One More Night

One More Night

As Judson faced the chains again, his heart quaked.

THE BRITISH forces advanced upon Burma, where Adoniram Judson, an American Baptist missionary, had already endured unspeakable horrors in prison for seventeen months. Falsely accused of espionage, he’d been out of prison less than two precious months. Now the Burmese government wished to negotiate with the British and ordered Judson to be their emissary. Because of Judson’s extreme physical weakness, his dear friend Dr. Jonathan Price volunteered to go in his stead, but the Burmese insisted that Judson be held in prison as surety for his return.

On December 29, 1825, the officials arrived, bearing the familiar, eerily clinking, blood-stained chains. At the chilling sight of them, the previous seventeen months of prison flooded back into Judson’s battered mind once again.

He remembered the stench of dead, decaying rats, human excrement, disease, blood, sweat, vomit. He remembered the acrid taste of his cracking, dry mouth and the rotten food he’d forced down. He remembered the sight of other prisoners, sickened, tortured, dying, and the horrified expression of his wife as she beheld his miseries. He could feel the torment of his mangled feet, worn raw from the long barefoot marches in the blistering sun, mercilessly shackled to a bamboo pole hoisted above him, painfully stretched upward cutting off circulation, and bitten by mosquitoes for endless hours. But above all, Adoniram Judson recalled the evil sounds: the creak of the bamboo instruments of torture; the frenzied screams of the victims; the sneering laughter of the guards; the scrape of their knives being sharpened; and, worst of all, the haunting voice of the gong, suspended outside the prison, daily announcing the three o’clock execution hour for yet more prisoners (Will it be me today? tomorrow? the next day?). He’d done absolutely nothing to warrant those months of horror; the tyrannical king of Burma, hating foreigners and denying his people religious freedom, accused all white-skinned persons of collusion with the British. Nearly all were imprisoned, and many perished. Judson’s prayer had been like his Savior’s—he was willing to accept death, should the Lord will it, but also begged that the bitter cup be passed from him.

As Judson faced the chains again, his heart quaked. Could he survive it? Could his dear wife, Ann, bear it? During his last imprisonment, Ann had borne their daughter, Maria, now just eleven months old and frail. Would the little girl remember him? Would she even survive? Throughout the last two years Ann had endured a painful, lonely pregnancy, lobbied the queen for her husband’s release, hidden their precious Burmese Bible translations and English-Burmese dictionary project, suffered with smallpox and spotted fever, and attended to her ailing newborn. Yet she had proven strong, but those sufferings and others had weakened her considerably. Just a few weeks before, when they had first heard Judson might be returned to the place of his worst tortures, it was almost too much for poor Ann. As they led him away, Judson prayed one more hopeful prayer for deliverance.

That prayer was answered miraculously soon. After just one night in a bearable local prison, the British insisted upon his freedom, and he was released. He and Ann returned to Rangoon, where they had spent their first ten years of ministry in Burma. Adoniram Judson’s missionary endeavors would continue with enormous success for another twenty-four years.

Reflection

While we are experiencing trials, it may seem as if they will last forever, but they do end. Even fatal illnesses end, albeit in death. When you suffer trials, be comforted with the realization that one day they will end.

After you have suffered a little while, he will restore, support, and strengthen you, and he will place you on a firm foundation. All power is his forever and ever. Amen.

1 Peter 5:10-11