Hudson Taylor-The Cambridge Seven

By Mary Vee

Year: 1884 

Hudson Taylor: age 52

From J. Hudson Taylor's Notes
Cambridge Seven Part 1

Cambridge University Photo Courtesy

There are times when God wants us to let Him drop wonderful gifts in our laps. Much like the finances that He provided from people we never asked or had even met!

There are other times when God wants us to do our part. We had asked Him for seventy new missionaries to go to China to help with the work.

I met with Mr. Dwight L. Moody had become quite famous as an evangelist. He wanted to help us find the men and women who would be called by God to be missionaries to China.

Moody and a his friend, Sankey received an invitation to speak at Cambridge University for a week of meetings. They arrived on a Sunday and felt maybe they should leave. They didn't dress like proper cultured Englishmen, nor did they act like one. 

The turn out for first meeting surprised the men. One thousand, seven hundred students showed up. The men stepped onto the platform and prepared to speak. The students mocked them and made fun of them.

Sanky sang a few hymns. Sadly, at the end of each verse someone from the crowd shouted 'Encore', which usually is a compliment but not this time. The student said it with a sarcastic voice. Mr. Sanky kept singing what he planned and ignored the rude behavior.

When he finished, Mr. Moody came to the platform to speak. Several students from the crowd interrupted him with mean words, but he kept talking as if he couldn't hear them. At the end of his message Mr. Moody invited anyone who wanted to stay for a time of pray to come forward. Four hundred students stayed to pray while the others left.

God had blessed this meeting way more than Mr. Moody realized. Among the four hundred students who stayed to pray were seven men who God would use to do great things.

While many students came to cause problems at this meeting, God used the meeting for His good. Next week I will tell you about some of the men. You may have heard of them.

J. Hudson Taylor

Missionary to China--Inland China!

So Very Blessed by God

Research resources: J. Hudson Taylor, An Autobiography by J. Hudson Taylor; It is Not Death to Die, a new biography of Hudson Taylor by Jim Cromarty; Hudson Taylor Founder, China Inland Mission by Vance Christie; J. Hudson Taylor, A Man in Christ, by Roger Steer, and Hudson Taylor's Spiritual Secret by Dr.and Mrs. Howard Taylor