What if Hudson Taylor
had not dedicated as the missionary for in-land China?
Just significant years of time prior
to the birth of Hudson Taylor and during his life time, scientific works and
philosophical development were in progress and conjured up for the advent of
civilization, which is systemically adverse to the advance of God’s kingdom.
Hudson Taylor had been born in an era which birthed geniuses of various fields,
whom are to be remembered for their work and have influenced society for
centuries. It seems to me that they envisioned the humanistic springboard to
transform all kinds of human works into intellectual vandalism. Historically
speaking, whenever human intelligence is not clearly screened through the Holy
Spirit, what was demonstrated through the careful exploration of historical
documentation is the incapacitation of the expansion of God’s kingdom. Of
course, whenever unevangelical movements have swept through history, they were
confronted and challenged by the biblical minority of Christians. In this
historical context, the method Hudson Taylor used in his approach regarding
missions was innovative. When it comes to mission, Hudson Taylor’s
contemporaries, who are involved with the mission field, were unconsciously
tempted to introduce the developed civilization rather than spreading gospel.
Removing this mindset, which has been established naturally, is one of the
hardest challenges even for those who are living nowadays. In comparison, what
made Taylor’s approach to missions revolutionary was that in order for him to reach
and indigenize, he abandoned the way he used to eat, wear, and live. Plus,
inter-denominational approach and his evangelical philosophy for women
represent what type of person he was. Finally, rather than some specific,
convenient areas of China, he desperately wanted “inland” mission His objective
was to go to areas in China that were more unreached and not as developed since
it was not the coastal areas. All these characteristics of his mission
demonstrate the rejection of imperialism. Imperialism was so common in mission
fields and is a strong temptation people from the developed countries might
easily appeal to. At times, this attitude of imperialism blocks or hinders
missionaries from having access to the enculturation. And the dissociation from
political involvement regarding the mission works and zero tolerance of
discrimination regarding fragile sector of people are considered as the imperative
element which drove Taylor to be single-minded for the expansion of kingdom of
God. His “inland” mission seems to advocate the present, unequal distribution
of missionaries on the globe. It is widely known that the significant numbers
of missionaries are dispatched into the developed countries in comparison to
the unreached areas located on 10/40 window. . All these can be explained as
his unprecedented approaches of doing God’s mission.
In the real confrontation among
values and conflict in adapting cultural norms there are times when there is a
tendency for those who launch mission works become confused between texts and
contexts. In reality, missionary work often entails giving the “text,” which is
word of God, while addressing the “context,” which is social environment or
atmosphere. Depending on the situation of the indigenous, there is a tension
between focusing on the text or the context. Too much adaptation into the
context often results in the negligence of spreading gospel. For example, the
generous construction of many civilized facilities and humanitarian aid efforts
are to be established, but these activities have inherently dangerous elements
which could shape many missionaries into becoming managers of maintenance work.
It is easily heard that there are many missionaries who are bombarded with the
contexts they are newly in so that the evangelism may be ignored gradually.
Looking carefully into many cases of missionaries, the battles and conflicts
between the texts and the contexts have provided with incurable corruption which
successfully has deviated considerable numbers of missionaries. Evangelistic
work transforms into the charity work which intoxicates God’s primary concern.
It is believed that Hudson Taylor struggled with same concerns and tried his
best to choose His will in the fine line between the evangelism and the
charity. And it is very evident that he and his comrade missionaries followed
after the way early churches Christians did the evangelistic works very closely
and established the authentic criterion in terms of becoming Jesus’ followers.
In my analysis, it is evident that the devoted
effort and sacrifice of Taylor and his comrades was the foundation in which
helped many Christians could endure the horrendous persecution during the
communistic revolution. If the communistic revolution was not preceded by his
evangelistic penetration into China, how things turn out now? Based on the
report of many mission organizations, it is widely said that number one
Christian country is China. And China has already become the number one mission
country which dispatches the maximum numbers of missionaries in the world.
Interestingly, the areas Chinese missionaries are concentrated on are Islamic
countries. Rather than other countries which send missionaries into all nations,
China highly focuses on Islamic countries. Is it imaginable without the efforts
of his and his comrades? When it comes to South Korea, significant numbers of
missionaries from Western countries were determined to serve my country when
Korea was considered as the uncivilized country. Among lots of missionaries, a
few missionaries such as Robert Hardie and Robert Jermain Thomas are regarded
as the representing missionaries who impacted on the great awakening held in
Pyong-Yang in 1907. Further, right before the Korean War happened and
communistic influence dominated on the northern soil of Korea, God planted the
evangelistic seed in many young Christians from western countries and they
dedicated their lives for the expansion of God’s kingdom. Due to their early
dedication to Korean people prior to the Korean War, many Christians came down
to the southern soil and turned South Korea into one of powerful countries in
which Christian dominance is easily seen. Likewise, Hudson Taylor seems to be
one of the representative missionaries who influenced China so that China can
sustain the heavy weight on its shoulder for the completion of God’s Great
Commission. In addition, it seems that God planted passionate seed of
evangelism and person like Hudson Taylor became determined to establish the
solid backbone prior to the advent of communism so that Chinese Christians may
be prepared. Based on the updated information on the Chinese churches and
mission plan, Church leaders sketch the equipment of one million missionaries
so that the solid barrier of Islamic countries surrounding Israel may be
destroyed. Furthermore, it is widely known that this master plan had already
been invented in the brains of churches leaders during persecuting period in
China. It is can be argued that all these developments within the Church of
China would not be possible without the ignition and contribution of Hudson
Taylor and his comrades.
In addition to this, based on
historical exploration, the example of Hudson Taylor left us with real hands-on
sets of specialized examples and spiritual heritages regarding the missionaries
of the next generation. Even if there
had been and are still a variety of masquerades named either in past era or in
contemporary time to blur the advancement of God’s kingdom, there had been a
few numbers of Christians who were directed by the authentic spirit of Jesus.
Whenever different types of secularizations tried to influence on Christians, only
a few Christians had led the history of God to advance while considerable
numbers of Christians were polluted with plausible secularized values and
mentality. The mission organization I am currently serving as a staff for
celebrated its 30th anniversary. When it had the ceremony, some Chinese
underground churches leaders were invited to come. When they were invited to
the main headquarter place, they were astonished to see the catchphrase saying
“Back to Jerusalem (BTJ)” which originates from Chinese Christians in the past.
It is known that they became fascinated with my mission organization, for they
never expected to see this theme in Korea. This BTJ theme is fundamental
momentum through which my organization had been pushing forward for the Islamic
countries. It is expected that the synergy on the greater scale will become
powerful amazingly.
There is a concept called the
“butterfly effect.” It means that one swing of its wing can cause the hurricane
to happen. Honestly, it is very likely that many Christians have proclivities
to measure missionary works. Input and output are easily evaluated and
analysed. However, many approaches indicate that how deeply Christians are
rooted in the secularized way of running company and business approaches. The
devoted sacrifices and efforts Hudson Taylor did are not short-lived one and
measurable. But, one obvious insight is that Hudson Taylor ignited the fire of
evangelizing and strongly influenced the cohesive collaboration of the Korean
mission organization and Chinese Christians. If he had not determined to throw
his life as the qualified missionary of inland China, then the raising of
history makers would have been a difficult reality to be actualized. Perhaps,
God would have had recruited another person to replace Hudson Taylor if he was
not inclined with the kingdom of God. Evidently, God could have chosen the
replacement. But, the direction our history represents itself is very different
from the way we are recognizing, or becomes worse than the way it is now. He
left us with many valuable legacies as the missionary and it is believed that
the preparation of certain numbers of pious history makers was preceded by the
sacrificial dedication of one man. When hearing many live testimonials of
missionaries from my mission organization, I became thrilled at how His words
are being completed. Hudson Taylor had moved become a person of big influence.
Accordingly, the spiritual hurricane spread into many areas. It seems to me
that now is the time when the spiritual descendants should add more power to
the hurricane so that it may penetrate into the thick wall confronting the
advancement of God’s history.
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