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Lea and Louise Little (retired missionaries to China and Japan)

Lea's Story, taken from: Mel Larson, 114 Ways to the Mission Field: Testimonies of Evangelical Free Church Missionaries (Minneapolis, Minnesota: Free Church Publications, 1967), 138-41.

 

TWO YEARS UNDER THE COMMUNISTS

 

A missionary call, to Rev. Lea Little, now serving in Japan, is just one aspect of a basic call to discipleship. He phrases it as follows:

 

"The call to follow Christ as His disciple is a lifetime call, an unchanging call. The Holy Spirit directs in a specific ministry and place. That may change, but there should always be the deep, abiding assurance that 'I am here doing this in the will of God.' My call has not been spectacular but it has been deep and abiding. I have never doubted my call during trying experiences. These include two years under the Communists in West China, four years of separation from my fiancée during the China upheaval, evacuation and closing of the door to China, language difficulties in Japan, sickness both personal and in the family, frustration in the work of evangelism and the necessity of changing mission boards. The assurance of being in God's will is a bulwark against discouragement during most difficult experiences"

 

Lea Little's grandfather was a pioneer farmer in Northwest Canada, corning by covered wagon and settling 300 miles past any railroad. As a boy Lea thrilled with the pioneer stories of the Indians, fording rivers, walking 80 miles for supplies, sleeping out in (10 below weather, etc. There was no positive Christian influence in the home, although his mother was a nominal Christian at the time. His father is as yet unconverted. The family attended a modernistic church and Sunday school and were under its influence until Lea was 12. During his teen years Lea was influenced strongly by an atheistic, Communistic high school teacher in their village school. His life centered in sports, movies and the dance hall.

 

Two experiences turned him toward God before his actual decision. The first was the sudden conversion of an older brother. Their grandfather had been converted as a young man in Missouri but had backslidden through the pioneer isolation and the influence of a liberal church. He came back to the Lord when he was 60 years of age and invited students from a Bible school to hold a summer Gospel ministry in that area.

 

Lea's brother was converted through these Bible school students. It brought an abrupt change in his life. Lea continued to be antagonistic to the Gospel but he could not help but see the change in the life of his brother. He concluded his brother had something he did not have, even as he realized a need for it.

 

A second experience came when he faced death. During the winter of 1942 he was employed by an oil company on the Alcal1 highway to Alaska. In a dynamite explosion he saw four or five firemen burned to death. He narrowly escaped. He for the first time sensed a deep fear of death and a conviction of sin, knowing he was not prepared to meet God.

 

His conversion came one summer after he returned to the farm. Six local Christians held cottage prayer meetings and one time the group was invited to their home by his brother. Lea tried to escape being present, but God had arranged things so he was forced to attend. He saw real Christians on their knees praying for the first time. Deeply convicted, he attended an evangelism service in the back of an old village garage and heard the Gospel preached by a Bible school student. After the meeting Lea sought out the evangelist and professed his faith in a brief, faltering prayer. He was Hl.

 

His call to missionary service came when about 20. He was operating his father's large grain farm. Because he wished to learn he enrolled in a Moody Bible Institute correspondence course. After long hours of outside work he often fell asleep over the lessons at night. This desire to study and the frustration of trying to do it at night, made him anxious to attend Bible school. He hired men to run the farm and entered Bible school during the winter. His older brother, upon his conversion, sold his farm, went into training and into the ministry.

 

Three things influenced him toward the field: First, the presentation of missions in Bible school courses. Second, missionary literature such as magazines, biographies like Borden of Yale. Third, missionary contacts and missionary conferences. The main factor that led him to the China Inland Mission staff in his early years was their literature. He made his first contact with the mission a year before graduation. The Word of God indicated he should go to the field. Circumstances indicated he should go. Other than a feeling of personal inadequacy there was no hindrance in the way of his going. He was physically able.

 

Though his unconverted father was disappointed in such a move, he did not oppose it. Finally, the conviction of the Holy Spirit made him know "This is the way. Walk ye in it." He had a growing burden for China. Each major step taken was accompanied by peace of heart. He graduated from Bible school in the spring and by fall sailed for China under the China Inland Mission. He later transferred to the board of the Evangelical Free Church of America.

 

Lea Little adds these concluding words,

 

"I've noticed that God reaffirms His call to me during each furlough. As I'm getting older there is a stronger temptation to covet the ease and security of the homeland. This is of course the delusion of the devil. It is not easier, nor is it more secure to serve at home. Nonetheless, the temptation is there. it is more accurate to say that the Holy Spirit faithfully recommissions me on each furlough and sends me back again fully assured that it is the will of God to serve again in .Japan."

 

That is where he is today.