The Life And Martyrdom Of John And Betty Stam

In 1925 John and Betty Stam left America to be missionaries in China. Nine years later they would be dead. Their story still changes lives today.

Before arriving in China Betty penned a letter asking God to hold her to her promise to give her life completely to serving Christ. She stated she was giving up her own ambitions and dreams that she may simply know the power of Christ and his resurrection.

In 1934 communists took over the area of China where the Stams served. They were arrested and sentenced to death. They would be marched a few miles through town to where they would die. By this time they had a new addition to their family, a four month old daughter named Helen.

As they were led through town by armed soldiers, a man asked where they were going. John replied they were on their way to heaven. Another man told one of the guards the infant was innocent. The guard told the man to move along, or take the child’s place. He chose the latter.

Helen’s life was then protected, as the people honored that a man died in her place, a fitting picture of the gospel message the Stams preached. Indeed, that man and the Stams were martyred that very afternoon, their lives taken for their faith.

Fast forward twelve months. In response to the lives the Stams lived, some 900 students committed their lives to enter the mission field. A Chinese periodical called “China’s Millions” wrote on the anniversary of their death, “Let no one call this ending of their career a tragedy, for in reality it is a triumph.” The article went on to say that no death of a missionary had ever before impacted the entire country, that is until John and Betty were martyred.

There are heroes in the world, who compel us to raise our own standards, to turn our shoulds into musts, and our doubts into faith. We live in a culture where the average person watches close to 50 hours of television a week. People like the Stams bid us to live for more than our own selfish wants and wishes.

When people asked Jesus about John the Baptist, he said there had been no one greater on earth before John. He then told the crowds that the least person in the Kingdom of Heaven was greater than John. John too would die for his faith, just as his master Jesus.

May we pray for bigger vision, for more selflessness, for more heroes like these; and may we live to pour out our lives for the King who sacrificed everything.