That evening"s mail brought a letter from a stranger living some distance away, judging from the postmark; for the letter had no address, and was not signed. The letter said:
"I do not know you, nor have I met you, but the Lord seems to have laid it on my heart to send you this five-pound note as a farewell gift, to do what you think best with."
It was with a joyful heart I sent off the gifts to the five Christian workers in Britain. Had the giver said it was "for work in China," as was usually the case, I could not have used it for any other purpose.
How to get the sewing done for my family and yet meet the pressing calls made upon me as the wife of a pioneer missionary, for almost thirty years has been perhaps the most difficult and constant problem of my missionary life. In connection with the solving of this problem, I have seen some of the most precious evidences of G.o.d"s willingness to undertake in the daily details of life.
The following story must be given in detail to be really understood, as one of the striking instances of how G.o.d, in his own wonderful way, can work out the seemingly impossible.
Returning home to our station from an unusually strenuous autumn"s touring, I planned as usual to give the month of December to the children"s sewing, so as to leave January largely free for a Bible-women"s training cla.s.s. But my health broke down, and I could make scarcely any headway with the thirty-five or forty garments which had to be made or fixed over, before the children returned to their school in Chefoo. By the eighteenth of December we decided to cancel the cla.s.s on account of my ill-health; and to all the women, except one whom I entirely forgot, I sent word not to come.
As the days pa.s.sed, the burden of the almost untouched sewing became very great. At last I cried to the Lord to undertake for me. And how wonderfully he did! On December twenty-eighth, when I was conducting the Chinese women"s prayer-meeting, I noticed in the audience Mrs. Lu, the very woman to whom I had forgotten to send word. She had come a long distance, with her little child, over rough mountainous roads, so I felt very sorry for my thoughtlessness. Mrs. Lu accompanied me home, and I gave her money for a barrow on which to return the next day. I then sat down to the sewing machine. The woman stood beside me for a little, and then said:
"You are looking very tired, Mrs. Goforth; let me run the machine for you."
"You!" I exclaimed, astonished, "why, you don"t know how."
"Yes, I do," she replied.
She was so insistent that at last, in fear and trembling, I ventured to let her try--for I had only one needle. It took but a few moments to convince me she was a real expert at the machine. When I urged her to stay and help me, she replied that, since the cla.s.s was given up, she would return home on the morrow.
That night I was puzzled. Why should the Lord lead this woman to me--the only one, so far as we knew, who could do the machine work--and then permit her to leave? I could only lay the whole matter before the Lord, and trust him to undertake. And again he answered. That night a fierce storm came on, lasting several days and making the roads quite impa.s.sable. Mrs. Lu, finding herself storm-tied, gladly gave all her time to me. The roads remained impa.s.sable for a whole month, during which time I did not once need to sit down at the machine.
While in Tientsin with my children during the revolution in 1912, I had occasion to go into the Chinese city with my servant. We visited three stores. On our way home by the tramway I discovered I had lost a five-dollar bill and one of my gloves. I had foolishly put the bill inside the glove. Ashamed to let the Chinese servant know of my carelessness, I sent him home when we reached the end of the tram line.
As soon as he was out of sight I took the tram back to the city. On the way I confessed to the Lord my carelessness, and asked him to keep the glove and money, and lead me to where they were. I retraced my steps back to two of the stores where we had been. As I entered the second, which was a shoe store, a number of men were in the shop; but there, right in sight of all, on the floor lay my glove, and I knew of course with the five dollars inside. It was with a heart full of grat.i.tude to my loving Heavenly Father, and an enlarged vision of his love, that I picked up the glove and returned home that day.
On one occasion when on furlough with several little children, and my husband in China, I had no settled home. When the time came to do the sewing for the long journey back to China, I had simply no way to get it done. I just had to look to the Lord; and, as so often before, he was again faithful, and opened the way. When shopping down town, one day, I met a minister"s wife from a distant country charge, who said: "I want you to come with all your children, and get your sewing done with me. A number of the ladies of our congregation sew well, and will be delighted to help you."
I gratefully accepted her invitation, and while staying with her a sewing-bee was held in the church. In one week the sewing was finished, which would have taken me many weeks of hard, constant labor to accomplish alone.
The winter of our return from China, after the Boxer tragedies, I felt keenly the need of a good sewing machine, as I could not possibly do the children"s sewing by hand and still get time for meetings. One day, as my husband was leaving on a deputation tour, I asked him for money for a machine. He a.s.sured me it was impossible; that we had only sufficient for bare necessities. I knew well he would gladly give me money for the machine if he had it. So I laid my need before my Father, confident that he knew it was a real need, and that according to his promise he could and would supply it.
I was so sure that somehow the money would come, that I went down town especially to choose a suitable machine. I found it would cost thirty-six dollars. A few days later I received a letter from a band of ladies in Mount Forest, Ontario, enclosing twenty-three dollars and some odd cents, and saying: "Please accept the enclosed to buy something you have lost as our subst.i.tute in China." Only a day or two later another letter came, from quite another part of Ontario, enclosing twelve dollars and some cents. The two amounts came to exactly the sum I needed to purchase the machine.
The second letter stated that the money was sent to help me buy a sewing machine. It has always been a puzzle to me how they came to send the money in that way, for I had not spoken to any one but my husband about wanting a machine. When Mr. Goforth returned I was able to show him what the Lord could give me, though he could not.
I had been holding a cla.s.s for women at an out-station, staying in the home of the elder, Dr. Fan. The day before I was to return home, Mrs.
Fan asked me to go with her to visit a very sick boy whom the missionary doctor had sent home from the boys" school, Wei Hwei, because of his having tuberculosis of the lungs. Mrs. Fan told me the mother was in great distress, and begged me to come and pray with her. I found the lad in a truly pitiable condition. His mouth was swollen, his face a ghastly hue, and every moment a cough racked his frame. He seemed to me quite beyond hope, and looked as if he could not live long.
On our way home to Mrs. Fan"s, the message of James 5:14, 15, kept coming persistently to me, as if spoken by a voice: "Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, . . . and the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up."
I simply could not get away from those words. On reaching Dr. Fan"s home, I sent for him, and asked if he and the other elders would be willing to pray with me over the lad. He consented, though at first he seemed rather dubious. There were quite a number of Christians gathered around as we placed the boy in our midst. All knelt down, and I read the words from James. I told them plainly that I could not say that it was indeed the Lord"s will to heal the boy; all that was clear to me was that we must obey as far as we had light, and leave the rest in G.o.d"s hands for life or death. Several prayed, and we then dispersed.
Early the following morning I left for home. Circ.u.mstances prevented my return to that place, and in time we moved to another field. More than two years later, while visiting Wei Hwei, I met Mrs. Fan, who told me that the lad had completely recovered and was then working with his father. Still a year later I met Dr. Fan, and upon inquiring about the lad, the doctor told me he was perfectly well, and was in business in Wei Hwei City.
The power of intercession is shown in the following two incidents:
In the winter of 1905 a call came for my husband to hold special meetings in Manchuria. On reaching Liao Yang for these meetings, one of the missionaries showed him a letter from Mr. Moffat, of Korea, which said: "I have a thousand Christians here who have promised to pray for Mr. Goforth, and I know their prayers will prevail with G.o.d." Can we doubt that their prayers had something to do with the marvelous revival movement which followed?
When in England, in 1909, my husband was the guest of a lady in London who was noted for her power in intercession. He was telling her of the great revival movements he had been through, which took place in different provinces of China; and she asked him to look at her diary, in which were notes of times when she had been led out in special intercession for Mr. Goforth. These dates exactly corresponded to the times of greatest revival power.
A few months after we returned to China from a furlough, I invited a certain missionary and his wife and children to pay us a visit.
Peculiarly touching circ.u.mstances had led me to give this invitation.
Both husband and wife were in ill health, and greatly needed a change.
They resided in a far inland station, quite cut off from other missionaries. They were not connected with any Society, and were looking only to the Lord for their support. Just as these friends had started toward us, on their five-days" journey, smallpox broke out at our station, and one of the missionaries died. A telegram was sent, hoping to catch them before they left, but it did not reach them until they were a short distance from our station. Then the whole family had to turn around, and once more take the long, trying journey, homeward. As the weather was very cold at the time, one could imagine what a terrible trial to faith the whole experience meant to them. I felt so deeply for them that I planned to send sufficient to cover at least the expense of the journey. But, on getting out of quarantine, I found I could not draw on our treasurer for the fifty dollars needed, as Mr. Goforth was not at home. However, the Lord had seen the need long before I felt it, and had the exact amount ready. Three days after I got out of quarantine I received a letter from Mr. Horace Goven, of the Faith Mission, Glasgow, enclosing a draft for five pounds which, at the rate of exchange at that time, came to fifty dollars Mexican. The gift came from the workers of the mission, and he stated that they wished me to accept it as a personal gift. Needless to say, the draft was sent off that same day to the needy friends in the far-off station.
On one occasion, while we were temporarily stationed at Wei Hwei, Honan, I was called to nurse a fellow missionary who had contracted black smallpox. This missionary died; and it was while shut away from every one during the time of quarantine that I had the following experience:
I awoke suddenly one night feeling greatly troubled for one in Canada.
So strong was the impression that this friend needed my prayers, that I felt compelled to rise and spend a long time wrestling with G.o.d on this one"s behalf; then peace came, and I again slept.
As soon as I was out of quarantine I wrote to my friend and told of this experience, giving the date. In time the answer came, which said that--though no date could be given, as no note had been made of it--as far as could be judged, it was about the same time that I had had the burden of prayer that my friend was pa.s.sing through a time of such temptation as seemed almost overwhelming. But the letter said: "I was brought through victoriously; I know that it was your prayers that helped me."
The following incident may seem trifling to some; but to me no answer in my life ever brought more intense relief. For this reason I have reserved it, as the final testimony of the original prayer record.
My husband had gone to hold revival meetings in a distant province, and while he was away I went with my Bible-woman to a certain out-station at the urgent request of the Christians, to preach at a four-days"
"theatrical," which brought great crowds. The four days there were enough to wear out the strongest; for many hours daily we had to face unruly crowds coming and going; and at the end of our stay I turned my face homeward utterly worn out. My one thought was to get to Wei Hwei, our next station, for a few days" rest with my youngest children, who were attending school there. A sight of them, I knew, would recover my energies better than anything else.
But in getting home I in some way lost the key of the money-drawer. It was Friday, and the train for Wei Hwei left on Sat.u.r.day at ten o"clock.
Different persons came for money, but I had to put them off with some excuse. There was too much money in the drawer for me to leave with the key lying around somewhere; besides, I myself could not go without money.
As soon as I had my supper I started searching everywhere. Drawers, pigeonholes, shelves, were all searched in vain. After hunting for two hours, until I was too exhausted to hunt any more, I suddenly thought, "I have never prayed about it." Stopping still just where I stood by the dining-table, I lifted my heart to the Lord. "O Lord, you know how much I need a rest; you know how much I long to see the children; pity me, and lead me to the key."
Then, without wasting a step, I walked through the dining-room, hall, and women"s guest room into Mr. Goforth"s study, to the book-case (which covers one side of the room), opened the door, slipped two books aside, and there was the key. So near did the Lord seem at that moment that I could almost feel his bodily presence. It was not that I remembered putting the key there, but he led me there.
Yes, I _know_ G.o.d answers prayer.
IX
TO HIS PRAISE!