CD: What to expect, and do ...

I was reading on the train the short book "Crash Course on Church History" by Christopher Catherwood. It is both a very entertaining and insightful book.

I read the following.

William Carey, sometimes known as the "father of modern missions", was one of the most famous missionaries in the 18th-19th centuries. His life-work was mainly in India (very much like James Hudson Taylor in China and David Livingstone in Africa). From the book I learnt his most famous quotation:

“Expect great things from God; attempt great things for God.”

This is very refreshing, uplifting and enlightening! This summarises the attitude of many great missionaries, and as I see it, should be the attitude of Christians as well. It also, to me at least, provides a perfect answer to CD's question to Pastor Li 李顺长牧师 at the end of last year. Perhaps it answers JZ’s earlier questions as well?

I am sharing this with those who are facing particular, new challenges right now, as many of us are in these days.



Another heart-warming passage I read from the book is the Prayer of St Francis of Assisi by Francis (1181-1226), one of the giants of Western Christianity in the Middle Ages and founder of the Franciscan Order.

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy;

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

Have a good day. CD