“‘Who says that?’ ‘The angel of the Lord; and the Lord Himself says
(Luke 12:47); “He that knew his Lord’s will and did it not, shall be
beaten with many stripes.”’”
[Sidenote: Danger and Loss.] In 1871 two of the stations of the Rhenish
Society were destroyed by a fanatic mob who accused the missionaries of
desiring to poison all those who were not Christians. Again in 1898,
stations were destroyed by robbers and rebels. Fortunately the Boxer
uprising in 1900 left the property of this mission almost untouched and
the missionaries returning after it was safe, were able to begin almost
where they had left off.
At Tungkum the society has a large hospital, whose superintendent had in
1899 twenty thousand consultations. The latest reports gave two thousand
five hundred church members divided among seven stations, at which there
are twenty-three missionaries. In 1873 the Rhenish Society took over
what remained of Gützlaff’s mission.
[Sidenote: A Missionary Scholar.] Among the missionaries of the Rhenish
Society was _Doctor Ernest Faber_, a scholar of immense learning, who,
after being in the service of the Society for eight years joined the
General Protestant Missionary Society. He is especially famous for his
translations of the Chinese classics and it was said of him that he
spoke a better Chinese than the natives themselves.
[Sidenote: A Chinese Saint Paul.] The _Berlin Society_ has two separate
fields of labor in China. The first is in the Province of Canton, near
the missions of the Basel and Rhenish societies. The mission has its
record of loss and persecution during the native uprisings and also its
stories of victory. In its early history the station at Thamschui was
the scene of a cruel attack. The mob was led by a young man blowing a
trumpet and calling to his followers to exterminate the foreign devils,
who meanwhile fled from house roof to house roof and finally escaped.
Subsequently this young man was converted and became a powerful
evangelist who like Saint Paul endeavored with all his power to build up
that which he had hitherto torn down.
[Sidenote: In Time of Famine.] The second station of the Berlin Society
is in the Province of Shantung. In consequence of the assistance given
during the famine in 1889, when over $200,000 was distributed and over
one hundred thousand lives saved, many became interested in Christianity
as the religion which inspires deeds of kindness and mercy; and during
1890 it is said that over a thousand persons were baptized whose
attention was drawn to the religion of Christ by the fact that the
missionaries were so prominent in securing this aid and distributing it.
In this work and its reward the Berlin Society had a part.
The following letter from a missionary of the Berlin Society describes
vividly a Chinese city and gives an account of the work of the Christian
evangelist.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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