It's no coincidence that God has me reading this book right now. Through Hudson Taylor's insights, I see that the critical issues He's been tackling in me recently are the symptom of a much deeper underlying work He wishes to do.
I read and re-read this letter Hudson Taylor wrote to one of his sisters, which appears in the biography I'm reading but has also been reproduced online*:
"The Exchanged Life"
On my second and third readings of this letter, I became increasingly frustrated to read about Hudson Taylor's immediate grasp of the principles God revealed to him. Perhaps because we live in an information-oversaturated age, I can read the very same words he did and not be transformed in the way he was.
It helped a great deal, therefore, to read the letters Taylor subsequently wrote to his children (at school in England) and to another sister, in which he expounds on these truths in plainer, but profound, terms:
From a letter to his children**:
I wish you, my precious children, knew what it is to give your hearts to Jesus to keep every day. I used to try to keep my own heart right, but it would always be going wrong. So at last I had to give up trying myself, and to accept the Lord's offer to keep it for me. Don't you think that is the best way? Perhaps sometimes you think, "I will try not to be selfish or unkind or disobedient." And yet, though you really try, you do not succeed. But Jesus says: "You should trust that to Me. I would keep that little heart, if you would trust Me with it." And He would, too. Once I used to try to think very much and very often about Jesus, but I often forgot Him. Now I trust Jesus to keep my heart remembering Him, and He does so. This is the best way. ...[P]ray God to make it plain to you, and to help you so to trust in Jesus. |
Oh, it is joy to feel Jesus living in you, to find your heart all taken up by Him, to be reminded of His love by His seeking communion with you at all times, not by your painful attempts to abide in Him. He is our life, our strength, our salvation. He is our "wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption." He is our power for service and fruit-bearing, and His bosom is our resting place now and forever. |
_______________
Sources:
* Found on the "Wholesome Words" website, under Worldwide Missions -- Missionary Biographies -- James Hudson Taylor -- The Exchanged Life.
** From page 181 of Hudson Taylor's Spiritual Secret, by Dr. and Mrs. Howard Taylor (Howard and Geraldine Taylor), Chicago: Moody Press, 2009. (First published in 1932)
*** From page 182 of the same book