Adoniram Judson: The Man Who Hid the Bible in a Pillow

Adoniram Judson was one of the very first people from America ever to sail across the world as a missionary. In 1812 he and his young wife Ann set out for Burma, a faraway land in Asia where almost no one had heard of Jesus. It was a brave and lonely thing to do; nobody had shown them how.

Burma was hard. The language was hard, the climate was hard, and for six long years Adoniram preached and taught and waited before even a single Burmese person believed. But Adoniram had set his heart on one enormous task above all: to translate the whole Bible into the Burmese language, so that the people could read God's words for themselves. Year after year he worked at it, page after page.

Then war broke out between Burma and Britain, and because Adoniram was a foreigner, the frightened rulers threw him into a dreadful prison. He was chained and kept in the heat and the dark for nearly two years, not knowing if he would ever come out alive.

In all that misery, one worry gnawed at him more than any other. His Bible translation — years and years of precious work — was hidden at home, and if it were found and destroyed, it could never be replaced. His wife Ann thought of a clever, brave plan. She sewed the great bundle of papers inside a hard, lumpy pillow and carried it into the prison for Adoniram to rest his head on. The rough guards, wanting something soft and fine, turned up their noses at the ugly, uncomfy pillow and left it alone — and so, night after night, Adoniram slept on the Bible, and it was saved.

At last the war ended and Adoniram was freed. Worn out and grieving — for faithful Ann did not live long after — he finished the work anyway. He gave the people of Burma the whole Bible in their own language, and it is still read there today. Adoniram Judson had learned that God's work is worth waiting for, worth suffering for, and worth guarding — even inside an ugly pillow.