word was uttered; for I feared to break that solemn silence, and call back to earth the soul that seemed almost in heaven. At last, however, I spoke; and well do I remember the identical words that passed between us, though more that thirty-six years have elapsed since then. I said, 'My dear friend, you evidently are standing on the borders of the eternal world. Do not think it wrong then, if I ask what are your feelings in the immediate prospect of death?' The question roused him and he earnestly replied, 'As far as my personal salvation is concerned, I have not the shadow of a doubt. I know Whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day. But when I think that I am about to appear in the presence of a holy God, and remember all my sins and manifold imperfections, I tremble.' He could say no more. The tears trickled down his cheeks, and after a while he relapsed into the same state of silence from which I had aroused him. Deeply solemn was that interview, and important the lesson I then received. Here was one of the most holy and harmless men whom I ever knew. Whilst thus convinced of the certainty of his salvation, through the merits of that Saviour whom he had preached, yet so impressed with the exceeding sinfulness of sin, that he trembled at the thought of appearing before a holy God! A few days after this event, Dr. Carey retired to his bed, from which he never rose."

~Mr. Gogerly, close friend

John Piper--Glorifying God

"The word glorify is like magnify. Magnify has two distinct meanings. In relation to God, one is worship and one is wickedness. You can magnify like a telescope or like a microscope. When you magnify like a microscope, you make something tiny look bigger than it is. A dust mite can look like a monster. Pretending to magnify God like that is wickedness. But when you magnify like a telescope, you make something unimaginably great look like what it really is. With the Hubble Space Telescope, pinprick galaxies in the sky are revealed for the billion-star giants that they are. Magnifying God like that is worship. We waste our lives when we do not pray and think and dream and plan and work toward magnifying God in all spheres of life. God created us for this: to live our lives in a way that makes him look more like the greatness and the beauty and the infinite worth that he really is. In the night sky of this world God appears to most people, if at all, like a pinprick of light in a heaven of darkness. But he created us and called us to make him look like what he really is. This is what it means to be created in the image of God. We are meant to image forth in the the world what he is really like."

~Don't Waste Your Life, page 32

Like Grass of the Field

"As for man, his days are like grass; he flourishes like a flower of the field; for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place knows it no more. But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him." Psalm 103:15-17

"All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord remains forever." 1st Peter 1:24-25

Quote from Matthew Henry

"The best and dearest of God's saints and servants may sometimes have their lot cast in a wilderness...but even then it is our duty and interest to keep up a cheerful communion with God. When faith and hope are most in exercise, the world appears a weary desert, and the believer longs for the joys of heaven, of which he has some foretastes in the ordinances of God upon earth."

The Creator's Kindness

Every object we behold calls on us to bless and praise the Lord, who is great. His eternal power and Godhead are clearly shown by the things which he has made. God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. The Lord Jesus, the Son of his love, is the Light of the world. When we reflect upon the provision made for all creatures, we should also notice the natural worship they render to God. The divine providence not only furnishes animals with their proper food, but vegetables also with theirs. The trees of the Lord are full of sap, not only men's trees, which they take care of and have an eye to, in their orchards, and parks, and other enclosures, but God's trees, which grow in the wildernesses, and are taken care of only by his providence; they are full of sap and want no nourishment. Even the cedars of Lebanon, an open forest, though they are high and bulky, and require a great deal of sap to feed them, have enough from the earth; they are trees which he has planted, and which therefore he will protect and provide for. We may apply this to the trees of righteousness, which are the planting of the Lord, planted in his vineyard; these are full of sap, for what God plants he will water, and those that are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. Yet man, forgetful ungrateful man, enjoys the largest measure of his Creator's kindness, the earth, varying in different lands. Nor let us forget spiritual blessings; the fruitfulness of the church through grace, the bread of everlasting life, the cup of salvation, and the oil of gladness.

~Matthew Henry's Daily Readings, October 15th

Adoniram Judson part 4

THE LOVE OF CHRIST USHERED HIM INTO THE FATHERS HOUSE

Judson became critically ill in the spring of 1850 and it was believed that his only hope of recovery lay in taking a long sea voyage. A French barque, the Aristide Marie, was scheduled to sail from Moulmein on the 3rd of April. The stricken missionary was carried on board by his weeping converts. When the ship, after certain delays, sailed several days later, he was accompanied only by Mr. Thomas Ranney, a fellow missionary. On April 12, 1850, Adoniram Judson breathed his last and on the same day his body was buried at sea. Meanwhile, Mrs. Judson waited in agonized suspense for four months before learning of her husband's death.

During the last days and weeks of his earthly life, he frequently referred to "the love of Christ" -- his favorite theme, and chief inspiration. As his eyes kindled and the tears chased each other down his cheeks, he would smilingly exclaim, "Oh, the love of Christ! The wondrous love of Christ! The blessed efficacy of the love of Christ!" One day he said, I have had such views of the loving condescension of Christ and the glories of Heaven, as I believe are seldom granted to mortal men. Oh, the love of Christ! It is the secret of life's inspiration and the source of Heaven's bliss. Oh, the love of Jesus! We cannot understand it now, but what a beautiful study for eternity!

The love of Christ! The efficacy of the love of Christ! The secret of life's inspiration! The source of Heaven 's bliss! A study for eternity! Oh, the wondrous love of Christ!

Shortly before his departure to receive "a victor's crown," he expressed pleasure at the prospect of being buried at sea. It afforded, he said, a sense of freedom and expansion, in agreeable contrast with the dark and narrow confines of the grave, to which he had committed the forms of so many whom he had loved. The vast blue ocean, to which his body was committed a few days later, seemed to Adoniram Judson a beautiful symbol of the love of Christ--

Boundless in its breadth,
Infinite in its length,
Unfathomable in its depth,
And measureless in its height.

In the exigencies of death, as in the ordeals of life, Ephesians 3: 17-19 was uppermost in Judson's mind. The love of Christ cleansed his polluted heart, sanctified his ambitions, glorified his tribulations, animated all his undertakings and transformed the Valley of Shadows into the bursting dawn of eternal day.

Adoniram Judson, part 3

THE LOVE OF CHRIST ANIMATED ALL HIS UNDERTAKINGS

Judson had two master passions. One was to translate the Bible into the Burmese language so that multitudes whom he would never see could read it and hear God's voice speaking directly to their own hearts. Having mastered the intricacies of this very difficult tongue, he spent long days, weary months and exhausting years in translation. It was while engaged in this pursuit that he was dragged away to languish in prison at Ava and Oung-Pen-La. Ruffians were plundering every white man's house. What was to be done to preserve the precious manuscripts? What seemed to be a clever plan occurred to Ann: She would hide the manuscripts in a pillow! Having done this, she brought the pillow to the prison and no one dreamed that the white man's head rested at night on the most precious of treasures -- the Word of God.

Then came a crushing misfortune. Taking a fancy to the pillow, the jailer grabbed it and kept it as his own. Judson's spirit groaned within him. What an irreparable loss! But Ann's ingenuity was not yet exhausted. Having made a prettier, nicer pillow, she brought it to the prison and Judson said to the jailer, "How would you like to exchange the old, soiled pillow for this bright new one?" Mr. Spotted Face readily agreed, wondering at the odd taste of the white man. Thus the precious manuscripts were recovered. Many times, smitten down with disease and at death's door, he breathed out the prayer, "Lord, let me finish my work. Spare me long enough to put Thy saving Word into the hands of a perishing people." What a day of rejoicing it was when the Word of God came off the press with its stupendous invitation, "Whosoever will, let him take the Water of Life freely."

Judson's concern to get the gospel into the language of other tribes and nations was shared by his wife. Ann was the first missionary to learn Siamese and to translate a portion of Scripture, the Gospel of Matthew, into that tongue.

Judson had a second passion and prayer, namely, to lead individuals to know Christ in His transforming power and to live to see one hundred converts. With great tact and consuming zeal, he preached by the road side and dealt with inquirers. Years went by without a single convert, but he refused to be discouraged. When a member of the Mission Board in America wrote, deploring the lack of results, and inquired concerning the prospects, this intrepid ambassador of Christ replied, "The prospects are as bright as the promise of God." There were many disappointments, but six years of unwearied effort and fervent supplication were finally rewarded. His Journal, of June 27, 1819, gives the thrilling record. "We proceeded," he says, "to a large pond, the bank of which is graced with an enormous image of Buddha, and there administered baptism to Maung Nau, the first Burman convert. Oh, may it prove the beginning of a series of baptisms in the Burman empire, which shall continue in uninterrupted succession to the end of time!"

With a judicious admixture of gentle entreaty and stern warning, he sought one day to point out to a native woman the momentous alternatives that lay before her. Making two divergent marks on the ground, he said, "This leads to eternal life, while this leads to eternal destruction. Will you leave this straight and narrow path drawn by the Saviour's finger for that which leads to everlasting despair? Will you? Will you?"

Many years later this woman, now an earnest and active Christian, said, "Even now I can hear that terribly earnest 'Will you?' coming from the teacher's lips as though it was the voice of God." Yes, the voice of God! Many listened wistfully to the foreigner's preaching, for even their depraved hearts discerned in his message the tender and imperious accents of the voice of God.

The voice of God!
Its tenderness!
Its imperiousness!
Will you heed the tender and imperious accents of the Voice of God?

Judson frequently went on extended preaching trips to villages scattered through the jungles. As Lower Burma is a delta region with innumerable streams, he usually traveled by boat. While living at Amherst, he became exceedingly burdened for the salvation of his boatman. He frequently went to the man's house to converse with him on his favorite theme, the love of Christ, but as soon as Judson justify, the man and his wife would scrub the bamboo house to remove the contaminations caused by contact with the foreigner. As they traveled by boat from village to village, Judson had many hours in which to enlighten his unwilling auditor concerning his soul's need and to tell him of the Redeemer's love. When a trip was completed and the man asked for his wages, Judson would say, "Come to the service Sunday morning and I will pay you." Greatly impressed by the missionary's life and passionate concern on his behalf, the man eventually came to appreciate and to appropriate "the riches of love in Christ Jesus." And so it was that the erstwhile depraved and stony-hearted boatman became not only a Christian, but also a very zealous evangelist among his own people.

The desperate need of a perishing people was matched by the love of Christ blazing in the soul of Adoniram Judson. In a letter pleading for missionary reinforcements, he speaks of "the sin of turning a deaf ear to the plaintive cry of millions of immortal beings, who, by their darkness and misery, cry, day and night, 'Come to our rescue, ye bright sons and daughters of America. Come and save us, for we are sinking into hell!'"

In the year 1828 an event of vast significance took place. Having come in contact with the Karens, a race of wild people living in remote and almost inaccessible jungles, Judson longed for the opportunity of winning a Karen for Christ and thus reaching his race. This opportunity came to him through Ko Tha Byu, a Karen slave who was sold one day in the bazaar in Moulmein and bought by a native Christian, who forthwith brought him to Judson to be taught and, if possible, evangelized. Ko Tha Byu was a desperate robber bandit. He had taken part in approximately thirty murders and was a hardened criminal with a vicious nature and an ungovernable temper. Patiently, prayerfully, and lovingly, Judson instructed the wretched, depraved creature, who eventually not only yielded to the transforming power of Christ but went through the jungles as a flaming evangelist among his people. The hearts of the Karens were remarkably and providentially prepared for the reception of the gospel message by a tradition prevalent among them to this effect:

Long, long ago the Karen elder brother and his young white brother lived close together. God gave each of them a Book of Gold containing all they needed for their salvation, success and happiness. The Karen brother neglected and lost his Book of Gold and so he fell into a wretched type of existence, ignorant and cruelly oppressed by the Burmese. The white brother, however, prized his Golden Book, or Book of God, and so, when he sailed away across the oceans, God greatly blessed him. Some day the white brother will return, bringing with him God's Book, which, if the Karen people will receive and obey, will bring to them salvation and untold blessings.

Accordingly, as Ko Tha Byu went on his unwearying preaching tours through the jungles, declaring that the long-looked-for white brother had returned with God's Book, hundreds received the message with gladness.

When a depraved slave, a bandit and murderer, was brought to Judson in 1828, who would have imagined that, a century later, the Christian Karens alone would have many splendid high schools, hundreds of village schools, some 800 self-supporting churches and a Christian constituency of more than 150,000?

Being a missionary meant, to Judson, just one thing: to join with Christ in a supreme endeavor "to seek and to save the lost." He was a tireless seeker of souls and the theme of his message never varied. The following entry from his diary is typical: March 11, Lord's day. Again took the main river. Soon came upon a boat full of men. Their chief, an elderly man, stated that he had already heard much of the gospel ... We went to the shore and spent several hours very delightfully, under the shade of the overhanging trees and the banner of the love of Jesus ... The old man went on his way, rejoicing aloud and declaring his resolution to make known the eternal God and the dying love of Jesus, all along the banks of the Yoon-za-len, his native stream.

In these deserts let me labor,
On these mountains let me tell
How He died -- The blessed Savior,
To redeem a world from hell.
The banner of the love of Jesus
The dying love of Jesus!
The redeeming love of the blessed Saviour!

Answering a communication from a group of missionary candidates in Hamilton, New York, Judson warned of the danger of growing weary in preaching the gospel and of substituting other activities for the business of winning lost souls. He says: Satan will sympathize with you in the matter and he will present some chapel of ease in which to officiate in your native tongue, some government situation, some professorship or editorship, some literary or scientific pursuit, some supernumerary translation, or, at least, some system of schools; anything, in a word, that will help you without much surrender of character, to slip out of real missionary work.

If all missionaries in all lands had shared Judson's passion for souls, his vision of missionary conquest would not now be so far short of realization. In his first tract for the Burmese people, written in 1816, he included this sanguine prediction: About one or at most two hundred years hence the religion of Buddha, of Brahma, of Muhammad and of Rome, together with all other false religions, will disappear and the religion of Christ will pervade the whole world; all quarrels and wars will cease and all the tribes of men will be like a band of mutually loving brothers.

More than a century and a quarter have passed since that prediction was made. We are hastening toward the termination of the two hundred years of which he spoke and, due to the tremendous increase in population, there are more -- vastly more -- unreached and unsaved people in heathen lands today than there were when Carey inaugurated the modern missionary movement. Adoniram Judson is still the voice of God, calling us to pray, witness and sacrifice.

By the mercy of God, Judson lived not only to translate the entire Bible into the Burmese tongue, but also to see thousands pass from darkness and death to light and immortality. At the time of his death there were sixty-three churches and seven thousand converts. "In achieving these triumphs," writes Dr. Boreham, "Judson constantly adhered to his favorite theme -- the love of Christ." He seemed convinced, as Dr. Wayland intimates, that the whole world could be converted if only each individual could be persuaded that there was a place for him in the divine love.

After eight years of loneliness following the death of Ann, Judson had married Sarah Boardman and, during their eleven years of married life, eight children were born to them, three of whom died at an early age. Upon Sarah's death, Judson returned to his homeland after thirty-three years absence for his only furlough. While at home he married Emily Chubbuck, who returned with him to Burma to share the fervent labors of his closing years. The year 1850 ushered in the final epoch in the life of this hero of the Cross.

Adoniram Judson, part 2

THE LOVE OF CHRIST SANCTIFIED HIS AMBITIONS

As a student at Andover Seminary, Judson heard and read of the work that William Carey and his associates were opening up in India. This influenced him to give serious consideration to the question of foreign missions. His first conclusion was that surely the love of Christ, which had so marvelously banished the darkness from his own soul, was meant for all mankind. By day he was haunted by the vision of vast nations bound and dying in the darksome prison house of sin. By night he spent long, sleepless hours contemplating the hapless condition of teeming multitudes beyond the sea sinking into Christless graves. But it was not easy to find and accept his place in the divine program. There was a terrific struggle in his soul between his worldly ambitions and the claims of the love of Christ. Then one epochal day he went out into the woods and fell down, praying: "More than all else, I long to please Thee, my Lord. What wilt Thou have me to do?" As he prayed, he felt the presence of Jesus close beside him and heard His voice saying, "Go to the uttermost parts and preach the gospel of My love. I send you forth, like Paul, as a witness to distant nations." And; also like Paul, he rose up determined not to be disobedient to his Lord's commission.

He soon gathered around him a group of kindred spirits. Among these were four young men who had come to Andover from William's College: Samuel J. Mills, Jr., James Richards, Luther Rice and Gordon Hall. Already, while in college, these young men had taken refuge from a storm under a haystack and had solemnly dedicated their lives to take the gospel to the "far away places." But there was no missionary society to send them forth. The question which now burdened Judson and his associates was that which Paul raised, "How shall we preach unless we be sent?" In response to the challenge of these consecrated young lives, a missionary society was formed, consecrated money poured in, the necessary equipment was provided and the missionaries arranged to depart. On the 5th day of February, 1812, Judson was married to Ann Hasseltine, who was destined to become the heroic "Ann of Ava." The next day he and his fellow appointees received solemn ordination at Salem, and on the 19th the Judsons embarked on the sail ship Caravan, bound for Calcutta.

During the long voyage the Judsons changed not only their physical, but also their denominational, latitude and longitude. As the result of a protracted study of the New Testament in the original Greek, they decided to become Baptists. Upon reaching Calcutta they had blessed fellowship with the English Baptist missionaries, Carey, Marshman and Ward, and formally aligned themselves with the Baptists.

This was a serious decision. They could no longer expect support from the churches that sent them out. Would the Baptists of the United States, at that time a very feeble people, rise up to their support? Just at this critical juncture another difficulty arose. They were peremptorily ordered out of India by the East India Company, on the expectation that the missionaries would interfere with its nefarious trading practices. After a long journey to the Isle of France, they returned to India and landed at Madras. Again the East India Company ordered them to leave the country immediately, else they would be deported back to England and America. Accordingly, they embarked on the Georgianna, which Judson described as a "crazy old vessel." For three weeks they were tossed about by a fierce monsoon in the Bay of Bengal. Ann became desperately ill, and Judson expected her death momentarily. Attended only by her husband, Ann gave birth to her first baby, which soon died and was buried at sea. As they sailed into the harbor of Rangoon, Ann finally rallied. Before them lay a squalid, unspeakably filthy village, whose uncivilized life had been utterly untouched and unsoftened by western influence. The night was made terrible by the cries of the dogs and pigs fighting for the garbage littered throughout the village. That night, said Judson in a letter written soon thereafter, "we have marked as the most gloomy and distressing we have ever passed." Instead of rejoicing that at last they had reached a heathen land where they might stay and proclaim the gospel, they found consolation, he writes, "only in looking beyond our pilgrimage, which we hoped would be short, to that peaceful region where the weary are at rest." Speedy death, either from disease or at the hands of Burma's notoriously cruel officials, seemed to stare them in the face and they were sorely tempted to return to America, concluding that God had shut the door in their face. But as they prayed through the long vigils of the night, the voice of the Lord comforted them, saying, "Fear not, for I am with thee; be not dismayed, for I am thy God." Assured that their blessed Lord was with them and that their commission was still binding, they determined to go forward, whatever the cost, soothed and sustained by the constraints of divine love. They were:

Assured of their Lord's presence!
Comforted by His promise!
Made strong in His love!

The next morning, July 13, 1813, they disembarked. Look ye mortals! Look ye angels! Look ye ages to come! Behold the scene as these two intrepid souls leave the vessel, thereby committing themselves irrevocably to the dark uncertainties of the future, although Mrs. Judson was still so ill she had to be carried in a stretcher! Behold and weep as they go forth together into the chamber of horrors and the vale of bitter tears! Then began the third great epoch in Judson's memorable pilgrimage.

THE LOVE OF CHRIST GLORIFIED HIS TRIBULATIONS

Following the missionaries in their holy adventure, we behold scenes too horrible for words. On one occasion Judson, pitifully weak and emaciated, was driven in chains across the burning tropical sands, until, his back lacerated beneath the lash and his feet covered with blisters, he fell to the ground and prayed that the mercy of God might grant him a speedy death. For almost two years he was incarcerated in a prison too vile to house animals. He was bound with three pairs of chains and his feet were fastened in stocks which at times were elevated, so that only his shoulders touched the ground. The room into which he and many other prisoners were crowded, was without a window and felt like a fiery furnace under the merciless glare of the tropical sun. The stench of the place was terrible, vermin crawled everywhere and the jailer, Mr. Spotted Face, was a brute in human form. And, as Judson saw other prisoners dragged out to execution, he lived in terrifying suspense and was able to say with Paul, "I die daily."

Surely he would have fallen and perished under the weight of his cross, except for the tender, persistent, beautiful ministrations of Ann. As often as possible she bribed the jailer and then, under cover of darkness, crept to the door of Judson's den, bringing food and whispering words of hope and consolation. Finally for three long weeks she did not appear; but, upon her return, she bore in her arms a newborn baby to explain her absence. An epidemic of smallpox was raging unchecked through the city and little Maria was smitten with the dread disease. Due to the double strain of concern for her imprisoned husband and the suffering baby, Ann found herself unable to nurse the little one. Tormented by its pitiful cries, Ann took her baby up and down the streets of the city, pleading for mercy and for milk: "You women who have babies, have mercy on my baby and nurse her!"

Near the prison gate was a caged lion, whose fearful bellowings had told all that he was being starved against the day when he would be turned loose upon some of the prisoners. But the lion died of hunger before the plan was executed. Thereupon, plucky Mrs. Judson cleaned out the cage and secured permission for her husband to stay there for a few weeks, since he was critically ill with a fever.

One of the most pathetic pages in the history of Christian missions is that which describes the scene when Judson was finally released and returned to the mission house seeking Ann, who again had failed to visit him for some weeks. As he ambled down the street as fast as his maimed ankles would permit, the tormenting question kept repeating itself, "Is Ann still alive?" Upon reaching the house, the first object to attract his attention was a fat, half-naked Burman woman squatting in the ashes beside a pan of coals and holding on her knees an emaciated baby, so begrimed with dirt that it did not occur to him that it could be his own. Across the foot of the bed, as though she had fallen there, lay a human object that, at the first glance, was no more recognizable than his child. The face was of a ghastly paleness and the body shrunken to the last degree of emaciation. The glossy black curls had all been shorn from the finely-shaped head. There lay the faithful and devoted wife who had followed him so unwearily from prison to prison, ever alleviating his distresses and consoling him in his trials. Presently Ann felt warm tears falling upon her face and, rousing from her stupor, saw Judson by her side.

And there were other sorrows. Before he had been in Burma fourteen years he buried Ann and all of his children. But "the love that never fails" sustained him. "If I had not felt certain," he says, "that every additional trial was ordered by infinite love and mercy, I could not have survived my accumulated sufferings." Judson joined with Paul in declaring: "The love of Christ constraineth me ... Therefore I will glory in reproaches, in persecution and in distresses for Christ's sake." Thus began the fourth epoch in the life of this amazing man, this apostle of the love of Christ in Burma.

Adoniram Judson, part 1

Disclaimer: I know nothing about the author, but this account of Adoniram Judson's life is the best that I have read so far. It comes from The Reformed Reader website and was written by Eugene Myers Harrison. The title is Apostle of t he Love of Christ in Burma, and you can find more info at this link: http://www.reformedreader.org/rbb/judson/ajbio.htm.

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There it was -- the site of the historic Let-ma-yoon prison, famous for its heathen horrors and its Christian conquests. Soon after commencing my missionary service in Burma, I went to Mandalay, then through the dense jungle growth to the memorial slab marking the site where Adoniram and Ann Judson, America's first missionaries, endured such incredible sufferings as ambassadors of Christ.

As I stood there I recalled the confident prediction Judson made in 1816, in his first tract for the Burmese people: "About one hundred or at most two hundred years hence the religion of Buddha, of Brahma, of Mohammed and of Rome, with all other false religions, will disappear and the religion of Christ will pervade the whole world." Why is it, as we hasten toward the termination of the two hundred years of which Judson spoke, that the unsaved multitudes of earth are greater by at least one thousand million than they were when Judson made his prediction?

In a day when the cause of world evangelism is so sadly languishing, it will be a humbling and inspiring experience for the Christians of America to turn aside and expose their souls afresh to the story of one who was magnificently captivated by the love of Christ. The love of Christ was his hope, his incentive, and his consolation. The love of Christ sang and sobbed and shouted its way through all the changing scenes, manifold trials and monumental accomplishments of the five great epochs of his life.

THE LOVE OF CHRIST CLEANSED HIS POLLUTED HEART

In the Baptist meeting house in Malden, Massachusetts, the traveler will find a marble tablet bearing the following inscription: Judson was a very precocious boy. When only three years of age he learned to read under the tutelage of his mother while his father was absent on a journey. How great was the father's astonishment and delight upon his return, to hear his young son read to him a chapter from the Bible.

He grew up in a devout Christian home. His father, a Congregational minister, cherished the fond hope that his son would follow in his footsteps. But Adoniram was enamored of his brilliance and could not think of wasting his superb talents in so dull a calling as the ministry. Having vanquished all rivals in intellectual contests, he graduated at nineteen from Providence College (now Brown University) as valedictorian. He entertained the most extravagant ambitions and his imagination ran wild as he contemplated his future eminence. He pictured himself as an orator, greater than Demosthenes, swaying the multitudes with his eloquence; as a second Homer, writing immortal poems; as a second Alexander the Great, weeping because there were no more worlds to conquer.

Judson was not only inordinately ambitious; he was also openly atheistic. It was during the early years of the nineteenth century, while Judson was in college, that French infidelity swept over the country. With only three or four exceptions, all the students of Yale were avowed infidels and preferred to call each other by the names of leading infidels such as Tom Paine or Voltaire, instead of their own names.

Providence College did not escape the contaminations of this vile flood of skepticism. In the class just above that of Judson was a young man by the name of Ernest, who was exceptionally gifted, witty and clever, and an outspoken atheist. An intimate friendship developed between these two brilliant young men, with the result that Judson also became a bold exponent of infidelity, to the extreme mortification of his father and mother. When his father sought to argue with him, he quickly demonstrated his intellectual superiority, but he had no answer to his mother's tears and solemn warnings.

One day he set out on horseback on a tour of adventure through several states. He joined a band of strolling players and lived, as he himself related later, "a wild, reckless life." Leaving the troupe after a few weeks, he continued his trip on horseback, stopping on a certain historic night at a country inn. Apologetically, the landlord explained that, only one room being vacant, he would be obliged to put him next door to a young man who was extremely ill; in fact, probably dying. "I'll take the room," said Judson. "Death has no terrors for me. You see, I'm an atheist." Judson retired but sleep eluded him. The partition was very thin and for long hours he listened to the groans of the dying man -- groans of agony and groans of despair. "The poor fellow is evidently dying in terror. I suppose I should go to his assistance, but what could I say that would help him?" thought Judson to himself; and he shivered at the very thought of going into the presence of the dying man. He felt a blush of shame steal over him. What would his late unbelieving companions think if they knew of his weakness? Above all, what would witty, brilliant Ernest say, if he knew? As he tried to compose himself, the dreadful cries from the next room continued. He pulled the blankets over his head but still he heard the awful sounds and shuddered! Finally, all became quiet in the next room. At dawn, having had no sleep, he rose and inquired of the innkeeper concerning his fellow lodger. "He is dead." "Dead!" replied Judson. "And do you know who he was?" "Yes," the innkeeper answered, "he was a graduate of Providence College, a young fellow named Ernest."

Judson was overwhelmed by the news that the young man who died the previous night in the adjoining room in evident terror of death was his college friend Ernest, who had led him into infidelity. For many hours the words "Dead! Lost! Lost!" kept ringing in his ears. There was now just one place that beckoned him. Turning his horse's direction, he went home and begged his father and mother to help him find a faith that would stand the test of life and of death, of time and eternity.

The brilliant young skeptic realized at last that he needed:
A faith for the testing of life!
A faith for the exigencies of death!
A faith for time and eternity!

At this time of acute spiritual struggle, when his mind was filled with the dark clouds of infidelity and his soul enveloped with the black darkness of sin; he turned to the Word of God. Before long his heart was cleansed, his mind illumined and his soul enraptured by the incoming tide of the love of Christ. Henceforth Ephesians 3:17-19 was his great text and the love of Christ was his theme. Henceforth he was magnificently captivated by the love of Christ as he explored the mystic meaning and the abounding fullness of its fourfold dimension -- its breath and length, its depth and height.

Jesus My Guide

"I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known; I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them, and not forsake them." Isaiah 42:16

Jesus my Guide! 'Tis my delight!
Peace fills my soul, He is my Guide.
In toil or rest, by day or night,
Jesus ever by my side.

My Guide is Jesus day by day,
His hand of mercy laid hold on mine;
He is my Guide, on Him I stay,
Upon His right hand I recline.

Fast hold of Jesus' hand I take
Life's journey through to Heaven's gate,
Nor weal, nor woe, my hope can shake,
Jesus is Guide, on Him I wait.

Victor I stand when life is done,
O'er outer foes and sin's foul brood,
Jesus my Guide, I trust alone,
I shall not dread the coldest flood.

~Written by Blind Chang Shen

Blind Chang's Story

I just finished a small, tract-sized story about a Christian martyr in China called Blind Chang. His testimony and life for Christ are incredible. After being struck blind in the middle of his life, he made his way to a hospital well known for healing and recovering conditions such as his. The hospital was run by missionaries and, though his sight never returned, he was convicted and finally converted there. The rest of his Christian life he would serve the Lord as an evangelist. I have taken excerpts of his story and split them into three sections; one prior to conversion, one post conversion, and one of his martyrdom. I think it will prove very encouraging.

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"Behold, I am the Lord...is there anything too hard for Me?" "Ah, Lord God! behold...there is nothing too hard for Thee." Jeremiah 32:27, 17

Yes, Blind Chang had a black past. It may be that the secret of his great passion later for making Christ known to other sinners such as he had been, was that "he loved much because he had been forgiven much." As the Lord Jesus said of another forgiven sinner, "Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much; but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little." Luke 7:47 Remember dear reader, we in fact are all great sinners.

But what of the black past? We are told that he bore a very bad name throughout his home region. He was a gambler and a man with such an immoral life that he had become a by-word in an area where such living was not uncommon. Some said [blindness] was a judgment upon him because of his evil life, while others said it was the direct result of that life. The people spoke of him as "one without a particle of good in him."

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A Mr. Inglis wrote of Blind Chang, "His was but to kindle the light and then pass on." C.H. Spurgeon once said, "Many men owe the grandeur of their lives to tremendous difficulties." This surely applied to the blind evangelist. Another has said, "The cost of shining is burning." Such was the life of this man whose testimony has come down generations.

For five years Blind Chang worked throughout his home region. By 1892 one hundred and seventy had received conversion and baptism there. At other centers Christian services were held regularly. One Christian remarked, "If Chang had not lost his eyesight there would be no church here."

Chang's ministry, for the most part, was away from his home region. Blind Chang, from the time of his conversion had the spirit and vision of the pioneer. There seemed to be within him that which kept him ever seeking to reach the most needy-those untouched and unreached by the Gospel. This man, blind and for the most part alone, had but his strong walking stick to depend on. Sometimes he was able to have a young person as a guide tramping over rough mountain roads. This would be dangerous for those who could see. But ever onward, always with that impelling desire did he live to make Christ known to sinners such as he had been. In a climate of great extremes, he did this year after year for twelve years.

[One guide,] a mere boy of fourteen well remembered what those journeys meant. He told how the blind man often met with bitter persecution and endured great hardships. Children were encouraged to pelt him with clods and bricks. Curses were hurled after him as the people drove him from their doors. Worst of all were the dogs that were set upon him. Yet none of these things moved him, neither counted he his life dear unto himself.

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Toward the close of the century the Boxers rose up. These Boxers were bitterly anti-foreign and their hatred extended to the Chinese Christians who the Boxers considered to be but followers of the foreigners. Men joining this society trained with one object, to destroy all foreigners and all Christians. Their numbers increased with unbelievable rapidity.

In a city called Chao Yang Shan, about fifty Christians were seized by the Boxers. They were threatened with death and as preparations were made for their execution a man spoke up saying, "You are certainly foolish to kill all these. For every Christian you may kill, ten will spring up while that man Chang lives. Kill him and you may crush the sect." As a result of this advise the Boxer leaders promised to save the lives of the Christians if they handed Blind Chang over to them for execution. When word reached Blind Chang and the blind evangelist listened silently through it all, a look of strange eagerness came over his face. Blind Chang said, "I will gladly die for them. Take me to them for it is better that it be so."

On reaching Chao Yang Shan, Chang was immediately arrested and bound. His quiet dignity and absence of any sign of fear impressed and awed his enemies. He was taken bound to the temple of Kwan Kung (god of war). Wild crowds had gathered and on reaching the temple he was dragged inside and commanded to worship the gods. To this he replied with quiet dignity, "I worship only the One Living and True God." "But you must repent," the people cried. "I have repented long ago," was the quiet answer. [Then] he knelt down and worshipped the God of Heaven and Earth.

Three days after his arrest and torture, Blind Chang was placed on an open cart and driven through the streets of town to the common burial ground outside the city. Christians followed beside the cart and witnessed the blind man all the way, engaged either in prayer or in singing aloud. On arrival at the place of execution Blind Chang was dragged from the cart and forced to kneel down. As he did so he cried with a loud voice, "Heavenly Father, receive my spirit." This he said three times but before the third sentence ended, the swords of his murderers from behind him cut him down.

Don't Waste Your Life

I just started reading this book and have already gained so much from it. How we spend our time is an important issue to God, and something that we will have to give an account for. I personally have fallen prey at times to the idea that the use of my time is not a serious thing. It is; and this book reveals a lot of truth on the subject.

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Just when I was about to leave my South Carolina home in 1964, never to return as a resident, Wade Hampton High School published a simple literary magazine of poems and stories. Near the back, with the byline Johnny Piper, was a poem. I will spare you. It was not a good poem. Jane, the editor, was merciful. What matters to me now is the title and first four lines. It was called "The Lost Years." Beside it was a sketch of an old man in a rocking chair. The poem began:

Long I sought for the earth's hidden meaning;
Long as a youth was my search in vain.
Now as I approach my last years waning,
My search I must begin again.

Across the forty years that separate me from that poem I can hear the fearful refrain "I've wasted it! I've wasted it!" Somehow there had been wakened in me a passion for the essence and the main point of life. The ethical question "whether something is permissible" faded in relation to the question "what is the main thing, the essential thing?" The thought of building a life around minimal morality or minimal significance--a life defined by this question "What is permissible?"--felt almost disgusting to me. I didn't want a minimal life. I didn't want to live on the outskirts of reality. I wanted to understand the main thing about life and pursue it.

~Don't Waste Your Life (pages 13&14), John Piper

Eternal Riches

"For you are great and do wondrous things; you alone are God." Psalm 86:10

[David] gives glory to God; for we ought in our prayers to praise him, ascribing kingdom, power, and glory, to him, with the most humble and reverent adorations. Our God alone possesses almighty power and infinite love. Christ is the way and the truth. And the believing soul will be more desirous to be taught the way and the truth of God, in order to walk therein, than to be delivered out of earthly distress. Those who set not the Lord before them seek after believers' souls; but the compassion, mercy, and truth of God, will be their refuge and consolation. And those whose parents were the servants of the Lord may urge this as a plea why he should hear and help them. It is his goodness that is over all his works, and therefore should fill all our praises; and this is our comfort, in reference to the wickedness of the world we live in that, however it be, God is good. God is not only compassionate, but full of compassion, and in him mercy rejoices against judgment. He is long-suffering towards us, though we forfeit his favor and provoke him to anger, and he is plenteous in mercy and truth, as faithful in performing as he was free in promising. We see that God is a kind friend and bountiful benefactor towards us. We ought to praise God as good in himself, but we do it most feelingly when we observe how good he has been to us. In considering David's experience, and that of the believer, we must not lose sight of him, who though he was right, for our sakes became poor, that we through his poverty might be rich.

~Matthew Henry Daily Readings, October 2nd