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JOHN GIBSON PATON (1824-1907). Scottish
missionary to the |
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One morning at daybreak I found my house surrounded
by armed men, and a Chief intimated that they had assembled to take my life.
Seeing that I was entirely in their hands, I knelt down and gave myself away
body and soul to the Lord Jesus, for what seemed the last time on earth.
Rising, I went out to them, and began calmly talking about their unkind
treatment of me and contrasting it with all my conduct towards them. I also
plainly showed them what would be the sad consequences, if they carried out
their cruel purpose. At last some of the chiefs, who had attended the
Worship, rose and said, "Our conduct has been bad; but now we will fight
for you, and kill all those who hate you." |
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Grasping hold of their leader, I held him
fast till he promised never to kill any one on my account, for Jesus taught
us to love our enemies and always to return good for evil! During this scene,
many of the armed men slunk away into the bush, and those who remained
entered into a bond to be friendly and to protect us. But again their Public
Assembly resolved that we should be killed, because, as they said, they hated
Jehovah and the Worship; for it made them afraid to do as they had always
done. If I would give up visiting the villages and praying and talking with
them about Jehovah, they intimated that they would like me to stay and trade
with them, as they liked the Traders but hated the Missionaries! I told them
that the hope of being able to teach them the Worship of Jehovah alone kept
me living amongst them; that I was there, not for gain or pleasure, but
because I loved them, and pitied their estate, and sought their good
continually by leading them to know and serve the only true God. |
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But my enemies seldom slackened their
hateful designs against my life, however calmed or baffled for the moment.
Within a few days of the above events, when Natives in large numbers were
assembled at my house, a man furiously rushed on me with his ax; but a
Kaserumini Chief snatched a spade with which I had been working, and
dexterously defended me from instant death. Life in such circumstances led me
to cling very near to the Lord Jesus; I knew not, for one brief hour, when or
how attack might be made; and yet, with my trembling hand clasped in the Hand
once nailed on Calvary, and now swaying the scepter of the Universe, calmness
and peace and resignation abode in my soul. Next day, a wild Chief followed
me about for four hours with his loaded musket, and, though often directed
towards me, God restrained his hand. I spoke kindly to him, and attended to
my work as if he had not been there, fully persuaded that my God had placed
me there, and would protect me till my allotted task was finished. Looking up
in unceasing prayer to our dear Lord Jesus, I left all in His hands, and felt
immortal till my work was done. Trials and hair-breadth escapes strengthened
my faith, and seemed only to nerve me for more to follow; and they did tread
swiftly upon each other's heels. Without that abiding consciousness of the
presence and power of my dear Lord and Saviour, nothing else in all the world
could have preserved me from losing my reason and perishing miserably. His
words, "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world,"
became to me so real that it would not have startled me to behold Him, as
Stephen did, gazing down upon the scene. I felt His supporting power, as did |
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One evening, I awoke three times to hear a Chief
and his men trying to force the door of my house. Though armed with muskets,
they had some sense of doing wrong and were wholesomely afraid of a little
retriever dog which had often stood betwixt me and death. God restrained them
again; and next morning the report went all round the Harbor, that those who
tried to shoot me were "smitten weak, with fear," and that shooting
would not do. A plan was therefore deliberately set on foot to fire the
premises, and club us if we attempted to escape. But our Aneityumese Teacher
heard of it, and God helped us to frustrate their designs. When they knew
their plots were revealed to us, they seemed to lose faith in themselves, and
cast about to circumvent us in some more secret way. Their evil was overruled
for good. |
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Yet dangers darkened round me. One day,
while toiling away at my house, the war Chief and his brother, and a large
party of armed men, surrounded the plot where I was working. They all had
muskets, besides their own native weapons. They watched me for some time in
silence, and then every man leveled a musket straight at my head. Escape was
impossible. Speech would only have increased my danger. My eyesight came and
went for a few moments. I prayed to my Lord Jesus, either Himself to protect
me or to take me home to His Glory. I tried to keep working on at my task, as
if no one was near me. In that moment, as never before, the words came to
me-- "Whatsoever ye shall ask in My Name, I will do it;" and I knew
that I was safe. Retiring a little from their first position, no word having
been spoken, they took up the same attitude somewhat farther off, and seemed
to be urging one another to fire the first shot. But my dear Lord restrained
them once again, and they withdrew, leaving me with a new reason for trusting
Him with all that concerned me for Time and Eternity. |
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The Story of John G. Paton Told for Young
Folks or, Thirty Years among |
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One day he
received information that he and his Aneityumese teachers were destined to be
the victims of a feast which the natives were planning. They looked out of
the window and saw a band of armed killers approaching. Knowing that they
were cut off from all human hope, they turned to prayer. For many hours they
heard the savages tramping around the house, threatening to break in or set
the place on fire. As they prayed, their hearts were quieted with the
assurance that He who was for them was greater than all their foes. Says
Paton: "Our safety lay in our appeal to the blessed Lord who had placed
us there, to whom all power had been
given in heaven and on earth. This is strength, this is peace -- to have
sweet communion with Him. I can wish my readers nothing more precious than
that." |
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The
indomitable herald of the Cross was thinking of Matthew 28:18-20 and the
reassuring Presence it vouchsafed to him: "All
power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go, therefore ... and lo, I am
with you." |
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The Hand
that reassured the missionary restrained the enemy, and at length
the killers departed without accomplishing their design. |
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Paton kept
several goats as a source of milk supply. One day he heard an unusual bleating
among the goats, as if they were being killed or tortured. He rushed to the
goathouse. Instantly a band of armed men sprang from the bush, surrounded him
and raised their clubs. He had fallen into their trap! "You have escaped
from us many times," they said, "but now we are going to kill
you!" Lifting his hands and eyes toward heaven, Paton committed his
cause to the Lord whose servant he was. As he prayed, the Divine Presence
overshadowed him, his heart was filled with a tender reassurance and the
cannibals slipped away one after another. "Thus," affirms the
missionary, "Jesus restrained them once again. His promise is a reality;
He is with His servants, to support and bless them, even unto the end of the
world!" |
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The promise that was ever on his lips! |
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The Presence that was ever in his heart! |
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The promise that held him! The Presence that
reassured him! |
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"Lo, I am with you all the way!" |
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On one occasion
when Paton was preaching in one of the villages, three sacred men stood up
and declared that they could kill him by Nahak or sorcery, if only they could
get possession of any piece of fruit or food of which he had eaten. Being
thus challenged, he resolved, with his Lord's help, to strike a blow at the
tremendous power for evil wielded by the sorcerers. After taking a bite out
of three plums, he handed one of them to each of the sacred men. The natives
were astounded at his action and momentarily expected to see him fall over
dead, as the sorcerers proceeded with their incantations. With many
gesticulations and mutterings, they rolled up in leaves the three plums,
kindled a sacred fire and burned them. "Stir up your gods to help
you," urged Paton. "I am not killed. In fact I am perfectly
well." |
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At length
the sorcerers said that they would call all the sacred men together and that
they would kill Missi before the next Sabbath arrived. Paton told the people
he would meet them at that same place the next Sabbath morning. Great
excitement prevailed on the island. Every day messengers came from different
quarters inquiring if the white man was ill. Sabbath morning he appeared
before the people in sound health and said: "Now you must admit that your
gods have no power over me and that I am protected by the true and living
God. He is the only God who can hear and answer prayer. He loves all human
beings, despite their great wickedness, and He sent His dear Son, Jesus, to
save from sin all who will believe and follow Him." From that day two of
the sacred men were very friendly but the others were his bitter enemies and
incited the natives to new animosity. |
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Heroes of Faith on Pioneer Trails
by E. Myers Harrison. Published by Moody Press, |
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Due to the
frequent attacks upon their lives and the murder of one of their number, all
the Aneiyumese teachers, except Abraham, returned to their own island. This dear
fellow, formerly a blood-thirsty savage, was a true hero of the Cross. In the
face of imminent death he determined to stay with the missionary at the post
of duty and of danger. As hundreds of furious cannibals shouted for their
death, the two knelt in prayer. "0 Lord," prayed Abraham,
"make us two strong for Thee and Thy cause, and if they kill us, let us
die together in Thy good work, like Thy servants, Missi Gordon the man and
Missi Gordon the woman." |
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The
savages encircled them in a deadly ring and kept urging each other to strike
the first blow or fire the first shot. Presently a killing-stone, thrown with
great force, grazed Abraham's cheek. The dear old saint turned his gaze
heavenward and said, "Missi, I was nearly away to Jesus." |
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"In
that awful hour," writes Paton, "I saw Christ's own words, as if
carved in letters of fire upon the clouds of heaven: 'Whatsoever ye shall ask
in My name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the
Son.'" As he stood praying, he saw the Lord Jesus hovering close by,
watching the scene, and an assurance came to him, as if a voice from heaven
had spoken, that not a musket would be fired, not a club would strike, not a
spear leave the hand in which it was held vibrating to be thrown, not an
arrow leave the bow, or a killing-stone the fingers, without the permission
of Jesus Christ, who rules all nature and restrains even the savages of the
South Seas. How were the savages prevented from carrying out their murderous
design? It was a miracle, emanating from the protecting presence of his Lord.
"If any reader wonders how they were restrained," says he,
"much more would I, unless I believed that the same Hand that restrained
the lions from touching Daniel held back these savages from hurting me." |
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In closing
the account of this remarkable episode, he comes back for the thousandth time
to the text that sang and sobbed and shouted its way through all his days. He
writes: "I was never left without hearing the promise in all its
consoling and supporting power coming up through the darkness and the
anguish, 'Lo, I am with you
alway.'" |
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The text that supported him! |
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The promise that consoled him! |
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The Presence that protected him! |
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"Lo, I am with you alway!" |
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Heroes of Faith on Pioneer Trails
by E. Myers Harrison. Published by Moody Press, |
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On several
occasions ships called at Port Resolution and the missionary was urged to sail
away to safety. In each instance he declined, hoping that he might yet win
the Tannese for Christ. But, finally, when the mission house was broken into
and everything he had was either stolen or destroyed, he realized that to
stay longer meant the direst of fates -- namely, to be killed and eaten by
the cannibals or else to die from slow starvation. Having decided to leave
Tanna for a season, he made his way across the island, amid indescribable
hardships and countless perils, to the mission station occupied by Mr. and
Mrs. Mathieson. |
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Completely
worn out with long watching and fatigue, Paton fell into a deep sleep. About |
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Opening
the door, Paton rushed outside to cut the reed fence. Instantly he was
surrounded by a company of savages with raised clubs shouting, "Kill
him! Kill him!" "They yelled in rage," says Paton, "but
the invisible Lord restrained them and delivered me. I stood invulnerable
beneath His invisible shield." |
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The presence of the invisible Lord! |
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The protection of the invisible shield! |
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The deliverance of the Divine Presence! |
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Just at
this juncture, a rushing, roaring sound came from the south. An awful tornado
of wind and rain was fast approaching! If it had come from the north, the flames
from the church would have quickly reached and burned the mission house.
Instead, the wind blew the flames away from the house and soon a torrent of
rain was falling. Terror stricken, the natives fled, shouting: "This is
Jehovah's rain! Truly their God is fighting for them and helping them." |
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Their
fright was short-lived, however. Early the next morning, they returned to
complete the bloody work they had commenced the preceding night. With wild shrieks
they drew near the house. Presently, amid the rising crescendo of shouting
and excitement, the missionaries heard the cry, "Sail 0! Sail 0!"
They were afraid to believe their ears but it was true: a vessel was sailing
into the harbor just when all hope seemed lost. The missionaries were soon
rescued and taken to Aneityum. |
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"In joy we united our praises,"
says Paton. "Truly our precious Jesus has all power. Often since have I
wept over His love and mercy in that deliverance." |
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Jesus -- the source of all power! |
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Jesus -- the fountain of love and mercy! |
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Jesus -- the author of every deliverance! |
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Jesus
claimed, "All power is given unto
Me" and promised, "Lo, I
am with you." On the basis of manifold miraculous experiences in the
life of John G. Paton, Christ's claim and promise were abundantly
established. |
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Heroes of Faith on Pioneer Trails
by E. Myers Harrison. Published by Moody Press, |
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