Ten years on, and what had he achieved? Seemingly so little. Across the way, morning services were continuing. Hundreds of well dressed men and women singing of their salvation but without the least idea of the needs across the other side of the world.
It was a frequent vision for Hudson Taylor (1832 – 1905) - him standing on a rock trying to pull thousands of dying Chinese out of the swirling sea. As he stood on the beach at Brighton that day, Sunday, 25th June, 1865, with the noise of the waves in his ears, he heard another sound- that of God speaking to him afresh. Gone was the doubt, away went the frustration. He began to believe that God could do a work through him, even him. A literal sea-change moment.
That evening Taylor wrote ‘I wandered out on the sands alone, in great spiritual agony; and there the Lord conquered my unbelief…. There and then I asked for twenty-four fellow workers, two for each of eleven inland provinces which were without a missionary.’ And so began the China Inland Mission.
Taylor and his team of over 800 missionaries were to reach the whole of China with the message of salvation through Christ.
A moment in time on a Brighton beach. It was enough for a lifetimes’ work.
Writing home on one occasion he said ‘If I had a thousand pounds China should have it—if I had a thousand lives, China should have them. No! Not China, but Christ. Can we do too much for Him? Can we do enough for such a precious Saviour?’
May we each of us have a ‘Brighton moment’. May we each of us know God’s call on our lives.
Further reading:
‘J. Hudson Taylor: A Man in Christ’ by Roger Steer
‘It is not Death to Die: A new Biography of Hudson Taylor’ by Jim Cromarty (second hand only)
‘Hudson Taylor and Maria’ by John Pollock
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