If in the sight of God you cannot say you are sure that you have a special call to stay at home, why are you disobeying the Saviour's plain command to go?
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of following one's calling and the duty to act in accordance with spiritual responsibilities.
Hudson Taylor's quote reflects the tension between comfort and duty, urging individuals to pursue their true purpose rather than remain in a place of complacency. It challenges the reader to reconsider their commitment to their beliefs and the extent to which they are willing to act upon them, especially when it comes to serving others and fulfilling a spiritual mission.
In practice
In a sermon discussing missionary work, this quote can inspire attendees to consider their personal call to service.
We are not only to renounce evil, but to manifest the truth. We tell people the world is vain; let our lives manifest that it is so. We tell them that our home is above and that all these things are transitory. Does our dwelling look like it? O to live consistent lives!
Brother, if you would enter that Province, you must go forward on your knees.
Too often we attempt to work for God to the limit of our incompetency, rather than to the limit of God's omnipotency.
When I get to China, I will have no claim on any one for anything. My claim will be alone in God and I must learn before I leave England to move men through God by prayer alone.
The prayer power has never been tried to its full capacity...if we want to see mighty wonders of divine power and grace wrought in the place of weakness, failure and disappointment, let us answer God's standing challenge, "Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and show thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not."
I have seen many men work without praying, though I have never seen any good come out of it; but I have never seen a man pray without working.
Don't despair too much if you see beautiful things destroyed, if you see them perish. Because the best things are always growing in secret.
Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream, so shall you become.
I found the purpose of my existence, and also the purpose of my circumstance. There's a purpose for why you're in the fire. If God can use a man without arms and legs to be His hands and feet, then He will certainly use any willing heart!
When all doors are shut and you have nowhere to go, that is when you go within. Every crisis is an opportunity and you are the beginning.
I'm 9, 10, and I'm watching the Apollo astronauts go to the moon. We're sitting on the floor of a school, and they have this... huge TV, and I'm looking at that, and I'm thinking 'Me, I would like to do that.' But it didn't dawn on me then that they were American; I was Canadian. They were men; I was a girl. They were test pilots, military folks.
Reach high, for stars lie hidden in you. Dream deep, for every dream precedes the goal.
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