CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER TWO
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~ A? Isobel was right. A halo, no matter whose, did not fit her. She was too definitely human for that. But like Amy
Carmichael, she was a good writer, and they each fitted snugly into someone's astute definition:
"The good writer is the person with full-orbed experiences and a sensitive heart and mind."
There is no denying that Isobel's experiences were "fullotbed." She shared those usual experiences of other women who are students, teachers, wives, mothers and housekeepers.
But she added as well, the experiences of a missionary pioneer, a public speaker and world traveller. And she was no stranger to the experiences of suffering brought about by war, sickness and isolation. Besides, threaded through all this gamut there were significant spiritual experiences, secret dealings with God, miraculous answers to her prayers for guidance, financial provision, deliverance from dangers and besetting sins.
What experiences!
Anyone who reads a few pages of her writing soon discovers that Mrs. Kuhn was a woman with a heart and mind sensitive both to God and to humanity. Especially did her affection flow for anyone who seemed to need her help—her converts, her own children, young missionaries, young churches, the Lisu.
And in return young people responded to her. On furloughs there always followed a wave of interest in the tribes wherever the Kuhns were speaking. Isobel's own daughter Kathryn said she could listen to her mother tell the same story a dozen times® and still be fascinated. One of Kathy's young friends, now a C.I.M. missionary in Laos, tells of the meetings where Mrs.
Kuhn addressed the students at the Multnomah School of the Bible. The girls were so much impressed that after Isobel spoke they just quietly slipped away to pray. Of course, this sort of
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Ls response was what Isobel most desired—that her message would not attract to herself, but to the Lord.
Her husband banked on her sympathetic prayer help in his ministry. "The bulwark of her prayers" as he expressed it.
When he left for the first of his long trips after their marriage, he stayed a month or two visiting the Lisu tribe. Someone at that time observed Isobel. "I was at home that month and I saw
Isobel was lonely. It was then she told me that she had promised the Lord that she would never stand in John's way if he felt led to go away for the gospel's sake. And she never has."
A young woman confided an intimate experience illustrating Isobel's sensitive desire to be right with the Lord not only outwardly but also inwardly. "She came to me one evening and asked to see me privately, so I invited her into my room. With tears in her eyes she asked me to forgive her. I knew nothing she had done that required my forgiveness. So she explained, saying that she had been jealous of me and that the Lord had spoken to her about it. She had confessed her sin to Him, but she felt she must ask my forgiveness, too, even though I had not known she had these feelings. I couldn't believe my ears. Jealous of me?
Why, she had more gifts than I, and she was filling a useful place.
But it just shows how conscientiously she was trying to follow the Lord."
Keeping her one vision in focus, she was determined that the good things of life must not displace the best things. More than one or two who lived under her roof observed how she chose to simplify home chores in order to make more time for a purely spiritual ministry: prayer, study, teaching and counselling. As Miss Nellie DeWaard recalls: "Isobel was the hostess in Tali, with a lot of guests to look after. Good servants were hard to get and Isobel never quite liked housekeeping; her talents and inclinations were quite otherwise. So the fact that she made a success of it was all the more remarkable. She created a pleasant atmosphere in the home and I am sure no guest ever went away feeling unwanted. She got 2 woman to help and taught her about a week's menus. It was quite easy if you lived there long enough, to know what you would have that day for dinner, ie it still was varied enough that you did not get tired of it. It really was a sensible plan."
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Speaking of that same time, about 1930, Isobel once remarked to Mr. Harry Owen that all the other young workers in the mission station were able to give undivided attention to study, while she had to spend much time in housekeeping. As this slowed her progress in language study, she was tempted to feel resentful. But, recognizing the danger, she resolved to spend an hour a night in Bible study. This enabled her to triumph over the sin of resentment and discontent; as she herself testified, ""No one could spend an hour a day studying the Bible without something happening in the spiritual area."
Mr. Charles Peterson had fifteen years to observe Isobel at first hand in Lisuland where he shared mission station life with her and John at Oak Flat. His cabin sat on the slope just below the "House of Grace" as the Kuhns called their Ce It was really he who was in charge of the station and a right arm of assistance to Isobel during John's long absences on Mission business.
Charles remembers a story of life at Oak Flat during the days of World War II. "We had been carrying on a full programme of village work and Bible Schools on the east bank of the Salween River. The Japanese were on the west bank. During the day we could often hear the boom of the Japanese guns. In the evening we sometimes saw fires from villages which they had lighted. We had planned that just as soon as the news came that they had crossed the river we would leave and make our way through the mountains into the Mekong River country. Then
| one night—well, I was sound asleep in my log cabin when one of the Lisu fellows rapped on the door.
'Teacher,' he said, 'the Japanese are coming. Ma-ma says » that you are to come up to the House of Grace.' When I got there
Isobel told me that Luke had been up to one of the high villages and had heard fighting at the river crossing. (Deduction; the Japanese are coming.) 'Isobel suggested we read a psalm. I began to read the gist
Psalm which would have been my reading when morning came.
When I came to the words, "Thou shalt not be afraid of .. . the terror by night,'
"*That's enough, Charlie,' she said, 'Good night.'
"Outside the whole village was in turmoil. Barking dogs,
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squealing pigs, crying children, shouting parents. But Isobel had eyes fi voice ant had gone to sie "In the morning we learned what had happened. Someone from the east bank of the river had stolen the ferryboat and was rowing towards the west bank. Natural result—gun fire, an excited Lisu, and a woman's bravery which I shall never forget."
Quite literally Isobel took God at His word. Though her imaginative nature easily conjured up all sorts of alarms, yet her confidence was in the Lord. And He developed in her the highest kind of courage, a boldness to push on straight through frightening situations despite her fears.
Victorious experiences!
For instance, she was timid about riding over the mountains.
Often she tried to walk when in dangerous places. But sometimes she was too tired. So she was forced to ride. Lucius, a fine Lisu lad, usually accompanied her, leading the mule. One day, however, when for the moment he was not at its head, the road turned suddenly and rose sharply over a bank. The mule lost his foothold. With a drop of hundreds of feet over the edge of the narrow path, Isobel felt herself still mounted—but over space.
"Oh God! Oh God!" she cried.
Stamping hoofs beat the air, stumbled, clambered and clung finally to terra firma. Isobel was unnerved and limp.
But she kept on riding.
"By nature I dislike travel and change," Isobel admitted. Yet she adjusted herself to the packing and juggling of suitcases, the endless changing from place to place, and Pore to people.
By ship, by rail, by plane and bus, by sedan and mountain chair, by mule and by foot, she covered the miles. She circled the world more than twice as she burrowed deep into the depths of Asia. Repeatedly on furlough she sped across the North American continent. These were the longer spans of travel. But within these spheres her downsittings and uprisings were considerable.
During the time she and John were first assigned to Chinese work, Isobel said she thought that she had visited every town and city in that whole populous area. Afterwards, as they worked in Lisuland, travel was still more rough and dangerous. But since she was on service for the a of kings, she kept on travelling.
Once an aching tooth prodded her into making an excursion
Pen oa See
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to the dentist. It was no pleasure trip. As Isobel came winding down the mountain trails on her mule, she was dreading the long stretch of Burma Road that loomed ahead of her. Her fear was quite understandable. Without regular bus service, travellers just chanced catching a ride on a Chinese cargo truck, piling on top of boxes, bundles and bales, Perched there they held on for dear life. Usually while on dizzy down-grades, the driver turned off the ignition and coasted. Wrecks pitched over the road's edge added nothing to the scenery nor to passengers' sense of security !
Thinking of these things, Isobel shuddered as she approached the Big Road. There to her great relief, however, she discovered a couple of General Chenault's "Flying Tigers," American airmen, driving through to Kunming. Off she started with them for an eventful four days' journey. i ""We were to leave at half-past five in the morning," Isobel recalled. "I arose about four o'clock in order to have a quiet time with the Lord first. I had been up early on the trail so many mornings, and travelling till dark, that I debated whether or not to skip my time of worship that day and get a little more sleep. But the habit of God first formed in Moody days, stood me in good stead now. For God had something particular to say to me. Yet when I lit my lamp at that early hour and turned my sleepy eyes on the portion for the day (Genesis 28) I had the feeling, 'Oh, just the goa of Jacob's ladder.' Is it the lazy flesh or the devil that puts such thoughts into our heads? I turned my sluggishness over to the Lord in prayer first, and then as I read that old story so familiar from childhood, verse 15 sprang out of the page as if I had never read it before.
"*And behold I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest.' The Lord's voice came clear and unmistakable: "This is My promise to you for the journey ahead.' "
How thankful she was on many occasions for such an assurance! For one night along the way where they stayed at a hostely a drunken man attempted to bash in her door in the dead of night! Then also, on the last day of their trip the car broke down completely. Besides, while it stood awaiting repairs it was thoroughly looted, Isobel's belongings included.
But Isobel finally reached the dentist and got the relief she
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needed. She had -$ite eight and a half days of travel to get it! e Somewhere on her journey, she was alarmed by the news that Rangoon (Burma) had fallen to the Japanese. And now in Kunming, that large provincial capital, dreadful war rumours dinned in her ears. Behind her a stampeding herd of pitiable refugees quickly filled the Burma Road. Back in that tumult of Sanhing and carnage John was doing what he could to rescue any stranded missionaries. Isobel had no way of communicating with him.
Fightings without and fears within left the lone wife a feeling of acute desolation. She seized an opportunity to escape to the province of Szechwan. There "'she was lost without her Lisu," said her hostess, Mrs. Arnold Lea. Isobel was also most distraught because she felt she had run off to Szechwan in panic rather than at the Lord's bidding.
Finally, as she and her pretty Chinese girl companion, Eva Tseng, started back to Kunming they had a hairbreadth escape from a vicious native driver in whose truck they were riding. A terrifying experience. Yet repeatedly they were aware of God keeping His promise, "I am with thee and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest."
"T had been tossed from pillar to post for six weary months,"
Isobel sighed. "I could hardly wait to get home to my quiet bedroom by the side of the deep ravine where the birds san matins, and the great peaks glowed back the sunset hues with their steady Baakcablences at day's end. I longed to get my roots down." But in Kunming Isobel learned that her brother-inlaw, Dave Harrison, must make a trip to some needy churches in the country. Would she consider teaching his Bible class of Chinese university students in order to free him for that itineration?
"T did not want to stay in Kunming. I wanted to get to John as soon as possible. I was desperately longing for him to put his arms around me and comfort me. But," she explained, "where common sense clearly points out a duty, that is the voice of God.
We do not need any other, provided a higher duty is not claiming us." So she stayed on, having consented to teach.
No wonder she could add, "The students' class began to grow. One day I was asked if I would teach a second Bible class, a morning class
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for Christians. Soon I was teaching three classes, and one young man had accepted Christ as Saviour."
And that was recompense enough for Isobel for all the frustrations of the road that lay behind her and for the sacrifice of her desire to see John's face.
Sensitively, Isobel's heart and mind responded to the Lord's discipline. She permitted her full-orbed experiences to press her closer to Christ. Then the bitter experiences became rewarding ones: her life was deepened and her service enriched. The Lord was teaching His pupil the joyful ultimate of all experiences, intimacy with Himself.