Hudson Taylor, The Dead Man

“You are a dead man!” the doctor exclaimed.  “Go home as fast as you can and get your affairs in order before it’s too late!”  Hudson Taylor was in London studying medicine in preparation for missionary work in China.  While performing a dissection,  he had pricked his finger with a
contaminated needle and was immediately infected with malignant fever.  The average man would have fled home horrified, perhaps cursing God for his misfortune, but Taylor calmly replied, “If I should die, I will have the joy of being with my Master in heaven.  However, I believe that I shall not die, for God has a work awaiting me in China, and however severe the struggle, I must be brought through.”  Hudson Taylor died that day.  No, not
physically, but inwardly he had completely resigned himself to the will of His Heavenly Father, and was prepared by life or by death to glorify His name.  Hudson barely made it to his house where he collapsed on the stairs and had to be carried to his room.  Two of his fellow students who had encountered the same misfortune died of the fever, but not Hudson Taylor.  After days of intense physical suffering, he recovered.  God was not
finished with this man of faith, and now, having come through the fire for the finer, Hudson went on to be one of the most greatly used men of God this world has ever seen. Let us ask ourselves this question.  Have you died yet?  No, your heart may still be beating, but have you died to self?  Is your life, its circumstances, activities and ambitions, entirely committed to the use of the Lord Jesus Christ?  The question is not, “Are you trusting him”, for this must be assumed if we are to ask ourselves, “Does He control you?”  Do you see and accept His Divine hand in all the downfalls and uprisings of your life?  Have you prepared yourself as a finely tuned instrument, ready at a moments notice to fly to His service whatever it may be, or are you living according to the whims of your own self worth?  Can it be said of you my friend, “You are a dead man?”