Undoubtedly with his brother Simon’s permission, Andrew temporarily left the fishing nets behind and journeyed to hear a man called John the Baptist. John was the talk of the town and wharf. He urged people to get right with God because the long-awaited Savior was coming. Andrew saw and heard something in John that he liked. This wild man was not only a scathing critic of society’s flaws, but he also offered people hope through repentance. He had a knack for making people feel very bad before he showed them how they could be forgiven. So Andrew became a follower of John the Baptist. Eventually, he was likely joined by his friend John, the son of Zebedee, who recorded the initial steps Jesus took in choosing a group of disciples to train. At some point, at least five of the original apostles were in the area where John the Baptist was carrying out his ministry. According to the biblical account, Andrew was the first of theapostolic band to discover Jesus in his unique role as Lamb of God whotakes away the sin of the world. Andrew was standing beside John theBaptist when the fiery prophet pointed out Jesus as the
Read MoreMaurice Tornay was the seventh of eight children born to aCatholic family who lived high in the Swiss mountainsnear Valais. The family was united in the work required tolive and the faith they lived by. Tornay recalled his mother at the fireside telling the story of Saint Agnes, virgin and martyr. “You are virgins,” she told her children, “but to be martyrs, that’s more difficult.You must love God more than anything else, and be ready to give yourlife, to shed the last drop of blood for Him.” Young Tornay never forgot his mother’s lesson. After secondary school, Tornay joined the Canons Regular ofGrand St. Bernard, best known for their rescue work in the Alps andthe famous Saint Bernard dogs they breed and train as “assistants.” AsTornay progressed, the Canons were asked by the church to send missionaries accustomed to living at higher elevations to begin evangelizing people in the Himalayas, or “the Asian Alps,” as they were called in Europe. Tornay volunteered, but he was kept back until surgery cured an ulcer. In 1936 he arrived in Weixi Province near the Tibetan border, where he finished theological studies, learned Chinese, and wasordained a priest. Tornay wrote: “And now I’ve almost
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