It is Pentecost Sunday! Selwyn Hughes has a word for us, and so does J. O. Fraser!
“The two main accusations which were directed at the early Christians – ‘They’re drunk’ (Acts 2:13) and ‘They’re mad’ – are rarely heard today. Most modern-day Christians do not come under this dark suspicion, though that is hardly to our credit. What would happen if we opened ourselves up to the Spirit as eagerly and responsively as did the Early Church? People would say the same about us as they said about the first believers: ‘they’re drunk and they’re mad’. “Maybe the fact that they don’t ought to be a matter of the greatest concern.” (Selwyn Hughes).
On that first Pentecost Sunday, as soon as they were filled with fire, they went out and preached the gospel to “every nation under heaven (who were) residing in Jerusalem” (v5).
That is the template – the Holy Spirit came so that every nation might hear. “Pentecost shows that the gospel is for people of all countries, because all nationalities heard God’s word in their own language in Acts 2.” Christianity is for “every tribe and tongue and people and nation” (Rev 5:9).
Fraser wrote: “I feel my weakness very much, yet the Lord seems to delight in making His power perfect in weakness. May I ask you then to remember me specially in prayer, asking God to use me to the salvation of many precious souls. I am feeling more and more that it is, after all, just the prayers of God’s people that call down blessing upon the work, whether they are directly engaged in it or not. Paul may plant and Apollos water, but it is God who gives the increase, and this increase can be brought down from heaven by believing prayer, whether offered in China or in England.
We are, as it were, God’s agents, used by Him to do His work, not ours. We do our part and then can only look to Him with others for His blessing. If this is so, then Christians at home can do as much for foreign missions as those actually on the field. I believe it will only be known on the last day how much has been accomplished in missionary work by the prayers of earnest believers at home, and this surely is the heart of the problem.
Solid, lasting missionary work is done on our knees. What I cover more than anything is earnest believing prayer, and I write to ask you to continue to put up much prayer for me and for the work here. I should like you to continue to pray, not only for the salvation of outsiders, but for blessing on those who have definitely accepted Christ. I want to be downright in earnest myself and to be filled with the Spirit.”
A Lisu family turn to Christ:
The Tsai family gathered around their indoor fire to listen to James and his American colleague Carl. Mother Tsai in particular, wanted to grasp the truth and believe. She was full of questions and thinking deeply. Their last night was spent with the Tsai family at Six Family Hollow. They really believed, the Tsai family said, that Jesus was the Son of God and had made atonement for them. They really wanted to join his family, the people of God. They did not know how to pray in Lisu, they said, but would God mind if they prayed in broken Chinese? They could sing the hymns they had learnt, couldn’t they? They would come down to Tungyueh to visit James and learn more. Encouraged, James and Carl returned over the mountains to Tungyueh.
The Tsai family had been singing their hymns one evening when the old father brought up the question of the demon shelf. His family at once decided it was time to burn it, and burn it they did. That night, however, the old man was seized with a back pain, which soon spread to the whole of his body. Such was his agony, the whole family was up trying to relieve it. Eventually, they decided to ask God about it. After prayer, the old man’s pain ceased, and gradually it went away altogether. This was a great bulwark to their faith, but there was still a shadowy fear of demons, and their power to wreak vengeance.
Later, a huge setback for Fraser:
But later, James wrote in his diary, while I was away their eldest grandson was taken ill with fever. Instead of coming to us for medicine, as I had arranged in case of need, they listened to their neighbours and called in a wizard. It was the spirit, he told them, outraged by the pulling down of a bunch of leaves (the demon shelf), who had come to take his revenge. Therefore they put up a big bunch of leaves again and promised to sacrifice a pig to the spirits. This they will do as soon as they can afford it. Down came the hymns, the coloured tracts, etc., and the old Christian books were put away. They have stopped singing and praying. Of the whole family, old five only seem to hold fast. The others have made a complete renunciation, at least for the present. They do not object to old five still being a Christian, if he likes, but they are going to bide their time, perhaps later on if it seems safe, etc. Of course, this is Satan’s argument. I cannot tell you how I feel about it. But I am going to pray for them as much as ever. Will you?
The news had an almost physical effect on James. All his labours had apparently come to nothing. All his hopes and encouragement had proved abortive.
(Source: Mountain Rain, a biography of James O. Fraser by Eileen Fraser Crossman.)
