Page 310 - Three Score Years & Ten
P. 310
“THREE SCORE YEARS AND TEN” MISSIONARY WORK IN CHINA
Amy Moore
three boys were going to take everything we had, but we could only commit that to our Heavenly
Father. Then the Becks wrote to us from Xixiang and said as their little Murray was going for the first
time to school, Jack felt he should fly down with him and see him settled in, and unless Percy
particularly wanted to go, Jack would be happy to look after our boys too. What a wonderful provision!
And as Percy would have to go to Shanghai for Council Meetings before long anyway, it would not be
long before he saw the boys again.
Just to keep us from getting too excited, we had just got all our accounts sorted out and the boys fares
reckoned for, when we heard that air fares had trebled! So much for life in China.
Jack and Murray came and stayed with us, and Percy decided he would go as far as Xi’an with them
and see our boys off on the plane. They were all going on the public bus from Hanzhong over the
mountains, but then a friend from the airfield came to see us and told Percy he could help them get a
ride on an Air Force truck for nothing. With our finances in the state they were, we felt this was God’s
provision. Then the rain began so all buses and trucks were held up for three days. Then the driver of
the Air Force truck said they would all have to go out to Baocheng and get another truck there as his
was loaded. Mr. Ma, Percy’s Air Force friend, offered to drive us all out to Baocheng next morning.
Dorothy and I would go that far to see them off.
Next morning the rain was pelting down again so no Mr. Ma. But about 12:30 the rain had eased and
Frank came running up the path to say Mr. Ma was waiting for us, so while the man got the luggage
onto his truck, I managed to get the children to eat some lunch, though they were all too excited to eat
much.
The road outside Hanzhong was not too bad, but about halfway to Baocheng a small bridge had
broken down and we had to make a detour. The detour took us through a ploughed field and of
course we got bogged. The more we tried to move, the deeper we got into the mud and more we
churned it up. We did get out eventually, but when we reached Baocheng we were told that the truck
Mr. Ma had been counting on had just left. There was nothing we could do but turn round and come
home.
It had started raining again and as our car had no cover, we just sat there and got wet, so by the time
we reached home, all the clean travelling clothes the children were wearing were either wet or muddy
or both. I spent the rest of the day washing them and trying to dry them over a big wicker basket affair
put over the charcoal fire. After all that, they did get away eventually and Percy was able to see them
all off in the plane from Xi’an. He stayed on then for a week of meetings in one of the northern
stations before returning home. Dorothy was disappointed when he came back without the boys, and
she missed Frank who had been her constant friend and mentor since birth.
I missed them all but kept myself busy by having a Daily Vacation Bible School for the Chinese
children. It lasted for a week and I had an average of fifty each day. I got some of the older young
people in the church to help me, and it was a great success. Each day we emphasized a subject from
the life of Christ which brought out the need of salvation. A group of them stayed behind at the end of
the week to say they wanted to be Christians, so I started a regular weekly meeting for Bible study for
them to which some of the other Christian young people also came.
Percy was actually away three weeks, partly because the plane the boys and Jack were to travel on
was delayed twice before they actually got away and partly because of meetings he needed to attend
in one of the northern churches.
310
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Contents
Amy Moore
three boys were going to take everything we had, but we could only commit that to our Heavenly
Father. Then the Becks wrote to us from Xixiang and said as their little Murray was going for the first
time to school, Jack felt he should fly down with him and see him settled in, and unless Percy
particularly wanted to go, Jack would be happy to look after our boys too. What a wonderful provision!
And as Percy would have to go to Shanghai for Council Meetings before long anyway, it would not be
long before he saw the boys again.
Just to keep us from getting too excited, we had just got all our accounts sorted out and the boys fares
reckoned for, when we heard that air fares had trebled! So much for life in China.
Jack and Murray came and stayed with us, and Percy decided he would go as far as Xi’an with them
and see our boys off on the plane. They were all going on the public bus from Hanzhong over the
mountains, but then a friend from the airfield came to see us and told Percy he could help them get a
ride on an Air Force truck for nothing. With our finances in the state they were, we felt this was God’s
provision. Then the rain began so all buses and trucks were held up for three days. Then the driver of
the Air Force truck said they would all have to go out to Baocheng and get another truck there as his
was loaded. Mr. Ma, Percy’s Air Force friend, offered to drive us all out to Baocheng next morning.
Dorothy and I would go that far to see them off.
Next morning the rain was pelting down again so no Mr. Ma. But about 12:30 the rain had eased and
Frank came running up the path to say Mr. Ma was waiting for us, so while the man got the luggage
onto his truck, I managed to get the children to eat some lunch, though they were all too excited to eat
much.
The road outside Hanzhong was not too bad, but about halfway to Baocheng a small bridge had
broken down and we had to make a detour. The detour took us through a ploughed field and of
course we got bogged. The more we tried to move, the deeper we got into the mud and more we
churned it up. We did get out eventually, but when we reached Baocheng we were told that the truck
Mr. Ma had been counting on had just left. There was nothing we could do but turn round and come
home.
It had started raining again and as our car had no cover, we just sat there and got wet, so by the time
we reached home, all the clean travelling clothes the children were wearing were either wet or muddy
or both. I spent the rest of the day washing them and trying to dry them over a big wicker basket affair
put over the charcoal fire. After all that, they did get away eventually and Percy was able to see them
all off in the plane from Xi’an. He stayed on then for a week of meetings in one of the northern
stations before returning home. Dorothy was disappointed when he came back without the boys, and
she missed Frank who had been her constant friend and mentor since birth.
I missed them all but kept myself busy by having a Daily Vacation Bible School for the Chinese
children. It lasted for a week and I had an average of fifty each day. I got some of the older young
people in the church to help me, and it was a great success. Each day we emphasized a subject from
the life of Christ which brought out the need of salvation. A group of them stayed behind at the end of
the week to say they wanted to be Christians, so I started a regular weekly meeting for Bible study for
them to which some of the other Christian young people also came.
Percy was actually away three weeks, partly because the plane the boys and Jack were to travel on
was delayed twice before they actually got away and partly because of meetings he needed to attend
in one of the northern churches.
310
Return to Table of
Contents
