Each clickety-clack of
the train wheels bounced the Vietnamese Christian woman’s frail body
painfully on the hard wooden seat. But she was on a mission.
She needed spiritual food
for the Christians she led in North Vietnam. Three congregations of
people were praying that their leader would be successful and bring back
precious copies of the Bible.
Her work back home was tiring. She was the only mature Christian in
the area,
and she had planted the three churches from nothing,
winning one soul at a time through her personal witness. She had no car
or even a bicycle. She walked or paddled a small wooden boat to her
church meetings.
She had faced police threats and harassment and her Buddhist
parents’ dismay because of her faith. Now she rode the train across
eight hundred miles for three consecutive days,
hoping to find one believer who could help. Finally she reached Ho Chi
Minh City.
There she met visiting western Christians who gave her Bibles for
the Christians in the North. They also gave her a bicycle to help her
minister to the three congregations. Before leaving,
they prayed together,
asking God’s blessing on her travel and her ministry.
“How old are you?” one of them asked,
just as she was about to leave.
The woman smoothed strands of black hair away from her face and
whispered,
“I’m twenty-two.”
Child prodigies have special abilities beyond their years. We may know
of someone who finished college at age fifteen or wrote a symphony
before age twelve or who excelled at a sport by age sixteen. Often our
response is jealousy; we wish we could do something great in our youth
and gain recognition for it too. The Vietnamese Christian woman did just
that,
but she probably didn’t have any special abilities above those of her
peers. She did,
however,
have a desire to follow Jesus and to bring him to the people of her
country. Christ calls you to be diligent for him as well. Sharing God’s
love is simple enough that it requires no special abilities—just your
availability.