One Cash Left

“The young lions suffer want and hunger; but those who seek the LORD lack no good thing.” — Psalm 34:10 (ESV)

By now Taylor had settled in Ningpo and had done something that made the money question far sharper: he had resigned from the society that paid his salary, because it had fallen into debt, and Taylor was convinced from Scripture that he should “owe no man anything.” He would depend on God directly — no salary, no fundraising appeals, no borrowing. Over the mantelpiece in the house he shared with his fellow-worker Mr. Jones, two scrolls hung in Chinese characters: Ebenezer — “Hitherto the Lord has helped us” — and Jehovah-Jireh — “The Lord will provide.” They were about to be tested to the last coin.

The two men were also feeding the poor — sometimes seventy destitute people came for breakfast every day. And the money ran out. It ran out so completely that on the 6th of January 1858 they were down to a single cash between them — a coin worth about a twentieth of a penny. There was enough in the house for one thin breakfast, and after that, nothing: no food, and no money to buy any.

They decided, reluctantly, to sell something. The one thing the Chinese would readily buy was an iron stove they owned, though they hated to part with it. So they set off on foot to the foundry. To get there they needed to cross the river by a floating bridge of boats — but when they arrived, the bridge was gone. It had been swept away during the night. The only way across now was a ferry, and the ferry cost two cash a person. They had one. The road was, quite literally, closed. There was nothing to do but turn around and walk home, and wait for God.

Back at the house they searched the cupboards and found no food — only a small packet of cocoa, which they made with hot water and which somewhat revived them. Mr. Jones had been invited to dine at a friend’s that day, but he refused to go and leave Taylor to go hungry alone. And then the two men got down on their knees together and prayed the plainest prayer there is: give us this day our daily bread. While they were still kneeling, a letter arrived from England. Inside was a remittance of money — enough not only for that day, but for the days after. Taylor’s marriage, as it happened, had already been fixed for exactly fourteen days later. God had cut it that fine, and no finer.

Do not turn this into a promise that God always shows up at the last second with cash. Taylor himself was scrupulously honest that his faith “often, often failed,” that the difficulty was real, and that the hunger that day was real. What the story shows is not that following God is financially safe — it plainly was not — but that God can be depended on right down to the last cash, and that he often lets you get there.

That is the part people miss. Taylor did not have a comfortable margin that made trust easy. He got all the way to one coin, a swept-away bridge, and a cup of cocoa. God did not spare him the emptiness; he met him at the bottom of it. And Taylor came out saying he would not have missed the trial for anything, because it taught him God in a way comfort never could have.

You will probably not be down to a twentieth of a penny. But you will hit real limits — of money, of ability, of options — where you genuinely cannot see how it works out, and where every escape route is a swept-away bridge. The lesson of the cocoa is not that God removes those moments. It is that he is trustworthy inside them, and that the bottom is often exactly where you finally meet him.

One thing to do when you hit a wall you cannot see past: instead of scrambling to manufacture your own escape or quietly panicking, name the need as plainly as Taylor did — “give us this day our daily bread” — and take it to God specifically before you take it anywhere else. He let two grown men get down to one coin and a packet of cocoa, and he did not let them fall.