Christmas 2024: December 20

John Fox wrote in 1563, "Christ will have a Church in this world," and "that same Church should mightily be impugned, not only by the world but also by the uttermost strength and powers of all hell... What force of princes, kings, monarchs, governors, and rulers of this world, with their subjects, publicly and privately, with all their strength and cunning, have bent themselves against this Church! What storms and tempests it hath overpast, wonderous it is to behold."

In 1934, that was the testimony of John and Betty Stam. Newlywed graduates of Moody Bible Institute, the Stam's set out as missionaries to China when a newly formed army of communist college students arrested them as "enemies of the people," along with their three-month-old baby. It was December, and they were stripped to their undergarments and then sent out on a sub-freezing march. In the providence of God, they were able to hide their little one in a sleeping bag in a hut along the way, and she was found alive five days later by a Chinese believer who set out after them. He discovered a note, and on it, the last thing John Stam ever wrote. "My wife, baby, and myself are today in the hands of communist bandits. Whether we will be released or not, no one knows. May God be magnified in our bodies, whether by life or by death. Philippians 1:20." John and Betty were killed on December 8th, 1934. John was 27; Betty was 28. Their beheaded bodies were later found in the snow. An eyewitness said John was praying on his knees for his captors when a soldier approached him from behind and cut him down with a sword. His wife, in horror and weeping, was killed next to him.

The deaths of the young couple shocked many around the world, including the head of their missionary agency (China Inland Mission - the very same missionary agency established by China's pioneering missionary, Hudson Taylor, about 70 years before), Frank Houghton, who was in Shanghai at the time. Encouraged by John's last written testament, 2 Corinthians 8:9 came to his mind, "Though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor." He then penned the words to an oft-forgotten Christmas hymn, "Thou Who Wast Rich," in honor of John and Betty Stam and all believers around the world, who, like their Lord, became poor and gave their lives for the sake gospel. Fittingly, the song is not about John, Betty, or any other Christian martyr. Instead, from the first line to its last, it is all about the One for whom they died. Each stanza reflects on the work of the Lord in His humiliation (Phil 2:5-8), the incarnation (Matt 1:21-23; Jn 1:1, 14), and exaltation (Phil 2:9-11), respectively, to give a wonderful reminder of the Christ of Christmas - and the only fitting response: the worship of the Christ-child.

By the way, carried in a small rice basket, little Helen survived the week-long dangerous journey through the rugged mountains of Jingde (home of the classic blue China tea sets found in many American households) until her rescuers finally arrived at the missionary outpost in Xuangchen. Within a few hours, Helen's extended family in New Jersey received the telegram, "Stam baby safe." She was then transferred to the same hospital she was born in three months earlier, where doctors pronounced her the "miracle baby." Helen went on to be raised by her grandparents (who were also missionaries in China) until she was five. She was then raised in a Christian home by her aunt and uncle.

Helen herself sought to live a quiet life away from the limelight of the press. She became a teacher in the States, but encouraged by her parents' faithfulness, thousands of students in Bible colleges across the U.S. dedicated themselves to mission work abroad. More than 600 students would come from the Stam's own alma mater at Moody in the few short years to follow their deaths. Her nephew, Dr. John Tweeddale, is now the academic dean and professor of theology at Reformation Bible College and is the former senior editor for Ligonier Ministry's Tabletalk magazine.