Geoffrey T. Bull (1921-1999) set out from London to be a missionary to China in February 1947. Little could he have imagined the drama and suffering he would endure in the ensuing years. He studied the Chinese and Tibetan languages, traveled thousands of miles preaching and teaching before entering Tibet in 1950.
Bull
witnessed the last days of Tibetan independence from China and was eventually imprisoned
by the Communists on the pretext of being a spy. At first, he was kept in
solitary confinement. There he established a daily routine which included
praying, memorizing the Bible, singing hymns, composing poems, and meditation.
When he wouldn’t crack, his captors tried brain-washing, but he claimed that
his “faith in Christ kept him from mental breakdown.”
In
his incredible autobiography, When Iron
Gates Yield, Bull recounted how the Communists seized him and drove him across
frozen mountains until he nearly died of exposure. Late one afternoon, his
captors staggered him into a small village where Bull was given a small upstairs
room for the night.
After
a meager supper, Bull was sent out to the stables to feed the horses and tend
to the animals that his captors rode. As he clambered down into a stable from a
rickety ladder the intrepid missionary found himself in total blackness. His
boots squished in the manure, mud and straw on the floor. The fetid smell of
the cattle, mules and horses was utterly nauseating. That’s when the Holy
Spirit tapped Bull on the shoulder and reminded him of something important.
Bull recorded in his memoir:
“Then
as I continued to grope my way in the darkness it suddenly flashed in my mind. ‘What’s
today?’ I thought for a moment. In traveling, the days had become a little
muddled in my mind. Suddenly, it came to me. ‘It’s Christmas Eve.’ I stood
suddenly still in that oriental manger. To think that my Savior was born in a
place like this. To think that He came all the way down from heaven to some
wretched Eastern stable, and what is more to think that He came for me. How men
beautify the Cross and the crib, as if to hide the fact that at birth we resigned
Him to the stench of beasts and at death exposed him to the shame of rogues. I
returned to the warm, clean room which I enjoyed even as a prisoner, and bowed
in thankfulness and worship.”[1]
The
great detriment of our Christmas imagery is that we try too hard to sanitize
the birth of Christ. He did not come to be born behind safe castle walls, or to
be laid in a soft, pillowed cradle. This was no clean hospital room with white
sheets and lab coats. No, this was the Messiah amidst the manure; the Son of
God just a few inches from the sawdust and straw of the mud floor. There were
no nurses or doctors to check the baby’s vitals, just the bleating of sheep and
the scratching of hoofs.
Christ
was born this way to totally identify with the meek and impoverished.
His birth was just a notch below third-world standards so that no one could
claim that He was given some advantage they didn’t have. He was born this way
because He was condescending to humanity’s need—a Savior who was not afraid
of the dirt, the stench or the blood. As Paul said:
“Christ
Jesus had equal status with God but didn’t think so much of himself that he had
to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. When the
time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a
slave, became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly
humbling process. He didn’t claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a
selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death—and the worst
kind of death at that—a crucifixion” (Phil. 2:5-8, MSG). -DM
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