June 1928
343
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Blind but Abundantly Blessed B y R ev . A lexander R . S aunders China Inland Mission, Yangchow, China
f T the close o f the year 1916 God permitted me to become blind. This thorn in the flesh, this mes senger o f Satan to.buffet, was the great enemy’s supreme effort to turn us aside from, our great life purpose. For a whole year the conflict went on, until on December 21, 1917, in the quiet of our own room on the tenth story of the Bible Institute Hotel of Los Angeles, the victory was won, and we launched out into the unfathomable depths o f God’s never-failing grace. The Steps leading up to this great cli max and the results that followed in the wake of a momen
the,simplest way possible told the Lord that once again we made absolute surrender for any service whatever, and when we rose up, it was with a clear conviction that we were to go back to China, and would sail from Amterica about October IS, 1918. The parting o f the ways wa§ passed ; for us there was but one way, and Satan, who for a whole year had done his utmost to turn us aside, was defeated. The path before us was by no means easy, nor were the difficulties all re moved at oncdjlbut the Lord had made the choice for us; it was for Him to deal with each obstacle as we came to it, and He truly did. T he R eturn to C h in a Faith must be followed by
tous decision are told for the glory of God, and that others may be helped by our expe riences. ' Everything possible had been done for the recovery of sight; earnest believing prayer had been made by many of the Lord’s devoted servants before we left China; so when on Oc tober 27, 1917, we sailed for North America to seek further surgical -aid, it Was a last re source. Few, if any, of our friends entertained any hope of our return to China. On arrival in the United States the advice o f one o f the most eminent eye specialists was sought, and after five examina tions he declared that there was no hope of recovering the eye sight. During the long, lonely wait in the consulting room my wife, far from being cast down, was wonderfully upheld by a song which the Lord brought to her mind, Land n o t h i n g could keep the words from constantly filling her h e a r t :
works, and we lost no time in ^announcing by circular letter the date of our expected return to China. “ I thank God from1 my heart,” wrote Dr. R. A . Tor- rey, in our autograph album, “ that your steps were ever di rected to the Bible Institute of Los Angeles., Eternity alone will show what great things have been done by your pres ence among us.” For nearly ten months God
worked wondrously, opening doors befóre us, giving us ac ceptance with the people, and blessing our testimony to hun dreds and perhaps thousands; but these tokens of His favor were but the means to the end. W e returned to China, sailing from San Francisco not actually on October 15, 1918, but on the afternoon o f the preceding day ; neither did we go alone, but with a band of twelve new recruits for the China Inland Mission which the Lord had raised up from the Bible In stitute of Los Angeles. If the decision to return to China was o f God, and no mistake had been made, even in fixing the time of de parture, then there would be signs following, and as this involves a fundamental principle of the life of faith, some of these proofs should be recorded. God’s endorsement of the step lies in what God wrought, and there are three results that may be regarded as His own proof that the way we took was the right way. Immediately after the fresh surrender had been made, and we had accepted the blindness as permitted by God, we began to experience in a new way the sufficiency o f God’s never-failing grace, and doors of opportunity seemed to open of their own accord. Not only among the students of the Institute, but in the churches o f Los An geles city and county, and even beyond, we found abun dant opportunity for the exercise of our ministry. Wide
“ Rejoice! for He is with us always/ L o ! even to the end. Look up, take courage and go forward : All needed grace He’ll send.”
We had reached the parting of the ways, but God did not fail us. When we returned to our upper room together in Los Angeles, and quietly faced the situation, three ways opened before us. One led to retirement from active ser vice, another to work for the China Inland Mission in America, and the third was to face seemingly insurmount able difficulties and return to. China. It was not the first time we had faced decisions involving momentous issues, but this was by far the greatest. How very thankful we may be that in such crises God does not leave us to our own devices, but has promised Divine wisdom, and gives the assurance that we shall hear a voice behind us saying, “ This is the way, walk ye in it.” We knelt down as we had often done before, and in
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