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but go to China.” Well, that is not in the Word, that was simply your fancy. You add still further, “The impression came, ‘You will never have the power of the Holy Spirit and peace until you go to China.’” Well, that impression was cer tainly not from God. When you are saved you may obtain the Holy Spirit anywhere by simply meeting the conditions. Of course you will need to be willing to go to China, if it is God’s will, but it is not clear that it is His will; in fact, it is very clear that it is not His will. Anyway this does not have anything whatever to do with your salvation. The baptism with the Holy Spirit is the gift of God to peo ple who are saved; it is not a condition of their being saved. You say further down, “Some months ago, while reading the re ports of our missionary work and the great peed for workers, the old feeling came over me, ‘Possibly I should have gone to mv knees on my promise, but I did not go.’ I began to probe my Christian life, I be came anxious again, so much so that I could neither eat nor sleep.” To this I would say, that even if you should have gone to your knees and did not, even though you made a mistake, it is done, it cannot be Undone, it should be left with God, you cannot possibly go to China now without disobeying God, and even if .you have failed of God’s first choice for you, He has other things for ^ou to do. Mark failed when he went with Paul and Barna bas ; he left the work and evidently did wrong in leaving it, but God found for him other fields of opportunity and made him a useful servant. Even if you have failed of God’s ¡best and highest choice for you, you have not buried your talents; you do that when you do nothing, and even though you do not gain ten talents with your one,’you can gain five, and will have the Master’s “Well done.” Let me add, we are not saved by using our talents to the best advantage, we are saved by believ ing on Christ. (3) You ask, “If it was a call from God and I have failed to heed, can you give me any assurance from God’s Word that
saved by simply believing in Jesus. When we are saved, of: course we will desire to be true disciples of Him. Let me add to this, though it is not exactly put in your letter in the form of a question, that even if you made a mistake in being married, instead of going to China (I don’t believe you did make a mistake, but even if you did) you cannot go back now, and have no right to go back now-and break your marriage promise to your husband and desert the children whom God has given you. Your duty now is plain, simply to go on and witness for ' Christ ¡by being a gentle, true, loving, self-denying wife and a faithful mother. Even if this were not the highest calling that God had for you (I really think it was the call God had for you, but even if it were not), nevertheless it is a high calling and one in which you may have great blessing. The woman most honored in the Bible is not the woman in public work but the woman who is a mother (ITim. 5:14; 2:14, 15). The wo man whom John- saw in heaven was a mother (Rev. 12:1, 2). Sanctified mother hood is a Christian woman’s first call. I do not doubt for a moment that God calls some women to a celibate life and to forms of service where a married woman would not fit the case, but the ordinary call to a woman is to be wife and mother. It is evident that you have no special fitness for the lines of service to which God calls some women, and, as a condition, calls them to give up the privileges of mother hood. (2) You write (though it is not ex actly a question, it involves one), “I felt that God cared not for earthly things ex cept spiritual matters and He would not save me unless I would go to China, and yet I could not see how to go.” This has been already answered in what I have said above, but I will repeat it, you are not saved by going to China or going any where else—you are saved by believing in Jesus Christ. Furthemore, God does not tell you to go to China and then not let you see how to go. You add the words, “Obey God and do His will mean nothing
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