Priscilla Papers Vol. 18, No. 3 (Summer 2004)

Not to be Forgotten: Gladys Aylward 1902-1970 Missionary to China LESLIE HAMMOND n 1930, a young woman named Gladys Aylward left the could. The Japanese placed a price of $100 on her head, but suburbs of London and set out for China, convicted that Aylward refused to seek her own safety (“Christians never Ishe was meant to preach the gospel to the people of this retreat,” she wrote angrily to a Chinese guerilla warrior remote land. Rejected by the China Inland Mission because who wished to save her). Instead she gathered up the 100 her “advanced age” of 28 made her too old to learn orphans under her care and walked with them for twelve Chinese, she headed for the mission field entirely without days and nights to the Yellow River. The government had support. Her resources were a meager two pounds nine seized all civilian boats to keep them out of Japanese pence, far short of the ship fare of the time, so her journey hands, and there was seemingly no way to cross. Aylward encompassed train, boat, bus, and mule before she finally and her orphans knelt, prayed, and sang, and soon their arrived in the city of Yangchen in a mountainous region just prayers were answered in the form of a Chinese patrol boat south of present-day Beijing. that gave them safe passage. Aylward delivered her charges Upon arrival in Yangchen, Aylward teamed up with to an orphanage at Xian and then collapsed with typhus another lone missionary, an elderly Scotswoman named fever. Upon recovery she traveled from village to village, Jeannie Lawson. As practical as she was idealistic, Aylward caring for the wounded victims of the Chinese-Japanese realized immediately that the local people were not recep- conflict. tive to foreigners and that she needed a subtle and non-con- Although her health remained unstable for the rest of frontational method of reaching them with the gospel. She her life, Aylward continued her Christian work with char- and Lawson seized upon the idea of opening an inn that acteristic fervor, starting a Christian church in Xian and would attract the commercial travelers that came though working at a leper settlement in Szechwan. After suffering Yangchen on their way to other cities. Along with clean injuries during World War II, she returned to England in beds, good food, and care for the travelers’ mules, the two 1947, where she preached and lectured widely and founded women provided evening entertainment in the form of sto- the “Gladys Aylward Charitable Trust” for orphans. In 1953 ries about a man named Jesus. The story-loving Chinese she returned to China, where she ran an orphanage in retold the Bible tales as they continued their travels, and the Taipei, Taiwan. gospel message was soon spreading along with the fame of During the latter years of her life, Aylward achieved the innkeepers. international fame through a 1957 biography entitled Small Despite the earlier predictions of the China Inland Woman, which was made into the popular movie Inn of the Mission, Aylward quickly mastered the local Chinese Sixth Happiness starring Ingrid Bergman. Aylward was dialect and won the respect of the citizenry. Among her deeply embarrassed by the Hollywood version of her admirers was the Mandarin of Yangchen, who appointed Christian walk and did not welcome the attention it brought her as the local foot inspector in charge of enforcing the her. Toward the end of her life, she wrote, “My heart is full new law against the ancient custom of foot binding. In this of praise that one so insignificant, uneducated, and ordi- role, she traveled widely and was able to share Christ as she nary in every way could be used to his glory for the bless- went about her official duties. Soon the Chinese were call- ing of his people in poor persecuted China.” Aylward died ing her “Ai-weh-deh,” which meant the “virtuous one.” in 1970 in Taiwan. During her travels as foot inspector, Aylward came upon a woman begging by the road with a small child and Reprinted with permission from PRISM Magazine, pub- soon learned that it was not the woman's child but rather an lished by Evangelicals for Social action—(800) 650-6600. orphan that she had kidnapped to aid her begging. Aylward http://www.esa-online.org/prism/home.php. bought the child for a handful of coins and took her under her own care. Soon that orphan was joined by another and CORRECTION then another, and Gladys Aylward’s mission to the orphans In Aída Besançon Spencer’s article titled “What are the Biblical of China was born. Roles of Female and Male Followers of Christ” (PRISCILLA In 1938, war came to Yangchen when the Japanese PAPERS vol. 18, no. 2), there was an error on page 13 at the bot- bombed the city, killing many and driving the survivors to tom of the left column. In the sentence, “The assembled church the mountains. By now a Chinese citizen, Aylward passed specified that the Son is ‘not inferior in power, not alike [the on military information to the Chinese army whenever she Father] in glory,’” the word “alike” should have been “unlike.” PRISCILLA PAPERS / Summer 2004 18:3 25.

Load more