In modern China, Lin Lezhi's image seems to be more like a messenger spreading Western culture rather than a solemn missionary. The reason for this is closely related to Lin Lezhi's understanding of Chinese society and his missionary policy.

In December 1859, the 23-year-old American missionary Lin Lezhi, his wife and their daughter who was less than 5 months old, boarded a ship bound for China. After 210 days of arduous sailing, they sailed to China in 1860. He came to Shanghai in June 2016 and began his more than 40-year career in China.

After Lin Lezhi arrived in China, he took the Chinese name of John Lin. Later, he changed his name to Lin Lezhi, with the courtesy name Rongzhang, and sometimes often took the meaning of the Chinese famous saying "If you don't know a thing, a Confucian knows his shame". Calling himself "American Jinshi" shows his strong interest in Chinese culture. A few years later, his Chinese learning improved quite a bit and he basically passed the language barrier. However, due to the outbreak of the Civil War in the United States at this time, the Supervisory Committee was unable to take into account Lin Lezhi's life, leaving him with nowhere to raise funds. As a last resort, Lin Lezhi found a way to survive and went to teach at the Shanghai Cantonese Dialect Center under Feng Guifen's introduction. He also pawned church property, sold grain, cotton and coal, and worked as a broker in the insurance department. Later, he was invited by Xu Shou to translate books at the Translation Hall of Shanghai Jiangnan Manufacturing Administration. From the analysis of relevant records in "Church News", the books translated by Lin Lezhi include "Gezhi Enlightenment Museum", "Gezhi Enlightenment Chemistry", "Gezhi Enlightenment Astronomy", "Gezhi Enlightenment Geography", "History of All Nations", "History of Europe" ", "German History", "Russian National History", "Indian National History", "Oriental Negotiations", "Annual Plans and Politicians of Various Countries", "Army System of Various Countries", "Newsprint", "Earth Science Enlightenment" and more than 10 books. Because of his serious teaching and diligent translation, the Qing court awarded him the official title of the fifth rank. During this period, Lin Lezhi's understanding of Chinese society and culture deepened day by day. One question he repeatedly thought about was how to adapt to Chinese culture and allow Christianity to spread widely in China. During the missionary process of Protestant Christianity in the late Qing Dynasty, two different methods emerged. One is what is customarily called "direct preaching", which involves setting foot in China's villages and cities to face the masses of ordinary people, preaching doctrines, praising God, publishing leaflets, distributing religious books, and choosing suitable locations to build churches. That is to say, preaching for the sake of preaching, rarely touching on China's social and political issues, and not running newspapers, establishing schools, building hospitals, etc. Most missionaries since Robert Morrison came to China in 1807 have adopted this method and have achieved some results, but the results are not significant. After Lin Lezhi came to China, he also adopted this method. In 1861, he became unusually interested in the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in Nanjing and attempted to use the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom to open a gap to promote missionary work. He invited his friends who were traveling with him and traveled a long distance to Nanjing to meet with Hong Rengan. However, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was busy dealing with the siege of the Qing army and was not interested in Lin Lezhi's missionary request. After the 1970s, individual missionaries such as Lin Lezhi proposed a new so-called "liberal" missionary approach. This method requires missionaries to firstly carefully understand and study Chinese society and transform China according to China's cultural characteristics; secondly, to skillfully combine Christian teachings with the dominant Confucian culture in China and gradually replace Confucianism with Christian culture. culture; the third is to use advanced Western science and technology and culture as a means, such as running education, building hospitals, running newspapers, etc., to improve the quality of Chinese people, expand the market for Christian culture, and absorb more Chinese into Christianity.

Lin Lezhi was extremely concerned about the situation of Chinese society, and paid special attention to the dissection of the social structure of the late Qing Dynasty. He said in "Middle East War Chronicles": "When I first came to Huahai, bandits were everywhere... When the bandits were at their peak, I personally entered the puppet capital and stayed in the palace of the puppet prince to watch what they did. Xianfeng Ten In that year, the British and French troops marched directly into Beijing, and immediately the foreign troops retreated and turned to help China to quell the rebellion. The Nian and Hui bandits started to cause chaos one after another. I remember that in the early years of Tongzhi, Japan fought in Taiwan, in the early years of Guangxu, France fought in Vietnam, and Japan fought in Korea. As for the peace treaties signed between China and other countries, I personally witnessed them. All matters concerning China and foreign affairs are examined month by month and recorded in the "Global Gazette". "In the process of carefully observing China's domestic and foreign affairs, Lin Lezhi came to the conclusion that if he wanted to spread Christianity widely, he must seize the opportunity. "Shi" is the conclusion of making friends with "officials".

He believed that in China, “the scholars are the first among the four peoples”, and officials and businessmen were mostly derived from the “shi”. Conquering the “shi” is equivalent to conquering Chinese culture and society. Therefore, he made friends with a number of "scholars" and "officials" in the 1860s and 1870s, such as Feng Guifen, Yan Liangxun, Wang Fengzao, Chen Lanbin, Shen Yugui, Ying Baoshi, Li Hongzhang, Ding Richang, Zhang Zhidong, Zhang Yinhuan, Lu Haihuan, etc. These people are generally open-minded and eager for new knowledge. What they value is Lin Lezhi's extensive Western learning. Lin Lezhi, based on the social status of these officials and gentry, tries to spread the Christian "gospel" from top to bottom through them. . These social activities of Lin Lezhi made him a good friend of the bureaucrats and celebrities in Shanghai at that time.

Lin Lezhi also attached great importance to using Confucianism to explain Christian doctrine. He even confirmed the "Three Cardinal Guidelines and Five Constant Principles" with Christian teachings one by one, and determined that the two are coherent and have the same essence. He cited scriptures and found out from Christian teachings arguments for kings and ministers, fathers and sons, husbands and wives, and even brothers and friends. He concluded: "Confucianism emphasizes the five ethics, and Christianity also emphasizes the five ethics, which is proved by the Bible." He They also believe that Confucianism talks about "benevolence", and although there is no word "benevolence" in the Bible, "love is benevolence"; Confucianism talks about "righteousness", and "Jehovah rejoices in righteousness"; Confucianism talks about "rituals", and the Bible People are required to "give way to each other with courtesy"; Confucianism talks about "wisdom", and the Bible says "the gift of wisdom is more valuable than pearls"; Confucianism talks about "faith", and the Bible says "stop at faith", that is, "faith" ” is the highest virtue. In short, in Lin Lezhi's view, Confucius and Jesus are the same person, and the original meaning of Confucianism and Christianity is the same.

Although Lin Lezhi equates Jesus and Confucius, he always believes that Chinese people under Confucianism, including intellectuals, are very ignorant, conservative, and backward, and lack understanding of modern science and culture. They know nothing about laws and philosophy, as well as chemistry and astronomy. "In order to preach, we must first break the backwardness of China's intellectual circles, so that they can have modern scientific knowledge and modern concepts, and be able to have the modern thinking and new value orientation of Westerners. This means that after the Chinese people are allowed to step out of the Middle Ages and be completely "Westernized", turning China into an American-style "New World," Christian culture can spread unimpeded in China. Starting from this reasoning, after the 1880s, Lin Lezhi devoted his main energy to spreading Western cultural knowledge and changing the knowledge structure and way of thinking of the Chinese intellectual community. He opened a new school in Shanghai to cultivate new talents; he translated books and introduced European and American scientific and cultural knowledge; he ran a newspaper to disseminate information and promote Christianity and Western culture. The "Global Gazette" he sponsored, in China at the end of the 19th century, was on par with Shanghai's "Shenbao" and became the most influential newspaper for Chinese people to understand the world and obtain information. He also organized the Guangxi Society with Timothy Richard, William Alexander Parsons Martin and others to publish books and expand the church's influence in China. At the 1901 annual meeting of the Guangxi Society, Lin Lezhi smugly declared: "In a sense, China has become a protectorate of Christian countries, and she has been placed under our power of teaching and enlightenment." At this time, Lin Lezhi also received further support from the U.S. Supervisory Committee and the U.S. government. When he returned to China in 1906, U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt personally received him. After returning to China, 70-year-old Lin Lezhi was still ambitious and wanted to further expand his career. Unexpectedly, he died suddenly in Shanghai on May 30, 1907. Looking at Lin Lezhi's activities in China, it cannot be said that his missionary career did not develop, but it was his cultural activities that really had a certain impact, especially the construction of schools and newspapers.