"Yet it has been a joy to me to know that you were bearing this great sorrow in a spirit of patient submission to the will of him who is "too wise to err, too good to be unkind." ... May the Lord bless and comfort you as he alone can. All human words are weak in the presence of such sorrow."
— Lottie Moon
Source: Letter of condolence to her cousin James and his wife on the death of their son Lindsay (c. 1902), in Una Roberts Lawrence, Lottie Moon (1927), pp. 279-280
Suffering, joy, gratitude, thanks to God
Views: 283
"A few months after I had begun my work at Yenching, Charles Corbett, Lucius Porter and I met to find a motto. All of us had been born in China and shared in the conviction that a Christian university should represent a blend of religious faith, the scientific spirit and method, and fearless unhampered inquiry. One of the others urged the saying of Jesus about ministering rather than being ministered unto. I recalled the quotation Thomas Jefferson had carved in Greek over the main gate of the University of Virginia, which was similarly inscribed over the entrance to the Chicago World's Fair in 1893, "Ye shall know the Truth, and the Truth shall make you free." Somehow, as we talked, the inspiration came to combine these two great sayings of Jesus and thus sum up the essence of His teaching, "Freedom through Truth for Service.""
— John Leighton Stuart
Source: Fifty Years in China: The Memoirs of John Leighton Stuart, Missionary and Ambassador (1954), "Yenching University: a Dream that Came True"
University, Truth, Freedom, Service, Jesus, Mind
Views: 356
"Yet, if I know my own depraved heart, I feel willing, yea, anxious, if it be the will of Heaven, to live and die without ever again beholding the land of my nativity and the friends of my childhood. It is sufficient to know that I do it for Christ. To him can I go in every time of trouble, and from him do I expect to receive every good and perfect gift."
— Henrietta Shuck
Source: A Memoir of Mrs. Henrietta Shuck (ed. J. B. Jeter, 1846), letter to her father written at sea, Oct. 6
Child, get rich, great, lamb, follow, grape
Views: 231
"On December 6, 1934, the China Inland Mission missionaries John and Betty Stam were seized by Red Army troops at Jingde, Anhui, and made to write to the CIM headquarters in Shanghai. John wrote that all their possessions had been taken, yet their hearts were at peace; he asked God to grant them courage and peace, and wrote that, whether by life or by death, God might be glorified. Two days later the couple were killed at Miaoshou; their baby daughter Helen, left on a bed, was found about 36 hours later and rescued by the evangelist Mr. Lo."
— Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Christianity
Source: bdcconline.net, "Stam, Betty" (including John Stam's letter to the CIM, December 6, 1934)
Life, prayer, plan, will, peace
Views: 339
"Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal."
— John 12:24–25
Source: Mrs. Howard Taylor, The Triumph of John and Betty Stam (1935), which sums up their martyrdom with this verse
Wheat, death, emptiness, life, Christ, eternity
Views: 329
"I have no inclination to shirk the work to which Providence has directed me, but rather rejoice that such a high privilege could be mine. … I am confident that my desire to be a missionary is the result of no ephemeral emotion. I propose to do my life-work, to consecrate to it all my energies and to do my best. Difficulties do not appall me, for I rest assured that as my day is so my strength shall be."
— William Scott Ament
Source: Letter of application to the American Board, Andover, Nov. 4, 1876, in Henry D. Porter, William Scott Ament: Missionary of the American Board to China (1911), pp. 32–33
Life, opportunity, Jesus, presence, soul, destiny
Views: 269