Real Hope: RevivalSample

Good Stewards

A few years ago, I was blessed to visit China to commemorate the 100th anniversary of my great-grandparents’ arrival in that country as medical missionaries. For 25 years, L. Nelson and Virginia Bell – the parents of my grandmother Ruth Bell Graham – ministered to the bodies and souls of people in the city now known as Huai’an, healing the sick while sharing the hope of Jesus.

My great-grandparents sacrificed for the sake of the Gospel. When they left for China, they had to walk away from everything, traveling on a boat to a distant shore. There was little communication with home, but they were good stewards of their lives and faith, giving all they had to reach people a world away.

The mission field was not very fertile. They toiled for years without seeing much fruit from their labors. There must have been days when they were frustrated or questioned their calling. Surely life would have been easier back in Virginia. I assume they longed to see their parents and siblings again, but they persevered. For the sake of the Kingdom, they continued. They humbled themselves to reach the Chinese people.

After a quarter-century of sacrifice and incredibly hard work, my great-grandmother’s health had deteriorated to the point they took their furlough one year early so she could recuperate.

In August 1941, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, and the United States was embroiled in war just months after they left. They never made it back to their mission field.

Fast forward to my recent visit to China. I stood at a podium in a large church in Huai’an. As I looked out over a sea of faces, some 3,000 in number, I felt the love the city still has for my family. They viewed my great-grandparents and my grandmother as their own, and their favor extended to me.

I opened my Bible to the book of John. “I want someone to read this passage to you,” I said through my interpreter. “You’ve likely never met him, but you know who he is.”

The crackly audio, recorded in the early 1970s, came through the sound system of my great-grandfather, Dr. Bell, reading John 3:16 in perfect Huai’anese.

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. JOHN 3:16 (ESV)

As the Word was proclaimed by the very missionary who brought it there a century ago, it pierced the hearts of those in the audience. I then shared the Gospel, and many came forward to begin a relationship with Jesus.

It was a humbling and emotional experience for me. I felt as though I was harvesting fields I did not sow, and it was a testament to my great-grandparents’ selfless sacrifice and stewardship a century ago.

My friends, be good stewards of your life and faith. We have just a short time on this earth. Use the moments you have to plant seeds, and – perhaps now or years into the future – God will bring the harvest.

Written by WILL GRAHAM