Northwestern Bible School - Scroll Yearbook (Minneapolis, MN)

Page 18 text:

MISSIONARY ADONIRAM JUDSON 1783—1850 FOR DEVOTION to a cause against overwhelming odds, the name of Adoni- ram Judson shines like a star in the firmament of Christianity. Against the advice of friends and in the face of extreme opposition, he went to India as the first American missionary. He met conditions that would have discour¬ aged a less consecrated man. His own ill health and that of his beautiful wife, Ann, added terrific discouragement to the well-nigh insupportable burden of life in Burma, Converts were won with the utmost difficulty. Governmental persecution finally cast the gentle, aesthetic Judson into a filthy heathen prison. The unmentionable torture and anguish of those two years was brightened by an unbounded faith and trust in the Lord of Glory. Neither Ann nor Adoniram doubted His goodness in permitting them to be missionaries of the Cross. Judson ' s knowledge of the language and the con¬ fidence of the Burmese in his integrity led to a short release from prison, that he might assist in effecting a peace treaty between the Burmese and English governments. This altruistic act was the means whereby he gained permission to establish more missionary stations. The manuscript of the translation of the Bible over which Judson had spent many months was threatened with destruction, To preserve it, Ann sewed it into a pillow, so hard that even the jailer scorned it, Upon this Judson was permitted to lay his sore and weary head in that wretched jail. Small wonder that his greatest accomplishment was this translation of the Bible into the Burmese language, although he also completed the very difficult compila¬ tion of the Burmese dictionary. He had such a passion for souls that had there been another man qualified for these great tasks of translation he would gladly have relinquished them. He was driven to take a sea voyage because of his illness, but the ocean breezes failed to cure him. Instead, he went to be with the Lord, and his body was buried in the unquiet sepulchre. He could not have had a more fitting monument than the blue waves which visit every coast, for his warm sym¬ pathies went forth to the ends of the earth. God used this humble vessel to shine in a dark place and to light thousands of benighted souls to Christ, because he counted all things but loss that he might win Christ '

Page 20 text:

HYMN WRITER FRANCES JANE CROSBY 1820—1915 WHAT believing soul has not been comforted by the words of this hymn: Safe in the arms of Jesus Safe on His gentle breast, There by His love o ' er shadowed Sweetly my soul shall rest? This favorite hymn of Miss Crosby ' s is only one of the eight thousand poems from her facile pen, many of which have become permanent and valuable additions to our religious literature, Fanny Crosby was born in Putnam County, New York, March 24, 1820. The story of her blindness from her own lips is a rebuke to our spirit of complaint: When about six weeks old, I was taken sick and my eyes grew very weak; those who had charge of me poulticed my eyes. Their lack of knowledge and skill destroyed my sight forever? ' Later her mothers consolation to her was that God sometimes deprived persons of a physical faculty in order that the spiritual insight might be more fully awake. She herself says, 1 verily believe that it was His intention that I should live my days in dark¬ ness, so as to better sing His praises and incite others to do so? ' The secret of Miss Crosby ' s influence lay in a little jewel called Content. With Paul, she could say, ll I have learned in whatsoever state I am, therein to be content? ' At the age of eight she wrote these beautiful lines: O what a happy soul am I! Although I cannot see, I am resolved that in this world Contented I will be. How many blessings I enjoy. That other people don ' t; To weep and sigh because 1m blind, I cannot, and I won ' t? ' Today she rests in Him; she has laid down a beautiful consecrated life, but her hymns continue to bring praise and glory to His Name.