Peace When You Have A Purpose – Hudson Taylor – Chapter 5

I am currently reading through an autobiography of Hudson Taylor, a pioneer missionary to China in the 1850s. He has a pretty incredible story, and within his story, many smaller crazy stories.

Maybe the thing I have been learning most about Taylor is his complete dependence on God. He was a man who lived EXTREMELY frugally. Didn’t seem to care at all about wealth, and the money he did make he either used only for the bare necessities or for others. Sometimes providing the latter before worrying about the former.

The chapters in his autobiography are short, so I may on occasion do a chapter review here so that I can process “out loud” my thoughts I read through it. One of the biggest reasons I’m reading this book is because if missions is something I want to do, who better to learn from than people who have gone before? And if I’m learning, I believe learning out loud is more productive for both the learner and also those who might take the journey with the learner.

Today I read chapter 5.

In this chapter, Taylor is calm and confident, as usual, and oh yeah, almost dies. Taylor, as he was studying in London, ends up contracting a virus from a body that they are examining. Taylor had so much peace through the whole sickness in knowing that God had a purpose for him. Could God’s purpose have been to allow Taylor to pass away? Of course, but Taylor felt very strongly that God was going to use him in China, so he had strong confidence that this sickness would not kill him.

Spoiler alert, he doesn’t die. But two others who get infected at the same time end up passing.

The peace that Taylor had I believe can only come when you are so confident in your purpose that nothing can slow you down or disturb you. Taylor had peace in something outside of this world and was thus able to trust in that. For many, their peace lies only in this world, and when that thing is challenged, where else can they go?