1
/
of
1
OGB
THE DIARY OF A JAPANESE CONVERT
THE DIARY OF A JAPANESE CONVERT
Regular price
$2.99 USD
Regular price
Sale price
$2.99 USD
Shipping calculated at checkout.
Quantity
Couldn't load pickup availability
Scanned, proofed and corrected from the original hardcover edition for enjoyable reading. (Worth every penny spent!)
***
This Book by a native Japanese, written in English by himself, from his Japanese home, will, we believe, be acceptable to a wide circle of American readers. So far as we know, it is the only book of the kind ever published in any language; and as a vivid portraiture of a struggling soul seeking light and peace for his and his nation's salvation, it will be read with deep interest by all who desire the good of humanity. It touches upon many vital questions connected with Christian missions in "heathen" lands ; and written in autobiographical form, it has all the freshness and reality of the author's own actual experiences.
Except in a few instances when the meaning might not have been quite clear, the work is issued as written by the author. The occasional indications of a foreign idiom but enhances the reader's interest, and it was not thought best to alter these or critically correct every minor inaccurate form of expression as judged by our English usage.
Preface.
In many a religious gathering to which I was invited during my stay in America to give a talk for fifteen minutes and no more (as some great doctor, the chief speaker of the meeting, was to fill up the most of the time), I often asked the chairman (or the chairwoman) what they would like to hear from me. The commonest answer I received was, "O just tell us how you were converted." I was always at a loss how to comply with such a demand, as I could not in any way tell in "fifteen minutes and no more" the awful change that came over my soul since I was brought in contact with Christianity. The fact is, the conversion of a heathen is always a matter of wonder, if not of curiosity, to the Christian public; and it was just natural that I too was asked to tell them some vivid accounts of how "I threw my idols into the fire, and clung unto the Gospel." But mine was a more obdurate case than those of many other converts. Though moments of ecstacy and sudden spiritual illuminations were not wanting, my conversion was a slow gradual process. I was not converted in a day. Long after I ceased to prostrate myself before idols, yea long after I was baptized, I lacked those beliefs in the fundamental teachings of Christianity which I now consider to be essential in calling myself a Christian. Even yet "I count not myself to have apprehended" ; and as I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus, I know not whether I may yet find any present position to be still heathenish. These pages are the honest confessions of the various stages of the spiritual growth I have passed through. Will the reader receive them as the unadorned expressions of a human heart, and judge with leniency the language in which they are written, as it is not the tongue that I learned from my mother's lips, and the ornate literature is not the trade by which I live in this world.
***
This Book by a native Japanese, written in English by himself, from his Japanese home, will, we believe, be acceptable to a wide circle of American readers. So far as we know, it is the only book of the kind ever published in any language; and as a vivid portraiture of a struggling soul seeking light and peace for his and his nation's salvation, it will be read with deep interest by all who desire the good of humanity. It touches upon many vital questions connected with Christian missions in "heathen" lands ; and written in autobiographical form, it has all the freshness and reality of the author's own actual experiences.
Except in a few instances when the meaning might not have been quite clear, the work is issued as written by the author. The occasional indications of a foreign idiom but enhances the reader's interest, and it was not thought best to alter these or critically correct every minor inaccurate form of expression as judged by our English usage.
Preface.
In many a religious gathering to which I was invited during my stay in America to give a talk for fifteen minutes and no more (as some great doctor, the chief speaker of the meeting, was to fill up the most of the time), I often asked the chairman (or the chairwoman) what they would like to hear from me. The commonest answer I received was, "O just tell us how you were converted." I was always at a loss how to comply with such a demand, as I could not in any way tell in "fifteen minutes and no more" the awful change that came over my soul since I was brought in contact with Christianity. The fact is, the conversion of a heathen is always a matter of wonder, if not of curiosity, to the Christian public; and it was just natural that I too was asked to tell them some vivid accounts of how "I threw my idols into the fire, and clung unto the Gospel." But mine was a more obdurate case than those of many other converts. Though moments of ecstacy and sudden spiritual illuminations were not wanting, my conversion was a slow gradual process. I was not converted in a day. Long after I ceased to prostrate myself before idols, yea long after I was baptized, I lacked those beliefs in the fundamental teachings of Christianity which I now consider to be essential in calling myself a Christian. Even yet "I count not myself to have apprehended" ; and as I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus, I know not whether I may yet find any present position to be still heathenish. These pages are the honest confessions of the various stages of the spiritual growth I have passed through. Will the reader receive them as the unadorned expressions of a human heart, and judge with leniency the language in which they are written, as it is not the tongue that I learned from my mother's lips, and the ornate literature is not the trade by which I live in this world.
Share
