Hudson Taylor

James Hudson Taylor ( born May 21, 1832 in Barnsley, Yorkshire, England; † June 3, 1905 in Changsha, Imperial China ) was one of the first Christian missionaries who have advanced into the interior of China. He was also known as a pioneer in the forbidden land. He came from a devout family pharmacist. His spiritual background was awakened Methodism.

Life

Youth and first experiences

His parents were James and Amelia Taylor. James Hudson Taylor grew guarded and strictly brought up. At 17 he worked in a bank in barsley.

In June 1849 Hudson Taylor experienced a conversion to faith in Jesus Christ. The Bible study began to play an essential role for him. He was interested from his youth to China and became convinced that he was called by Jesus Christ to go as a missionary to China. His letters, which are still preserved, show a lot of faith in God and the desire to follow the call of God, no matter what it costs.

Hudson Taylor knew that Dr. Karl Gützlaff, a German missionary, and went new ways, for example, worked in Chinese clothing, as well as the missionary Robert Morrison.

In May 1850, he began his medical studies in Hull, to prepare for missionary work. At the time, he was also a dangerous blood poisoning, which he had contracted at a dead section.

First trip to China and Marriage

In 1853 he traveled with an English mission, the Chinese Mission Society, to China. It was a perilous journey by steamer " Dumfries ".

In China, Hudson Taylor was disappointed by the states and the operation of the missionaries. In 1857, he split from the Chinese Evangelization Society.

Inspired by Dr. Parker and the Scottish missionary William Chalmers Burns, he also began to work in Germany. In the meantime, he had come to the conviction that it was right to work in Chinese clothing. He had also shave or dye their hair and wore a Chinese pigtail.

Here he learned his wife Mary Dyer, an orphan who lived in China, whom he married after much resistance on 20 January 1858. She was the love of his life. With her he began the China mission. He took over in 1859 the infirmary of Dr. Parker and experienced in the early years many inner personal struggles. Financially and faith he was moderately supported by the orphanage father Georg Müller.

As part of the Holiness movement supported the believers in Switzerland, such as the Lutheran Society reinforces this mission newly created. Through the magazine crumbs from the Lord's table by Franz Eugen Schlachter is evidence that support for Taylor's Missionary Society had to do with, among other theological influences in the Basel Mission, which have not been approved by parts of the Lutheran Society.

1860 was the first home leave of Hudson Taylor in England.

My Mission

In 1865 he founded the China Inland Mission, which persists to this day under the name of Overseas Missionary Foundation ( OMF ). One of his missionaries was George Stott.

1870 his wife died Mary at the birth of her son Noel. 1871 was a stay in England. In this year he married an employee of the China Inland Mission named Jenny Faulding.

In 1875 he went to the nine provinces of China not yet reached. In the next few years was also preached in these provinces, so that the gospel was now spreading throughout China. There were repeated trips to Europe and America. Hudson Taylor had to survive critical illness.

1900 started the Boxer Rebellion in China, which claimed many victims among the Missionary Society Hudson Taylor. In 1902 he handed over the management of the China Inland Mission Dr. E. Hoste. Died in 1904 his second wife Jenny in Switzerland. On June 3, 1905 James Hudson Taylor died in China.

Remembrance

June 3 in the Protestant calendar name.