In these days, we received revelation and inspiration from the divine move in history from continent to continent. We are motivated knowing our region in Northwest Ohio is directly connected to the movement in China during a pivotal time of missionary work from the Western world into a closed society. The story of a young woman missionary named Susan Bird and her companions in the Oberlin Band from Oberlin, OH paid the ultimate price to bridge two worlds. This bridge that would later issue forth the serving of brothers such as Watchman Nee and Witness Lee reminds us that it is the Lord who master-plans and orchestrates all things for His good pleasure. It is also He who ushers the earthly time, events, places, people with an eternal outlook. Moreover, this revealed truth encourages us to thrive, to live well, to be His testimony, and to continue sounding out all that the Lord is doing within His Body with an out-standing, out-reaching vision that encompasses more than our limited time and space. We are His masterpiece, His remnant, too. Without such a sister and her fellow lovers of Christ, the gospel and the full truth would never have made it to us. The church in Toledo is part of a long, winding, and miraculous lineage that was preserved in the hearts of the saints and dispensed to a dry land throughout the last 20 centuries. Today, we are a group of people surviving from that line—and we would like to ask whoever is reading, are you? We have produced a message on this topic taken from our meeting at the end of 2018. To read, please visit the Note 1: “I was reading about the city of Oberlin” in our Notes section: here.
