AN OPEN SECRET
Bear not a single care thyself,
One is too much for thee;
The work is Mine, and Mine alone;
Thy work — to rest in me.
SELECTED.

HUDSON TAYLOR was no recluse. He was a man of affairs, the father of a
family, and one who bore large responsibilities. Intensely practical, he
lived a life of constant change among all sorts and conditions of men. He
was no giant in strength, no Atlas to bear the world upon his shoulders.
Small in stature and far from strong, he had always to face physical
limitations. Next to godly parentage, the chief advantage of his early years
was that he had to support himself from the time he was about sixteen. He
became a hard worker and an efficient medical man; he was able to care for
a baby, cook a dinner, keep accounts, and comfort the sick and sorrowing,
no less than to originate great enterprises and afford spiritual leadership to
thoughtful men and women the wide world over.
Above all, he put to the test the promises of God, and proved it possible
to live a consistent spiritual life on the highest plane. He overcame
difficulties such as few men have ever had to encounter, and left a work
which twenty-seven years after his death is still growing in extent and
usefulness. Inland China opened to the Gospel largely as an outcome of
this life, tens of thousands of souls won to Christ in previously unreached
provinces, twelve hundred missionaries depending upon God for the
supply of all their needs without promise of salary, a mission which has
never made an appeal for financial help, yet has never been in debt, that
never asks man or woman to join its ranks, yet has sent to China recently
two hundred new workers given in answer to prayer — such is the
challenge that calls us to emulate Hudson Taylor’s faith and devotion.
What was the secret, we may well ask, of such a life? Hudson Taylor had
many secrets, for he was always going on with God, yet they were but
one — the simple, profound secret of drawing for every need, temporal or
spiritual, upon “the fathomless wealth of Christ.” To find out how he did
this, and to make our own his simple, practical attitude toward spiritual
things, would solve our problems and ease our burdens, so that we too
might become all that God would make us. We want, we need, we may
have Hudson Taylor’s secret and his success, for we have Hudson
Taylor’s Bible and his God.
Remember them that had the rule over you...
and considering the issue of their life,
imitate their faith.
Jesus Christ is the same
yesterday and to-day, yea and for ever.