259
JUNE, 1946
KING ' S BUS INESS Zke Children’s Church BETTY BLACKSTONE
J U N I O R Xhe
Of T UCKED away in the mountains in the province of Shantung, in Northern China, there lies a pretty little village. Each family who lives there is kept very busy all day long doing many things, especially feeding the pigs and chickens. These are very important, for each family must have eggs and little pigs to carry to the town when market day comes. When the time comes to plant the millet (wheat) and pequats, the boys and girls and men and women all work in the fields. When the grain waves like a cloth of gold in the bright sunshine, everyone turns out again to help cut and bring it in to the thresh ing floor in the courtyard of these vil lage homes. Visitors or strangers sel dom come to this little village, but one day the children heard the squeaking of a wooden ox cart a long way down the road. Across the sunny courtyard they called to each other in great ex citement, and, pulling little brothers and sisters along or carrying them on their backs, they all ran to the house nearest the road at the edge of the village. The squeak of the lumbering old cart grew louder and louder as it came around a bend and into sight. Fat Whoo, “Fifth Brother,” who usually talked the most and feared nothing, turned to the rest of them. His face suddenly looked very strange, and no one dared to say a word. Then, as though his words would choke him, he whispered, “It’s a foreign devil.” That is the name the Chinese people sometimes give rio foreign mission aries. How frightened they were! But it was too late to run and hide. Some of the girls did think to sit down and hold their baby brothers and sisters with their tiny plump faces against their shoulders. They had never be fore seen one of these foreign devils, but they had heard that their eyes held some sort of magic which could make babies eyes all dark and blind should they let them look squarely into them. No wonder they were fright ened! As the cart squeaked along close to
wanted to save them from their sins. Then she told them He not only did that, but that He arose from the dead and is here with us now. She also said that some day He would come back just as He went away and take us to be with Him forever. Buddha was dead and wasn’t with them and wasn’t coming back after them. Con fucius was dead, too, but this God was living—the Good Tidings must be true,: thought the children. When the missionary lady went away from the little village, one sev enty-year-old man and fifteen children had believed on the Lord Jesus. They studied their Bibles at school and knelt and prayed the prayer the missionary had taught them. Then their parents became angry and they were no longer allowed to read and pray at school, so they had to find some other place. One day the father of Fifth Brother found him reading his Bible and praying, so he dragged him out into the courtyard and beat him until perspiration stood out all over the boy’s face. “Now do you still believe?” Fifth Brother’s father shouted. “Yes, I can’t help but believe,” Fifth Brother said. His father beat him sb much he was very’ weak. He asked Fifth Brother again and again whether he would stop believing, but always the answer came back that he must believe. Finally from the crowd that had gathered, somebody felt so sorry for him that he called, “He says that he won’t believe.” “Oh, no, I didn’t say that. I still Relieve,” poor weak Fifth Brother an swered from where he lay on the ground. Many who stood by in that crowd believed that day because Fifth Broth er would not go back on his new-found Lord. Later, these believers, with Fifth Brother, founded a church called “The Children’s Church.” It was many years ago that these things happened in that little village in far-off China. There are, many Christians there now, and it is still known as the “Village of the Chil dren’s Church.”
them they stood amazed. Why, this was a strange sight sure enough! This person must be a woman for her skirts were long, but the feet which hung over the edge of the cart were not tiny "golden lilies” all bound tight to be dainty and ladylike—why, they were as large as Some of the children’s big brothers’ feet! Her face was white, too. Didn’t that look strange? Instead of glossy black hair, her hair was brown, and how could anyone possibly see out of blue eyes? But the queer est thing of all was her nose; it was so high and right between her eyes. Some of the bolder children turned their faces away and felt between their own eyes to see whether their noses stuck up high, too, but they didn’t; theirs were flat, of course. No wonder the men of the village had brought back such fantastic tales of these foreign devils! They knew now that all those tales must have been true. Suddenly, the cart squeaked to a stop, and the lady climbed down. Some of the children who were on the edge of the group scampered off, but those closer to her dared not move. The devils had probably given her special powers of witchcraft, and they had better stand politely and quietly for something terrible might happen to them. Then she began to speak. Her voice was gentle and soft. They looked at her and then at each other. Could it be that they were able to under stand this foreign devil’s language? No, she must have learned theirs, they decided. This white missionary lady taught the Good Tidings in their village for many days, and as they sat in the sunny courtyard and listened as she explained from her sacred Book how Shang Ti, the God of the Heaven, had loved them so much He was willing to leave all the glories of that wonderful place and come down to live as man on earth. She told them, too, how He gave His life on the cross for all the people upon the earth because Ha
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