A year went by. Hudson read his Bible through for the fortieth time. He wrote hundreds of letters and prayed constantly for China and the missionaries who served there. The news that Jennie had cancer hardly changed their lives at all. Both of them were already living in the light of eternity. Although she was thin and weak, she told a friend, “I couldn’t be better cared for or happier. I’m nearly home. What will it be to be there! The Lord is taking me slowly and gently.” And so He was. On July 29, 1904, Jennie died with Hudson at her bedside.
Hudson was now seventy-two years old and badly wanted to go back to China. There were so many people to encourage there and so many people to thank. So, in the spring of 1905, he and his son Howard, now also a medical doctor, and Howard’s wife, Geraldine, set off on Hudson’s eleventh journey to China.
And what a trip it was. Hudson was able to visit many areas by train now. Trains were much more comfortable than the wheelbarrows he used to ride in. Everywhere he went, people gathered to listen to him. He had his seventy-third birthday at one of the seven China Inland Mission stations in Henan Province. The Chinese Christians made him a huge, red satin banner which read, “O man greatly beloved.”
Hudson visited China Inland Mission hospitals and orphanages, new mission stations, and the home in Yang-chow where he and Maria had survived the riot. He also visited the cemetery where Maria, Grace, Samuel, Noel, and his adult daughter Maria were all buried.
Later that day, he spoke to a new group of missionaries with China Inland Mission who were about to go into the interior. He looked at these young people who had left their families and friends to take the Gospel message to the Chinese people, and for a moment he was one of them: a twenty-one-year-old landing in China with no money, no wife, and no plan. Yet, he had trusted God, and God had used him. Now, fifty-four years later, over eighteen thousand Chinese Christians had been baptized, and the China Inland Mission had eight hundred twenty-five missionaries.
“It’s a great privilege to meet you here,” he told the group. “I have met many here in days gone by. My dear wife died by me here. In spirit our loved ones may be nearer to us than we think; and God is near, nearer than we think.”
And Hudson was nearer to his loved ones than anyone might have imagined. On June 3, 1905, several weeks after visiting the graves of his family, Hudson Taylor died quietly in his bed. He was buried beside Maria and his children. His tombstone read: “Hudson Taylor, a man in Christ.” His life had ended where he had always wanted to be: deep in the heart of China.
