George Mueller 1805 - 1898 *****
George
was born in kroppenstadt, Prussia, in his youth he was very wild, and lived in
sin and crime even while studying for the ministry of the state church. But in
1825, he was converted at a prayer meeting in a private home, and from that
time his life was changed.
Müller
moved to England and there sought acceptance by the London Missionary Society
as a missionary to the Orient. After his rejection he began preaching and
ministering wherever the door was opened.
His preaching led him to Bristol, where in 1834 he founded the
Scriptural Knowledge Institution for Home and Abroad. One year later he opened
his first orphans' home for twenty-six girls, even though he had no financial
assistance. By 1870 he had built five large orphans' homes and was feeding 2,100
orphans daily. He solicited no financial help and told only the Lord of the
daily needs. Only born-again Christians were accepted for service in the
institutions. Many children were won to Christ each year. The Scriptural Knowledge Institution also was
instrumental in sending missionaries, Bibles, and Gospel literature around the
world. The various schools operated by the institution matriculated over
121,000 students, with thousands of them receiving Christ while in the schools.
The institution distributed almost three hundred thousand Bibles in different
languages in addition to one and one-half million New Testaments. One hundred
and sixty-three missionaries were sent out and/or supported, and over 111
million tracts distributed. In all, in a period of sixty-three years God poured
out in response to the faith and prayers of George Müller over seven and
one-half million dollars for the spreading of the Gospel.
Müller
read the Bible through over two hundred times, half of that on his knees, where
he claimed the promise, "Open wide thy mouth and I will fill
it." When George reached seventy
years of age he turned the orphanage over to his daughter and her husband, then
he started a new minstry, He spent his
last seventeen years touring the world, telling of the blessing of a life of
faith. Müller died at the age of ninety-three, leaving an estate valued at less
than one thousand dollars. He had given back to the Institute almost one-half
million dollars of personal gifts received during seventy years of ministry.
A
quote from George Muller;
A
servant of God has but one Master.
It
ill becomes the servant to seek to be rich, and great,
and
honoured in that world where his Lord was poor, and mean, and despised.