That evening's mail brought a letter from a stranger living some distance away, judging from the postmark; for the letter had no address, and was not signed. The letter said:
"I do not know you, nor have I met you, but the Lord seems to have laid it on my heart to send you this five-pound note as a farewell gift, to do what you think best with."
It was with a joyful heart I sent off the gifts to the five Christian workers in Britain. Had the giver said it was "for work in China," as was usually the case, I could not have used it for any other purpose.
How to get the sewing done for my family and yet meet the pressing calls made upon me as the wife of a pioneer missionary, for almost thirty years has been perhaps the most difficult and constant problem of my missionary life. In connection with the solving of this problem, I have seen some of the most precious evidences of God's willingness to undertake in the daily details of life.
The following story must be given in detail to be really understood, as one of the striking instances of how God, in his own wonderful way, can work out the seemingly impossible.
Returning home to our station from an unusually strenuous autumn's touring, I planned as usual to give the month of December to the children's sewing, so as to leave January largely free for a Bible-women's training class. But my health broke down, and I could make scarcely any headway with the thirty-five or forty garments which had to be made or fixed over, before the children returned to their school in Chefoo. By the eighteenth of December we decided to cancel the class on account of my ill-health; and to all the women, except one whom I entirely forgot, I sent word not to come.
As the days passed, the burden of the almost untouched sewing became very great. At last I cried to the Lord to undertake for me. And how wonderfully he did! On December twenty-eighth, when I was conducting the Chinese women's prayer-meeting, I noticed in the audience Mrs. Lu, the very woman to whom I had forgotten to send word. She had come a long distance, with her little child, over rough mountainous roads, so I felt very sorry for my thoughtlessness. Mrs. Lu accompanied me home, and I gave her money for a barrow on which to return the next day. I then sat down to the sewing machine. The woman stood beside me for a little, and then said:
"You are looking very tired, Mrs. Goforth; let me run the machine for you."
"You!" I exclaimed, astonished, "why, you don't know how."
"Yes, I do," she replied.