Going To The Place Where Judson Lived
Today I'm beginning the journey to Myanmar (old Burma) to train a group of Chin pastors from the mountain area in the north of the country with other pastors from the area of Yangon. This marks our seventh year of training among them and our third with this particular group of church leaders. For those who may be reading who don't know much about Adoniram Judson, let me tell you about him.
He was the first missionary to leave America's shores in 1812 from a Congregational church in Malden, Massachusetts. He had just secured the hand of his wife Anne Hasseltine two weeks prior with the promise to her father that he would love her, but could not guarantee him that he would ever see his daughter again in this life. He didn't.
On board ship Judson, while reading his Greek New Testament realized that baptism was for believers only and that his infant baptism was actually no baptism at all. Upon reaching India, he and Anne were baptized by an associate minister of William Carey, a Baptist leader from England. This decision officially ended Judson's financial lifeline from the Congregational churches in New England and forced Judson's partner to return home and begin raising new support for their mission among the Baptist churches. After several weeks, Adoniram and Anne decided on the momentous move to Burma to begin what would become a one of the most difficult, yet fruitful missionary lives ever lived in the modern era.
Within a few years of his arrival, Judson would be arrested under suspicion of being an English agent and imprisoned. He would spend nineteen months in incarceration hung up by his ankles from Bamboo poles, living in conditions that were unspeakable by any civilized standard. Having begun his early translation of the first Burmese dictionary and Bible, Anne had smuggled the manuscripts into the prison in a homemade pillow to avoid the authorities who had ransacked their personal dwelling. Because of Anne's constant interventions for him during his prison stay, Adoniram survived, and was finally released.
Not long after his release, they had their first child Maria. Unfortunately, Maria lived a very brief life and the Judsons buried her in Molmein where her grave exists to this day. Not long after burying Maria, Anne became ill and passed away in the prime of her life, leaving Adoniram alone except for the two couples who had accompanied them to Burma. For several days, Adoniram sat in a chair beside the grave of his wife in a deep depression from which many thought he would never recover. He did, and eventually remarried a missionary wife whose husband also had died. For the next thirty plus years Adoniram translated the first dictionary, a complete Burmese Bible which is still the mainstay of translations used in my classrooms today, and was responsible for the reaching of hundreds of Buddhists with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
This week I will be investing in fourth and fifth generations of Judson's converts to Christ and training them to take the gospel which Judson shared with their relatives long removed. Please pray that God would burden them greatly for those who need the gospel in a land that remains 89% Buddhist.
He was the first missionary to leave America's shores in 1812 from a Congregational church in Malden, Massachusetts. He had just secured the hand of his wife Anne Hasseltine two weeks prior with the promise to her father that he would love her, but could not guarantee him that he would ever see his daughter again in this life. He didn't.
On board ship Judson, while reading his Greek New Testament realized that baptism was for believers only and that his infant baptism was actually no baptism at all. Upon reaching India, he and Anne were baptized by an associate minister of William Carey, a Baptist leader from England. This decision officially ended Judson's financial lifeline from the Congregational churches in New England and forced Judson's partner to return home and begin raising new support for their mission among the Baptist churches. After several weeks, Adoniram and Anne decided on the momentous move to Burma to begin what would become a one of the most difficult, yet fruitful missionary lives ever lived in the modern era.
Within a few years of his arrival, Judson would be arrested under suspicion of being an English agent and imprisoned. He would spend nineteen months in incarceration hung up by his ankles from Bamboo poles, living in conditions that were unspeakable by any civilized standard. Having begun his early translation of the first Burmese dictionary and Bible, Anne had smuggled the manuscripts into the prison in a homemade pillow to avoid the authorities who had ransacked their personal dwelling. Because of Anne's constant interventions for him during his prison stay, Adoniram survived, and was finally released.
Not long after his release, they had their first child Maria. Unfortunately, Maria lived a very brief life and the Judsons buried her in Molmein where her grave exists to this day. Not long after burying Maria, Anne became ill and passed away in the prime of her life, leaving Adoniram alone except for the two couples who had accompanied them to Burma. For several days, Adoniram sat in a chair beside the grave of his wife in a deep depression from which many thought he would never recover. He did, and eventually remarried a missionary wife whose husband also had died. For the next thirty plus years Adoniram translated the first dictionary, a complete Burmese Bible which is still the mainstay of translations used in my classrooms today, and was responsible for the reaching of hundreds of Buddhists with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
This week I will be investing in fourth and fifth generations of Judson's converts to Christ and training them to take the gospel which Judson shared with their relatives long removed. Please pray that God would burden them greatly for those who need the gospel in a land that remains 89% Buddhist.
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