“‘Pebbles in a brook polish one another'”—thank God for the pebbles of His Lisu Church.” So wrote Isobel Kuhn, who with her husband John spent more than 20 years in China and Thailand as China Inland Mission missionaries, specifically among the Lisu people. The bright countenance of an aged and faithful believer and the humble prayers of young Christians helped her to persevere when faced with her own self-doubt and “ordinariness.”*

In her book Nests Above the Abyss, Isobel ends with several biographies of Lisu Christians—the many “pebbles” that made up the Church in Yunnan province. She wrote:

“Old Big, a rough country farmer, accepted the Lord the first time he heard of Him, when the gospel was given in Pine Mountain Village. His hut was on the lowest level of the village, but his mansion is in glory. Until he died, I never heard of his dishonouring the Lord in any way. I always looked forward to his beaming smile and a loving handshake on Sunday morning. About 65 years old, his kindly face was a token of ‘the adding up of days in which good work is done.’ Some others of the Lisu saints may have given us heartache or worry from time to time but never Old Big. Beside him was his sweet, happy-faced wife. Charles named them Zacharias and Elizabeth, for in these latter years they truly walked blameless.

On Sundays he used to sit up near the front, the light on his face was never dim. Too old to learn to read, he always sat up close to the front and with a radiant countenance did his best to memorise hymns, texts and sermon outline, so that I had long regarded him as my special Sunday joy. During the week he held services in his own home for his neighbours and preached and sang from memory, and how his face glowed with beatific joy when he sang.”

Like all saints, Old Big did not escape the sharp wind of trials.

Sometimes inclement weather would destroy much of their crop, the year’s food supply. Isobel wrote, “I remember how his face was set—‘The most important thing,’ He said, ‘is eternal life’.” He was determined to walk in a godly manner in all things, and wind or no wind, he did.

Isobel & John developed the Rainy Season Bible School for the edification of the Lisu people. These classes were taught by the Kuhns and others. “From these classes, countless Lisu took the Christian message to untold numbers of nationals and travellers throughout China.”

One of Isobel’s joys, when it was not her turn to teach a Bible School class, was to sit in the back of the room and listen. She jotted down a few sentences from their prayers to share with her supporters a glimpse into the hearts of the Lisu Christians:

“Thy name is written on my heart and my name is written on Thy hands, so we cannot be separated.”

“Lord, I’m not worthy to be Thy slave and Thou has made me Thy friend. I am worthy of death, and Thou has given me eternal life.”

“Lord give strength to our teachers; help them so that when they teach, we may see the face of Jesus.”

The teachers encouraged their students to “keep tryst” with Jesus for a time of prayer and listening. Isobel wrote:

“I had been feeling slightly discouraged, wondering if we teachers were not too ordinary in our spiritual gifts and wondering if the students’ hearts were being penetrated with the Word in the way we hoped them to be. At sunset time I slipped out for my usual tryst (in the mountains). I turned to the upward path, and suddenly turning a corner I came upon Junia and Lucius who were descending, apparently from the same errand on which I was bound. They passed me in smiling but self-conscious silence, and I was reminded that those two were scheduled to take between them the weekend services at Village-of Knoll the coming Saturday. We had urged our boys to ‘keep tryst’ and to pray about such things, but who did, and where they did, I had no notion. I had stumbled upon their effort to fortify themselves in prayer!”

Encouraged by her discovery, she continued to a place higher up. After a time of prayer, Isobel arose and returned to the trail. As night approached, she heard the voice of another student.

“I could hear his voice clear and strong, ‘O Father, help me to learn this Book…’ And then I knew he was praying. I tried not to listen and glided more swiftly and carefully onward, but a curve of the path and I saw him, kneeling before the open scriptures, his face right down on the grass even with his knees and his voice cutting the still air with all the freedom of one who believes himself to be entirely alone in the woods. He did not see me at all so occupied was he, and I heard him say, ‘O Father God, I hand over my whole body, soul, and spirit to Thee—do with me as Thou willest.’ Then with thrilled heart I turned and fled down the path out of sight and sound. What I could hardly believe was this praying lad, alone on the mountain consecrating himself to his Maker, was our dear little ‘Brand-New.’”

Whether raising a family, teaching a class, or leading a team on the mission field, self-doubt may assail us: Are we doing any good?

Unaware of how they were impacting the Lisu church, Isobel, John and others had led by example the joy of a long and faithful life in Christ, and the benefit of “keeping tryst” with God. How merciful our heavenly Father was, during those times of self-doubt, to give them glimpses of His glory in the joyful countenance of a fellow believer, or in observing a humble and godly life, or in the over-hearing of earnest hearts in prayer.

These are the things that encourage us to persevere in doing good (Galatians 6:9) and to stay on that narrow way that leads to life (Matthew 7:14). This is how pebbles in a brook truly polish one another. It is by fellowship with other believers that we are polished by the godly living and mutual encouragement of our fellow pebbles.

Note:

* Unless otherwise noted, all quotes are from Nests Above the Abyss, by Isobel Kuhn, China Inland Mission Publishing, 1947.

¹ Isobel Miller Kuhn, gutenberg.org

Perhaps you have heard of reluctant missionaries and pioneer missionaries, but have you ever heard of “a kind of missionary?” This was Patrick Collinson’s description of his mother, Belle Patrick, who as a young woman, went to Algiers, North Africa, to assist Lilias Trotter, noted pioneer missionary to Arab & Berber Muslims.

Belle Hay Patrick (1895-1972) was born August 22 in the Scottish fishing community of Anstruther.

She was the eighth of 10 children. Her son, Patrick, wrote, “Belle had more than her fair share of the Patrick brains, although she was not, at first, very practical, in the domestic sense. Her mother sometimes called her a “gey, haundless tottie (a happy but helpless little one).”¹ But with her “fair share of brains,” little Belle “learnt the entire book of Psalms by heart and never forgot them.” At the age of nine, she won a scholarship to the local secondary school, which eventually led to a scholarship at St. Andrews University. She qualified as one of the first three women lawyers in Scotland in 1925, but she never practiced. Instead she responded to a call to become a “kind of missionary” in Algeria. In her own words, “It was to be the Gospel instead of the Law.”²

SCOTLAND (1920-1925)

As a young woman, children were drawn to Belle. A prayer meeting that she started with five other friends at the end of World War I, soon began to attract children. Four little girls who had been skipping rope came one August evening to peer through the open windows at the women praying. Belle said to them, “If you want to see what we are doing, come inside. You’ll be less bother in than out,”³ and in they trooped. They sat in a row on the front bench. The women went through their usual routine of hymn-singing, Bible-reading, prayer and an address, and the girls were as quiet as mice. Belle wrote:

“I felt really sorry for them, prisoners of their own choice, in a cold dark room, while outside the sun still shone and other bairns were laughing and playing. So when our service was over I said, ‘You’ve been very good so I’ll tell you a story all to yourselves’, and I launched on my favourite pastime. They were still quite quiet but now it was not the quiet of boredom; they were entranced. When I finished and they reluctantly rose from their seats I said: ‘We’ll be back next week and if you come half an hour earlier I’ll be here to tell you a story and then you can go home without sitting through the meeting.’ Next week I was greeted by eight children, and week by week the numbers grew until I had over fifty, packed like herrings on the narrow benches. Then in walked the halflins, half-grown boys, adolescents. The South fishing had started and all the men and older boys had left, so there was nothing to do in the dead town. So what better than to break up the bairns’ meeting? By changing my style of story-telling I managed to keep them in reasonable control for the children’s meeting, but then they began to stay behind for the women’s prayer meeting!”⁴

Weeks later, after Belle had told a gangster type story and preached what she thought was a gospel sermon, she decided to confront the boys by appealing to their better nature. “And then a remarkable thing happened. Week by week we had prayed for revival, and now it happened. The boys were held to their seats by a power outside themselves; they were under conviction of sin. Our six lads went home converted.”⁵ It was the autumn of 1920, and there in East Anglia to the south, the last of the fishermen’s revivals broke out. She wrote, “Many of our local fishermen were caught up in the movement of the Spirit. When the campaign was over our Prayer Union group had grown from 6 to 60. Again I felt a concern for the children. So I started a children’s meeting for them, which met before the prayer meeting, and once again it grew by leaps and bounds until it was difficult to pack all the youngsters into the room. The reading room could hold about 80-100 adults, but on my register I had 200 children, with an average attendance of about 150, and mostly I had no helpers!”⁶

ALGIERS (1925-1927)

By November 1925 Belle Patrick found herself in Algiers at Dar Naama with beloved artist & missionary Lilias Trotter.

Belle’s son Patrick wrote, “I say ‘a kind of missionary’ since her role was that of secretary to the remarkable Miss Lilias Trotter, founder and leader of the Algiers Mission Band (AMB).” When Belle arrived at Dar Naama, she found Lilias, age 72 with a weakened heart and confined to her bed. Patrick wrote, “She lived with Miss Trotter and others in Dar Naama, the rambling house of a former Barbary corsair (pirate!) in El Biar, Algiers.”⁷

Her initial missionary posting was for one year. Lilias wrote one enthusiastic letter after another to Belle’s mother; she said, “I do look on her as one of God’s most special gifts to me of late.”⁸ She explained to Mrs. Patrick that Belle’s first task was in “getting the gospel to the Sufi Moslems, a brotherhood of mystics.” As Lilias saw it, Belle was accomplishing this by typing the text of her book The Way of the Sevenfold Secret, considered by many as Miss Trotter’s magnum opus.

Written with the Sufi brotherhood in mind, it was a book based on the seven I Am’s of Christ in John’s gospel. The next project was a beautifully illustrated oversized book, Between the Desert and the Sea. Miss Trotter had assembled the watercolor illustrations earlier in her confinement, and now she began to prepare the text with the help of her secretary, Belle.⁹

The intent of the book was to “make people care,” Lilias said.¹⁰ “The text reveals her intimate knowledge and love of a people and a land; the watercolours bring to life unforgettable images, exquisite and exotic.”¹¹ In her forward Lilias writes, “The colour pages and the letterpress are with one and the same intent—to make you see. Many things begin with seeing in this world of ours.” ¹² Belle saw. When she left Dar Nama for home in 1927, she went with the vision to tell of the ‘other sheep’ that Jesus had in Algiers (John 10:16).

At the end of her first year, Lilias told Belle that she could not see her as a missionary, “at least not yet.”¹³ Before heading back to the UK, she felt that it was necessary for Belle to learn more about the mission by joining some of the tournées (tours) undertaken in the interior of Algeria and Tunisia, as a colporteur, distributing Christian literature. She wrote to her mother some of her hair-raising adventures in places not yet frequented by tourism. The railway lines were often blocked by drifts of sand. When traveling by car, they were bounced around as shuttlecocks due to the deeply rutted roads, while other times they had to take off their shoes and stockings to pull the car through mud and mire and salt marshes.¹⁴

Miss Trotter and her team appointed Belle as assistant secretary of the AMB in London, England. She was to organize prayer groups that were springing up across Britain, and she was to be the “liaison officer” between the field needs and the prayer partners.¹⁵ Before Belle left Dar Naama, Miss Trotter had clarified her English and French wills—Belle’s “fair share of brains” and law degree must have been useful. But Lilias’ most personal legacy was her journals and sketchbooks to be distributed among her family and friends, including the contents of ” one hundred & twenty-five pigeon hole shelves and drawers.” Under Miss Trotter’s direction, Belle had organized the ordering of the contents of those pigeon holes into alphabetical order!¹⁶

LONDON

Meanwhile, before leaving Algiers, Belle had met a Mr. Cecil Collinson, Deputation Secretary of the AMB. Upon her return to Britain in 1927, “Mr Collinson escorted Belle and another missionary lady to the Keswick Convention in July. It was at the nearby Friars Crag on Derwentwater that he proposed marriage. By the end of the year they were married.”¹⁷ Belle later discovered that it had been Mr. Collinson who suggested the placement of Belle in Croydon, South London, as the assistant secretary of the AMB! Perhaps this foreknowledge had also influenced Miss Trotter’s remark to Belle that she could not see her as a missionary, “at least not yet.”

EGYPT

Cecil had retired from business in the 1920s as he felt a call to evangelize the muslim world, now devoting himself full-time to the home end of such missions as the AMB, the North Africa Mission and the Fellowship of Faith for the Muslims. Later in 1935, he was appointed Secretary of the Egypt General Mission (EGM), which led to regular visits to Egypt with Belle. It seems Cecil was a “kind of missionary,” too.

During WWII, the Collinson family lived in Highbury, North London, where their house was badly damaged twice by bombs. Belle & Cecil also ran a canteen for the forces. Cecil died in 1952 and in the 20 years of life remaining, Belle applied her astuteness in all directions. She actually typed Patrick’s Ph.D. thesis, and when he became a lecturer at the University of Khartoum in the SUDAN, Belle spent her winters there with him. Many of her old missionary friends were deployed there, and she took trips with them as challenging as those Algerian tournées 30 years earlier! She moved to Sydney, AUSTRALIA, with Patrick and his family celebrating her 74th birthday en route. In Sydney she was soon doing all the secretarial work for the local office of the Middle East General Mission (formerly EGM). She died of cancer, patiently borne, in January 1972. Belle’s book, Recollections of East Fife Fisher Folk, lay in a drawer unpublished for many years. Upon re-reading her remarkable book before publishing, Patrick remarked, “I think I always underestimated my mother.”

A “kind of missionary?”

Yes, of the very special kind. What was her legacy? Today we like to use the phrase “on mission” and a word derived from two words “mission” and “intentional,” that is “missional,” to describe an active walk of faith. Certainly those modern terms “on mission” and “missional” fit Belle Patrick well. Everywhere she ventured she was herself. She used her upbringing, education, talent, personality and Spiritual gifts, with the intention of bearing the name of Christ and making Him known. Her life spanned 77 years in six different countries. In each decade, in every nation she gave her all. At age 30, she had decided, “It was to be the Gospel instead of the Law,” and for the next 47 years, it was so.

In her 30s, Miss Trotter had made a similar decision—it was to be the gospel instead of a career in art. In her 70s she understood the necessary & supportive part Belle played in getting the gospel to the Sufi Brotherhood. Without a secretary to type her manuscripts, Miss Trotter’s final works may not have reached the audience she had hoped for.

The body of Christ was always meant to be a team of connected parts, working together with Christ as the head. Each part is a necessary part, not kind of a part. If anything, Belle’s life demonstrates to us a life picture of what the apostle Paul was trying to tell us in 1 Corinthians 12:12-27. Each part is a necessary, supporting part to the other, making up a whole. Perhaps we can conclude that there is neither a “kind of a missionary” nor is there a “kind of a Christian” either. Each believer is a necessary, living, active and supportive part of the whole.

“If one part suffers, every part suffers with it. If one part is honoured, every part shares in its joy. You are the body of Christ. Each one of you is a part of it” (1 Corinthians 12:26, 27, NIRV).

¹ Recollections of East Fife Fisher Folk, Belle Patrick. Birlinn Limited, 2003.
² Ibid
³ Ibid
⁴ Ibid
⁵ Ibid
⁶ Ibid
⁷ Ibid
⁸ Ibid
⁹ The Love That was Stronger, I.R. Govan Stewart. Lutterworth Press, 1958.
¹⁰ Until the Day Breaks, Patricia St. John. OM Publishing, 1997.
¹¹ A Passion for the Impossible, Miriam Huffman Rockness. Harold Shaw Publishers, 1999.
¹² Between the Desert and the Sea, I. Lilias Trotter. Hunt, Barnard & Company, Ltd., 1928.
¹³ Recollections of East Fife Fisher Folk, Belle Patrick. Birlinn Limited, 2003.
¹⁴ Ibid
¹⁵ A Passion for the Impossible, Miriam Huffman Rockness. Harold Shaw Publishers, 1999.
¹⁶ Ibid
¹⁷ Recollections of East Fife Fisher Folk, Belle Patrick. Birlinn Limited, 2003. Friars Crag—John Ruskin described the view as one of the three most beautiful scenes in Europe.

We look forward to the next article in our missionary biography series, Pioneer Missionary to North Africa, Miss I. Lilias Trotter.

“But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; for He has prepared a city for them. For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come” (Hebrews 11:16; 13:14).

This is the story of how a Christian sojourner willingly let her feet be “tied” for love’s sake.

Amy Carmichael (1867-1951) was an Irish born missionary to Japan and India. She spent her early years reaching out to the marginalized in Belfast, Ireland and later Manchester, England. At age 25, she was sent out as the first Keswick missionary to Japan. She served there as an evangelist for 15 months but developed what was called “Japan head” (she suffered with neuralgia) and was told to move to a more suitable climate.
She arrived in India at age 28 and immediately came down with Dengue fever. But having reached the land of her calling, where she would spend the next 50+ years, she set out to learn Tamil, and after 14 strenuous months, passed her language exam. Amy began evangelizing with a team of young Indian women whom she called “The Starry Cluster.” She loved itinerant preaching and sharing the gospel across southern India, fully expecting to carry on in this way indefinitely.

But one day, as He does, God changed everything.

He sent her a little girl, who had run away from the Hindu temple women, who were preparing her to be “married to the gods.” She was seven years old, and having heard of Amy and her love of children, had run away in hopes of finding her. As she told her story, Amy thought, “If these things are true, something must be done.” This was the beginning of the season Amy referred to as having “her feet tied.” In the Tamil culture, when a woman bore children, it was said that the children tied her feet to the home. Amy wrote, “Children tie the mother’s feet, the Tamils say…We knew we could not be too careful of our children’s earliest years. So we let our feet be tied for love of Him whose feet were pierced.”

In the ensuing years, Amy rescued numerous children from being sold into slavery, while others were brought to her for refuge, or like the very first child, found their way to her.

Biographer Iain Murray wrote, “She would not have let her feet be so tied had she not been convinced that God meant her to be the full time ‘mother’ of the family now gathered. Most of the children Amy took care of and taught were former temple children, entrapped in a dark life of temple prostitution.” She sacrificed what she loved most, sharing the gospel, itinerant preaching, evangelizing across Southern India, so that those little ones “could know not just physical freedom from slavery but ultimately spiritual freedom.”

Her highest calling became teaching each child God’s love for them.

As the Tamil proverb said, Amy’s feet may have been tied, but not so of the feet of hundreds upon hundreds of little children that were raised to know and love Jesus and later sent out to love and serve their countrymen. Although her feet were tied, in her 50s, Amy was known to drop everything and set off in the old Ford, with kindred spirits, to go out evangelizing. Amy’s children remember how she would suddenly appear and call them to go out preaching with her, and off they flew! Those journeys were exciting, with plenty of laughter as well as evangelizing. Though her feet were tied, Amy’s heart was ever free.
Amy’s home in Southern India became known as Dohnavur Fellowship and continues today. According to their website: “During the past 113 years, about 1875 girls and 670 boys have been rescued from situations of moral and physical danger and brought into the safety and love of the Dohnavur Family.” For more information, visit their website.

Also, enjoy other articles in this missionary biography series such as “How William Carey Expected Great Things from God” & “How We Know Our God Determines How We Live Our Lives”

¹ Amy Carmichael of Dohnavur by Frank L Houghton, SPCK, 1953.
² Amy Carmichael: Fragment’s that Remain, Triangle SPCK, 1987.
³ Amy Carmichael: Beauty for Ashes by Iain H Murray, Banner of Truth, 2015.