"How few there are who die so hard."

The Difficult Death of Adoniram Judson

Yesterday (April 12, 2010) marked the 160th anniversary of the death of Adoniram Judson, America's first foreign missionary. For 38 years—through imprisonment, torture, illness, deep depression, isolation from family and friends, and the loss of two wives and numerous children—he suffered to bring the gospel to the unreached peoples of Burma.

At age 61 he fell ill for the last time. John Piper recounts those final days:

The only hope was to send the desperately ill Judson on a voyage. On April 3, 1850 they carried Adoniram onto the Aristide Mariebound for the Isle of France with one friend, Thomas Ranney, to care for him. In his misery he would be roused from time to time by terrible pain ending in vomiting. One of his last sentences was: "How few there are who . . . who die so hard!"
At 15 minutes after 4 on Friday afternoon April 12, 1850 Adoniram Judson died at sea, away from all his family and Burmese Church. That evening the ship hove to.
"The crew assembled quietly. The larboard port was opened. There were no prayers. . . . The captain gave the order. The coffin slid through the port into the night" (To the Golden Shore, p. 505).

He died in obscurity, but to this day the fruit of Judson's life and death proves the promise Jesus gave in John 12:24: "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit." As Piper observes,

Today it is estimated that the Myanmar (Burma's new name) Baptist Convention to be 3,700 congregations with 617,781 members and 1,900,000 affiliates—the fruit of [Judson's] dead seed.

What significance does this have for us today? Piper asks the hard question, especially of pastors:

Are you sure that God wants you to be a pastor in this comparatively church-saturated land? Or might he be calling you to fill up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ, to fall like a grain of wheat into some distant ground and die, to hate your life in this world and so to keep it forever and bear much fruit?
[...]
The question, brothers, is not whether we will die, but whether we will die in a way that bears much fruit.

* * *

Read or listen to the rest of John Piper's biography of Judson.

God Is Great. God Is Good.

Usually part of a childhood table grace, these six words make up one of the most theologically astute prayers a person can utter.

That is, when it is understood.

At first glance, it could be the most theologically problematic. Most of God's perfections, especially His greatness and goodness, seem to be irreconcilable with life's often harsh realities. If God is great then He becomes some kind of monster if he allows human suffering that he could stop. That kind of God is definitely not good. But neither is he very great if in His goodness He would stop or remove the pain yet is powerless to do so.

We have cancer in our family; we have know it for about a week now. We don't know the future because God has not shown it yet - doctors do not have enough data to give us a prognosis or even set out the treatment options. Nevertheless, we are strong. This means that right now the prayer's significance comes precisely at those two points: His goodness and His greatness as they relate to the perennial so-called "problem of pain."

We are realistic. Both of us have run the emotional gamut. We do not accept simplistic answers to big questions and there is nothing cavalier in our attitudes. We know very well what we are up against.

But, neither have we even come close to asking, "Why me?" "How could God allow such a thing?" We ask none of these questions because we know the answer and we are completely satisfied with it's logic and fairness.

What we DO find ourselves wondering is, "Why not us?" "Why not this?" We might even ask, "Why has there not been even more of this?"

The writer, Terry Johnson, points out that we tend to approach the question of pain and suffering from the wrong direction. We get off on the wrong foot by beginning with a presumption of human innocence instead of human guilt. We might ask for example, "Why would God allow this to happen to such a fine person who deserves so much better?"

In Genesis God promised death to Adam and his progeny. Final death is postponed but in the meantime, life consists of multiple mini-judgments; "mini" because they fall short of eternal death in hell. The fact is that every minute that we spend this side of hell is a problem.

In reality, the problem is not one of pain but one of pleasure. Why are we permitted to enjoy as much pleasure as we do and to escape as much pain as we do? Strict justice demands hell. Anything less than that - injury, poverty, hunger, heartbreak, or cancer - is mercy; "stays of execution," as it were.

While we rejoice in our deliverance from hell's final punishment, the residuals of the death that entered the world through one man's sin, frequently remind of both a great deliverance to come and of the glorified bodies that await us in a future eternal state.

For our family then, the bottom line is simply this:

God is great. God is good.

Out of His greatness and goodness He has ordained suffering. Terry Johnson: "That suffering has a purpose and knowing this, we will not be shaken. Our sovereign and powerful God is on His throne, we are in His hand, our circumstances are His doing, and He is working them for our good."

Hmmmm . . . sounds a bit like Job, doesn't it?