Helen Stam - The Miracle Baby

In 1933 John and Betty Stam became official missionaries to China. A year later, in September 1934, their daughter, Helen Priscilla, was born. Soon after her birth the province where the Stam’s were stationed was overrun by Communist soldiers. On Dec. 6, 1934, John Stam wrote a letter to the mission headquarters in Shanghai with the news that they had been taken hostage by the Communists who were demanding $20,000 in ransom money. He told his captors that he doubted the mission would pay the money. The Communists taunted them by discussing when they were going to kill the baby to be rid of it.

The next day, the Stam’s were forced to walk twelve miles to the neighboring town of Miaosheo, where they spent the night in an abandoned house. On the morning of December 8, John and Betty were paraded through the city to their execution. When a local Chinese merchant pleaded with authorities to spare the couple, soldiers searched his home. Finding a bible and hymnbook among his possessions, they arrested the man and killed him the next day. The Stams were forced up a hill outside Miaosheo, where they were executed by decapitation at the summit. Betty was 28 and John was 27 years old. Their bodies were left behind by the evacuating soldiers.

John and Betty Stam

And what of their young daughter? When the Communists took John and Betty away, they left baby Helen behind in the abandoned house. A day later a Chinese evangelist, Pastor Lo, found her still in her sleeping bed, alive and well. He also discovered several clean diapers and two five-dollar bills packed with the child. Pastor Lo carried baby Helen in a rice basket through the mountainous regions of China, using the ten dollars Betty concealed with Helen to buy powdered milk for her. On December 14, nearly a week after the Stam’s murder, Pastor Lo delivered the baby to the mission station in Shanghai. Within hours, the Betty and John family in Paterson, New Jersey received a three-word telegram: “Stam Baby Safe.”    

Remember that ransom letter John Stam was forced to write? His last written words were, “The Lord bless and guide you—and as for us—may God be glorified whether by life or by death.”

The Stam’s sacrificial deaths are often cited as galvanizing a new generation of missionary candidates, including 700 young people at Moody Bible Institute, the Stam’s alma mater

I think we learn something important about the ways of God from this story. A family friend wrote these words concerning the miraculous deliverance of Helen Priscilla: “Everything about her deliverance tells of God’s love and power. If the Lord could bring a tiny, helpless infant through such dangers to perfect safety, surely He no less could have saved the lives of her precious parents had that been in His Divine plan.”

As Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego faced the fiery furnace they said to King Nebuchadnezzar, “Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up” (Daniel 3:17-18). But if not…

We all hope and pray to live long lives in peace and safety. No one wants to be a martyr for Christ. But each of us should be prepared to face the fire of persecution. Our God is able to deliver us. But if not, may we be found faithful to Christ, even unto death.  -DM

Sources: 

Ray Pritchard, "But if Not," Keep Believing Ministries, 5 December 1999 <https://www.keepbelieving.com/sermon/1999-12-05-the-martyrs/>

"Stam Baby Safe: Remembering John and Betty Stam," Wheaton, 3 December 2019 <https://fromthevault.wheaton.edu/2019/12/03/stam-baby-safe-remembering-john-and-betty-stam/>