Ron Blough

6 October 2019

Dear Phyllis,

The other day a friend wrote me a letter mentioning Ron Blough. What a flood of memories that brought back. My total time of working with Ron was not that long, but if I could compile a list of the five men of God who have had the greatest influence on my life, Ron Blough's name would certainly be on that list. This is not because Ron was deep or profound. He was a badly flawed man, but he had excellent convictions that he uncompromisingly lived by. I set the standard of my life to try to live like him.

Four months after I arrived at Yokota, Japan, Russ O'Quinn and I started the Church of the Open Door. Inasmuch as we were all transient, and we wanted the church to be permanent, we wrote to Jesse Miller of OCSC asking if they had a missionary they could send out to establish a permanent Christian service mens center. Ron had just graduated from Bob Jones University and was seeking the Lord for His next move. Ron heard Jesse's' appeal one night and came out to take the church in 1960. Ron and I were radically different. He had three men guiding him in his life, Bob Jones, John R Rice, and Jack Hyles. Ron had a one string banjo and the only message he knew was witness and win souls. I was more devotional and into prayer. The first six months were agony of conflict. But through that we developed a system of honest heated discussions where we learned how to work together.

Ron was as wild as a spring hare and totally void of sanity and common sense. When facing problems he never considered reality and whether or not something was possible. He had marvelous integrity; if he thought something was the will of God he would just do it. I was deeply impressed as I saw the Lord, time and again, move mountains and open impossible doors in honor to Ron's faith.

The Church of the Open Door ran from 1959 to 1966. When that dried up Ron took his family to Sapporo in Hokkaido. After a couple of years of language study in Sapporo, Ron felt it was time to move out into unevangelized territory. One day Ron and Marlene got on a train and road to what is almost the end of the world. They went over to Rumoi on the west coast of Hokkaido which was about as remote as you could get. After spending time several hours walking around town trying to find some place to live, Ron spotted an ice cream store. Ice cream stores were rare in Japan in those days and Ron wanted to get some to eat. Marlene protested, “Dear, we don't have money for luxuries like that”, but Ron never let that argument stand in his way. He said, “Maybe the Lord will open a door for us in there.” As they were sitting in front of the store window eating their ice cream, a large crowd of people gathered outside peering at them. Americans there were as rare as aliens. A newspaper reporter saw this large crowd of people and went over to investigate what they were looking at. When he saw Ron and Marlene he walked in, introduced himself, and ask them why they were in Rumoi. Ron told him they were missionaries and wanted to move to Rumoi, but they couldn't find a house. The reporter knew a good story when he saw one and said he would get them a house.

Half an hour later they were in the biggest house Ron had ever been in located about 1 km south of town. This huge house had been built 50 years before then to house 80 fishermen. One of the main industries of Rumoi was fishing and this house had been built for fishermen, but it had been empty for several years. Using the newspaper reporter as the go-between they were able to negotiate a deal to rent that house for an extremely reasonable price. Ron and Marlene were jubilant over this amazing miracle how the Lord gave them an unimaginable house while they were sitting in the ice cream store. They went back to Sapporo packed up their things and moved to Rumoi.

But when Ron came back to Rumoi with a large truckload of their belongings, he learned a big lesson in Nihongo (the language). In Japan it is impolite to say no. so very often, the answer to a request maybe yes even though it is impossible. (And you're supposed to know the difference.) The house owner had no intention of letting the Bloughs have that old fishing house. They were shocked when Ron took them seriously and pulled up with a truck load of belongings. A serious sodan (discussion) ensued. Ron told them how they had canceled the rent they had on their house in Sapporo, and cleared out to move to Rumoi. As he was talking to them, he said their neighbors in Sapporo had a sobetsu kai (farewell party) and gave him a neck tie. When the house owners saw the neck tie, that made everything different. If the neighbors had had a sobetsu kai for them an gave them a farewell present, that closed the door so they could never go back there. That meant the Bloughs must live in Rumoi. There was a great deal of discussion among the family and then the elder brother, who was the main man, said, “We will give you a one year contract and see how things work out”. One year later, Ron took the rent money and spoke to the elder brother asking him if it would be possible to extend the lease. The brother told him, “Burau san, that house is yours for as long as you want to live there. I am a commercial fisherman. The day we made the decision to allow you to stay in that house I caught the biggest catch of fish I had all year”. That's the Lord for you folks. The Lord gave the Bloughs the best house they ever lived in through eating some ice cream and a neck tie they got at a farewell party. Plus Jesus put His hand on the situation by giving the house owner the biggest catch of the year.

The Bloughs couldn't have done more to get to the end of the earth in Rumoi, and yet they were some of the best known missionaries in Japan. They were the featured article in the Hokkaido Graph, which was the Life magazine of Japan. Twice NHK did a one hour national special on them about having babies and raising children They were national celebrities. Ron was like an angry bear to reporters coming to him for stories. To one reporter from Sapporo, Ron told him flat out, “I will not talk to a dishonest reporter. You promised the last time not to change the story and you did.. I won't talk to a liar like you.” When the end finally came, the day the Bloughs left to go home, the headlines in the Rumoi Times was “Blough goes home today”, and JR put on a special car to take them to Tokyo. I know of no missionary as celebrated as they were.

Ron had been in Japan for 18 years when one day he woke and said to the Father, “I have finished the work which You gave me to do.”, and in typical Ron Blough fashion, packed up and went home. It had been several years since the last I saw them and I went up to Tokyo to see them off. I asked Ron, “After you land in San Francisco, which way will you be headed?” Ron replied, “The only thing I can tell you for certain is that it will not be west.” They got in a car with six kids and drove from San Francisco to Maine. There they turned around to head west again and wound up locating in Little Town NH. Ron pastored a church and started a very popular Christian school. Then one night Ron had a squall with their oldest daughter who had made a decision to go a way that her father felt was was dishonoring to Christ. In typical Ron Blough fashion he submitted his resignation as pastor because he felt that a child of his was not following the Lord. As a returned missionary and a disqualified pastor Ron loaded his family in a car again to drive to the end of the road. He drove up the ALCAN Highway until he found a logging camp in Alaska that had no witness for Christ. There they stayed for another 20 years

I have not seen them since they left NH. Ron and Marlene are retired now living just outside Greenville, SC. There is talk that Ron might write his autobiography. If he does, it will be a good one, but one that will be hard to believe. God never made a man who was less concerned about what other people thought of him and more concerned to live a life totally devoted to the honor of Jesus. 2 Chron. 16:9 tells of God searching the earth for a man with a special type of heart. He certainly found one in Ron Blough. It was a privilege to be his friend.

bill

Church History

29 September 2019

Dear Phyllis,

In the Song of Solomon the Lord has given us two snapshots of church history. The first one is a picture of Jesus and the second one is a shot of His Bride. They both are taken in the same place with the same background. Both verses begin by mentioning the scene where the pictures are taken - “the wilderness”. The first verse says, “Who is this that cometh out of the wilderness...?”; and the rest of that verse focuses on the fragrance of Christ. I wrote about this verse a few weeks ago. In the second picture we see the Church as it describes her as “Coming up out of the wilderness, leaning upon her Beloved”. Nothing could be more clear than that.

I have not been a major player in church history, but the Lord has given me a front row seat to be an observer and rub shoulders with some of the major actors who have left their mark in writing the book of church history.

After the communist takeover of China in 1949, a large number of “China hands” missionaries came to Japan. One of them was Will Schubert. Will had been a missionary in China for 30 years and then spent another 17 years in Japan. We were together in Karuizawa for nearly all that time. How major a man of God Will was in China I don't know, but he frequently spoke about John Sung as though he was almost a father and mentor to Sung. The only confirmation I have of this is that Leslie Lyall did mention Will Schubert in his biography of John Sung.

If we were to list the five greatest Chinese men of God, John Sung's name should be on that list. John Sung was born in 1902 the son of a poor Methodist pastor. He obviously was exceptionally brilliant, having gone to Ohio State University and won a PHD in chemistry. Prestigious offers in chemistry came in from all over the world But after finishing in OSU, John Sung decided to serve the Lord and went on to Union Theological Seminary - which was one of the most anti-Christ seminaries in America. Sitting under that modernistic theology the professors stripped John Sung of all his Christian faith. But then one night the Spirit of God came upon him. He rushed out in the hallway shouting, “I'm saved! I'm saved!”. He stood in the midst of campus and burned his books denouncing them as doctrines of demons – which is true. The facility at Union said he obviously was crazy and had him committed to an insane asylum, where he read his Bible through 50 times in 192 days. Some Christians got him out of the funny farm and on a boat going back to China. As the ship was approaching China John Sung had a dream where he saw himself in a coffin with an angel standing beside it weeping. He asked the angel, “Why are you weeping?''. The angel replied, “Because he is not dead yet”. Sung said to the angel, “By the grace of God I will keep him dead”. He reached in his trunk and took out the PHD and all the awards he had won at Ohio State and threw them in the ocean. Getting off the boat as a poor itinerant evangelist John Sung began to serve the Lord.

Will Schubert told me it was at his mission station in Sung's very early years that he had him for some special meetings. One night Sung woke up in the middle of the night and could hear Will praying for revival downstairs. This convicted Sung to join in that prayer. The next night Sung stood up to preach, but the meeting was absolutely flat. After a few futile minutes, Sung decided to quit, and have everyone go back to their homes and pray asking the Lord why the meeting was so bad. He said, “I will pronounce the benediction and then let's all go home to pray.” He raised his hands to pronounce the benediction, and suddenly everyone in the church burst out praying at the top of their lungs. Sung shouted them down and said, “Be quiet. I will pray and we can go home.” He raised his hands to pray, and suddenly the same thing happened again. Sung thought it was a misunderstanding. He quieted the crowd and explained “Now be quiet and I will pray.” When he raised his hands and the same thing happened the third time, he let it go. The Spirit of God fell on that congregation. A group of communist students had come to that meeting to be disruptive. When the Spirit of God fell on that crowd they were terrified and tried to escape. The Christian kids locked their hands on the benches and held them down so they couldn't get out. Those radical students stood screaming, “My sin! My sin! My sin!”; and everyone was saved. Will told me that happened at his church in the very early years of John Sung's ministry and that was the beginning of a remarkable 15 years of historic revival.

John Sung and Watchman Nee knew each other but they were not close friends. Watchman Nee was a deeply devotional, quiet man, and John Sung was a fiery man with a very hot temper. He would have historic meetings seeing thousands saved, and shortly thereafter come unglued at a train station master where you wonder if he was saved.

John Sung was married and had five daughters that he named Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Will told me he loved Numbers the least as that was the book of spiritual failure. One day Will met Sung at the train station. He had been gone for three months. When Sung saw Will he asked, “Brother Schubert do you know where my wife is?”. He replied, “Yes, after you left, she had no money and I have taken her and your daughters to live with me. They are at my house.” Apparently they were very close friends. Sung was a man who was so totally given to his ministry that he virtually abandoned his family. Schubert stepped forward to take care of the needs of Sung's family, and was a close confident during Sung's short career.

I can't cover John Sung's biography in five short pages, but he probably was the greatest evangelist China ever produced. He was famous for is use of props. His best known one was a coal stove. He would put coal in the stove to demonstrate the fire of God. Then he would hold up the largest chunk of coal and say, “This is the pastor. He is the hardest one to set on fire.” The crowd would roar.

Sung told Will that he thought his ministry would be a short one. That proved to be true. It lasted only 15 years divided into three, five year periods – sowing, reaping, and blood. During that time he impacted millions of souls in China and SEA. It has been said that he won well over 100,000 souls for Christ. His time in Thailand was very brief but he is credited with having the greatest impact on Thailand of any man in church history here. The war with China and Japan began in 1938. His life was a reflection of that suffering as he was stricken with TB of the lower intestines. At times he could only preach leaning over as the pain was too great to stand erect. In his last year he could only lay on a sheet suspended between two poles. As he lay dying in a hospital, there was a famous Chinese movie star that had been converted, but after he was saved, disaster struck his life, and he lost his family. He visited Sung in the hospital sharing his tragic story. When he finished, Sung suggested, “Let's sing.” The man was offended and asked, “What could we sing?” Sung replied, “We could sing the song of Job. You could sing chapter one and I could sing chapter two.” Will said in his final years he was a greatly subdued man and repented of the frequent temper outbursts of his earlier years. He died at the age of 42 in 1943.

The Song of Sol. gives us two snapshot pictures of church history. The first is of Jesus and the moving of the Spirit of Christ for 2,000 years, characterized by the fragrance of Christ (2:6). The second snapshot is of the Bride of Christ who are the mighty men of God (8:5). It is our great privilege to not only read about these heroes but to leave our footprints in the sand of time as we walk with them coming up out of the wilderness leaning on our Beloved.

Lord, let our lives count for Christ,

                                               bill