Adoniram Judson was born at Malden, Massachusetts. He learned to read at age three and at twelve mastered Greek. Adoniram regularly won honors at Brown University in Providence Rhode Island. Jacob Eames, a persuasive unbeliever, led Adoniram toward free thinking. A year or two later, returning from New Yor City, Adoniram stopped at an inn, but was told there was only one room available; it was next to someone who was very ill. With no other choice, Judson took the room, but could not sleep for the groans and noise of the sick room. Upon rising he inquired about the person who was so ill, and learned that he had died. Judson asked who it was and the innkeeper told him: "Jacob Eames from the college of Providence." A shaken Adoniram Judson returned home under deep conviction and shortly yielded his life to the Lord. In 1812 Judson and wife Ann went to India, and being refused permission into that country, went to Burma. Burma went to war with Britain and Judson because he shared the same skin as the British, was imprisoned for seventeen months. His wife, Ann, wore herself to death trying to succor and save him. A strong Burmese church remains to this day under intense persecution.
Florence Matheny was born in Marion Iowa. When she chose Seattle Pacific College, she read about Jacob DeShazer, a former Doolittle raider who had spent 40 months in a Japanese prisoner of war camp and planned to train so as to return there with the gospel. "What a coincidence it would be if he should choose the same college I have chosen," she thought. "I might even get to shake his hand!" They met at college and she did more than shake his hand: she became his wife. They had a long and productive ministry.
