There is something significant in knowing I am not alone. When I fear the future that my children will face and the hard choices ahead for believers to stand for truth and righteousness, it always calms my heart to remember that they will not be alone either. Other believers will face the same thing and can walk that path with them. As children of God, we draw encouragement and strength from one another. The Lord designed it to be so.
Maybe that is one of the reasons I enjoy biographies. We are not alone in our Christian walks. Not only does the Lord give us believers to walk alongside now, but He has also given us many examples in those who have gone before, who faced their own sets of challenges and joys in the times that God placed them. Every time I read the biography of a brother or sister in Christ, I am encouraged and challenged in my own walk with the Lord. I am encouraged that God uses ordinary people who choose to take Him at His Word and believe that He can do extraordinary things. I am challenged to not allow material things to sidetrack me, but to keep my mind on the eternal, that I, too, may be remembered as a vessel that the Lord used.
So, with these things in mind, let me very briefly tell you what I learned from the three men whom I finished reading about yesterday in John Piper’s A Camaraderie of Confidence. (This is a book in Piper’s Swan Series, in which each book contains three short biographies.) Charles Spurgeon, George Mueller, and Hudson Taylor were contemporaries in the British Empire in the 1800s and even knew and admired one another.
, faced many challenges in life including physical illness and recurrent bouts with depression, yet said that “the good that I received from my sorrows, and pains, and griefs, is altogether incalculable… Affliction is the best bit of furniture in my house.” (Piper, 50) Honestly, I am still not hoping for affliction to come my way, but this testimony of Spurgeon gives me hope that Romans 8:28 is true. God does cause all things to work for good for those who love Him
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Mueller, well known for running orphanages without ever asking people directly for money, did so “that the hand of God evidently might be seen in the matter, that thus my fellow-believers might be encouraged more and more to trust in Him, and that also those who know not the Lord, may have a fresh proof that, indeed, it is not a vain thing to pray to God.” (Piper, 76) His life reminds me that prayer works (James 5:16), challenging me to pray more fervently.
Taylor, a missionary to China, knew great sorrow, having lost a young wife as well as five children. Yet he continued in ministry with the desire to experience the fullness of oneness with Christ, and to that end, he said, “To let my loving Savior work in me His will, my sanctification, is what I would live for by His grace. Abiding, not striving nor struggling; looking oft unto Him; trusting Him for present power; resting in the love of an almighty Savior.” (Piper, 98) His testimony challenges me to savor and be filled with the fullness of God (Eph. 3:19) as I abide in Christ (John 15:1-5).
There is so much more to say about these three men, but my hope is that you, dear reader, would be encouraged to pick up a biography yourself and allow your heart to be encouraged and challenged by faithful men and women of God who have modeled lives well lived for His glory.
--Amy O'Rear
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