Owe No Man Any Thing

Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. ROMANS 13:8

No part of Hudson Taylor’s teaching has been more admired, imitated or argued about than his principles of money. The China Inland Mission guaranteed its workers no salary. It would not go into debt. And it would not solicit funds: no personal appeals, no collections, no collecting-books. A saying long attached to Taylor’s name puts it in a sentence: God’s work done in God’s way will never lack God’s supply. Whether or not those were ever his exact words, they are a fair summary of what he believed.

A society in debt

The principle was born in Ningbo in 1856 and 1857. Taylor was then an agent of the Chinese Evangelisation Society, and he noticed that the society was frequently in debt; the bills he was instructed to draw were often met with borrowed money. He himself had always avoided debt. But could that which was wrong for one Christian be right for an association of Christians?

His reasoning in A Retrospect is worth reading slowly. To borrow money seemed to him “a confession that God had withheld some good thing, and a determination to get for ourselves what He had not given.” He could not believe that God was poor, or short of resources, or unwilling to supply what His work really needed. So he drew a startling conclusion: “if there were lack of funds to carry on work, then to that degree, in that special development, or at that time, it could not be the work of God.”

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. PSALM 23:1

In 1857 he resigned from the society, and his colleague John Jones did the same. They parted without ill feeling. Taylor had no friends from whom he expected support, and was ready to work for his own living if God did not supply. But God did. The story of the one remaining cash, the broken bridge of boats and the remittance that arrived while they were on their knees is told in the same chapter, and he adds a line that sums up the whole: “I would not, if I could, be otherwise than I am — entirely dependent myself upon the Lord, and used as a channel of help to others.”

Not asking, but praying

When the mission was formed in 1865 the principle was built into its foundations. Taylor determined never to use personal solicitation, make collections or issue collecting-books. Why? Partly because he did not want to divert money from existing societies. But chiefly because he was convinced from Scripture that the way to obtain workers and means was not, in his words, “elaborate appeals for help, but, first, earnest prayer to God to thrust forth labourers, and, second, the deepening of the spiritual life of the church.”

Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest. MATTHEW 9:38

A Retrospect tells of a lecture he gave on China in 1866, on the condition that there be no collection. The chairman proposed one anyway, and Taylor insisted on the condition. He wanted people to go home burdened with China’s need and to ask God what He would have them do. He added that the tendency of a collection was “to leave the impression that the all-important thing was money, whereas no amount of money could convert a single soul.” The next morning the chairman, who had spent much of the night in prayer, handed him a cheque for five hundred pounds. That morning’s post had brought an offer of the whole passenger space of the Lammermuir.

Taylor compared that season to Exodus 36, where Moses had to restrain the people from bringing more gifts for the tabernacle. He thought that if there were less solicitation and more dependence on the Holy Spirit, that would be the common experience of the Church.

For the stuff they had was sufficient for all the work to make it, and too much. EXODUS 36:7

Giving to a rich Christ

Behind the method lay a view of God. In his address Coming to the King, Taylor asks a question that cuts deep: “Do we not often give to a poor Christ rather than to a rich one?” We give, he says, when His work is in straits, moved by the recital of need. But the Queen of Sheba brought her gifts to Solomon not because he was poor but because he was glorious. Taylor wanted Christians to give to Christ out of worship, not pity, and he wanted Christian workers to depend on the King, not on the sympathy of His subjects.

The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the LORD of hosts. HAGGAI 2:8

God is not poor. His work does not hang on our cleverness in raising funds. Much Christian fundraising, then and now, has been manipulative, anxious or unscrupulous, and Taylor’s protest against it still stands.

Where care is needed

But here he must be read with care. First, Scripture does not forbid asking. Paul asked the Corinthians plainly for the collection for Jerusalem and wrote two chapters urging them to give generously (2 Corinthians 8–9). Many faithful missions and churches make their needs known openly, and it would be wrong to treat them as less spiritual. Taylor’s method was a calling for his mission; it is not a law for the Church. His conclusion that a lack of funds proves a work is not of God is especially too strong. The apostles themselves were at times hungry and in want (1 Corinthians 4:11).

Second, the line between praying and appealing is finer than it looks. The mission published a magazine, China’s Millions, which reported its work and needs to thousands of readers. But it shows that information and appeal are not always easy to separate, and critics were quick to say so.

Third, a no-appeal policy can place a heavy burden on workers. Missionaries who were promised nothing sometimes received very little, and some lived close to want. Taylor shared their hardship and never asked of others what he did not bear himself, but the burden was real.

But godliness with contentment is great gain. 1 TIMOTHY 6:6

Fourth, and most subtly, such a principle can become a boast. It is easy to take quiet pride in not asking, and to look down on those who do. Taylor’s own emphasis was on the faithfulness of God, not on the virtue of those who trusted Him.

What remains, when all these cautions are made, is a challenge that every Christian and every church can hear. Do we trust God to supply what He wants done? Do we keep out of debt that presumes on a provision He has not given? And do we pray first, and then speak, rather than speak and forget to pray?

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. Look honestly at any debt you carry and ask whether it presumes on a provision God has not given. Make a plan to be free of it.

2. Before you next ask anyone for help with a need, spend a set time bringing it to God first.

3. Examine your giving: do you give mainly when moved by crisis, or as worship to a rich Christ?

4. If you belong to a church or ministry, pray for its finances by name, and ask whether its fundraising honours God.

5. Guard against pride: if you have adopted a principle of faith in money matters, refuse to judge those who work differently.

A PRAYER

Lord of the harvest, the silver and the gold are Yours, and You are not poor. Forgive me for the anxiety that forgets it.

Keep me from debt that presumes on You, and from fundraising that trusts in pressure rather than in prayer.

Teach me to give to You as to a glorious King, not as to a beggar, and to depend on You rather than on the sympathy of others.

And keep me from pride in any way of trusting You that I have chosen. Let the glory be Yours alone. Amen.