James Hudson Taylor (1832–1905) was an English missionary to China for 51 years. He founded the China Inland Mission (CIM), which at his death included more than 200 missions stations with more than 800 missionaries, 125 schools and more than 100,000 Christians.
This year marks the 150th anniversary of the founding of CIM.
Taylor was born in Barnsley, England, on May 21, 1832, to James and Amelia Taylor. Before his birth, the Methodist couple prayed that their newborn would serve God in China.
Finding Christ
During his teen years he became skeptical and worldly. At age 17 he went into his father’s library and picked up a gospel tract. At the same moment, 70 miles away, his mother was praying until she received confirmation of his salvation. Taylor read the tract titled, “It is Finished.” He prayed and received Christ as Savior.
In December 1849 he committed himself to going to China as a missionary. He began studying Mandarin, Greek, Hebrew and Latin.
Taylor was baptized into the Plymouth Brethren church in 1852. That year he studied medicine at Royal London Hospital in preparation for working in China.
Taylor left England on Sept. 19, 1853, for China and arrived in Shanghai in March 1854. He took a radical step for missionaries and dressed in Chinese clothes and grew a pigtail. He traveled to the interior distributing Chinese Bibles and tracts. He faced many hardships including civil war, fires and famine but always prayed to God for deliverance.
In 1858, Taylor married Maria Dyer, the daughter of missionaries in China. Because of Taylor’s health problems, the Taylors returned to England in 1861. He completed medical studies, revised a Chinese New Testament and recruited missionaries. He became friends with English Baptist minister Charles Spurgeon, who became a lifelong supporter.
On June 25, 1865, in Brighton, England, Taylor founded CIM to evangelize unreached inland provinces of China. CIM accepted missionaries of different denominations and relied solely on God for all its needs. Taylor is known for repeatedly saying, “God’s work done in God’s way will never lack God’s supply.“
Taylor prayed for 24 missionaries to serve through CIM. The Taylors went back to China in 1866 along with 18 missionaries. Another 18 arrived in 1870. Then another hundred. Finally more than 800 missionaries ministered across the interior of China.
Taylor loved Christ and China. His words spoke of that love: “If I had a thousand pounds, China should have it — if I had a thousand lives, China should have them. No. Not China, but Christ.”
Family life
The Taylors had 13 children, three of whom died. After his wife died in 1870, Taylor married Jennie Faulding the following year. They had two children and then she died in 1904.
Taylor took 11 furloughs during his 51 years in China. He returned to Shanghai in March 1905 for the last time. On June 3, 1905, he died and was buried in the Protestant Cemetery in Zhenjiang. His remains were reburied near a church in Zhenjiang in August 2013.
Today Taylor’s work continues as CIM is now OMF-International, which has more than 3,000 workers from 30 countries.
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