DAYS OF STUDY AND TOIL IN AMERICA

1920-1923

When the S.S. Nile docked March 22nd in San Francisco, Golden Gate to the American Continent from the Pacific, a sudden sense of loneliness seized the young Sung. No more days of leisure and high feasting on a luxury liner but an endless dusty road lay before him now. With a smattering of Hinghwa-accented English, he felt quite lost in this New World. Moreover, to get to that missionary friend's home in Delaware, there stretched before him yet three thousand more miles of road or rail. Finally, when he made it to the East Coast it was told him that his missionary friend was still in Peking!

Man's extremity is God's opportunity. Dependence on God and not on man was a first lesson young Sung must learn in his new domicile. "Self help, with God's help, is the best help."

Nor would he take advantage of other people's money committed to his trust. Seeing that he still had $246 in his wallet he decided to keep only the small change of $6 to himself and remit the round sum of $240 back home to repay his debt. The Lord helping him again, the American dollar had now overturned the Chinese dollar! The Chinese dollar equivalent to US$240" was quite sufficient to refund all the friends who had so kindly rallied to his help.

From Delaware Shang Chieh hitch-hiked 400 miles back­wards and eastwards to Ohio Wesleyan University. Though he was enrolled as a scholarship student, with only $6 in his pocket, he must quickly find work in order to keep soul and body together.

As a foreign student he must humbly start from the lowest rung of the ladder. He found a first job as a shop-cleaner at only 25 cents an hour. From there he worked his way up to Westinghouse where he got $27 a week. Now, while this Chinese student toiled in his work he alleviated his burden by giving vent to crooning. The tunes of the Orient so captivated the manager that he promoted him to a machine job that paid $1 an hour. This plus a janitor's job at a hotel at $27 a week with free board and lodging earned him $600 for his first summer in America. This sum was to pay for all his expenses through his Freshman year. Comparing notes with other foreign students earning their way through school, he found he topped them all by his overtime work.

Soon after entering Ohio Wesleyan, Shang Chieh found a bosom friend in Dr Rollin H Walker, Professor of Bible. He called him his "American father," and a father to Shang Chieh he was from beginning to end.

As a student Sung excelled in chemistry and mathematics. With a confidence he could finish his degree course in three years instead of the prescribed four, he went to see his supervisor. To which came the reply, "With your broken English, it would be more likely for you to take five years instead!" When at the end of the freshman year Sung topped his class with straight A's, the supervisor began to reorientate his western mind. Everybody started to talk about this wonder boy and whiz kid from China.

When his elder brother joined him in 1921, America was going through a recession. With mounting unemployment it was difficult for Oriental students to get good-paying jobs. In these trying circumstances, when bread and butter had to be found also for his "greenhorn" brother, Shang Chieh was discovered to grow an abscess in his spinal region. This required an immediate operation and hospitalization of several weeks. But how could he find the means to pay the medical bills? "O Lord, with You all things are possible", prayed Shang Chieh in his new trial. Sure enough, two Christian friends came forward to take care of this need, but the kindness shown him by Christian nurses and visits from Church members were equally vital to nurture him back to health. Shang Chieh learned yet another lesson of God's providence, for has not the Apostle testified to the Philip­pians, "But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus" (Phil 4: 19). How true is another saying, this one from our Lord Himself, "There is no man that hath left house, or parents, or brethren, or wife, or children, for the Kingdom of God's sake, who shall not receive manifold in this present time, and in the world to come life everlasting" (Luke 18:29,30). Did not young Sung come to America with the view of preparing for the preaching ministry? And has not his close association with the Church brought him help in time of need?

The heavy stresses and strains of class studies and ill health as a result of overwork and undernourishment could not but affect Shang Chieh spiritually. It was only by clinging to the Lord and to the Church that he continued to find succor and sustenance. By organizing preaching bands among his fellow classmates, he found occasion to visit outlying churches. As he and his colleagues were enter­tained in Christian homes, especially at Easter, Thanksgiv­ing and Christmas he found a warmth and solace in America not known in China. This gave him an idea that he should promote a Christian home movement with family worship when he returned to his fatherland.

It was on Thanksgiving Day, 1922 in the home of a Christian friend who lived at Smithville, Ohio that he had an unforgettable experience. In visions of the night, in a most unusual dream, he saw himself back in Hinghwa his beloved home country. He saw himself standing on the hill he was wont to climb. Below was the river that flowed to the sea he knew equally well. Suddenly he heard a cry from the river, a cry of sore distress. He flew down in the flash of a second, for there was a man drowning in the swift flowing water. But when he tried to render help, he found himself in danger of drowning instead. Whereupon he negotiated a firm place to plant his feet, which turned out to be a cross anchored in midstream. Sure of foot, he began to rescue the drowning man. Not only him, but a long line of others, and so many more that they could not be counted. Suddenly the river scene changed. Shang Chieh was now transported to Heaven. A throng gathered around him who clasped his hands gratefully for his help, praising God! Sung realized this was an allegory of his future ministry, and related it to his audience wherever he went preaching. This moved many a hearer to return to God and moved Shang Chieh to reconsecration whenever he told it.

Returning to his daily program of hard study and endless toil Sung began to slip away from God. Neglecting his daily Bible reading and prayer he got into a temper easily with his brother then depending on him. He bullied his elder brother right and left, making him practically his slave. He made false claims to the hours he had put in at the factory. Worst of all he succumbed to cheating in one of his examination papers. These were black marks on an other­wise immaculate record. "If Thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?" (Ps 130:3).

With deep remorse Sung did his best "upon his honor" in the 1923 Bachelor degree examinations. Three other stu­dents and he graduated at the top of a class of three hundred. He was awarded a cash price for physics and chemistry with a gold medal, and elected to the Phi Beta Kappa Fraternity, cum laude.

As this was the first time that a Chinese student had attained such distinctions in spite of many hardships, doing his Bachelor's in only three years, Sung's photo was splashed across the States. Indeed, his fame spread even to Europe, so that the name of Sung in academic circles was on everybody's lips.

In the light of this achievement, he received offer of a job from the University of Minnesota and of a scholarship from Harvard. These were followed up by several other offers, including one in theology from some quarter which knew the original purpose of his coming to America. He finally came to the decision to study for the M.Sc. at Ohio State University, which offered him a scholarship plus a grant of $300. This was brought about by an assistant in the Chemis­try Department at Wesleyan, brother-in-law to a missionary in Hinghwa. "Man's goings are of the Lord; how can a man understand his own way?" (Prov 20:24).