Chapter 5
“I will not let Thee go,
Thou Help in time of need!
Heap ill on ill,
I trust Thee still.
Even when it seems that
Thou would’st stay indeed!
Do as Thou wilt with me,
I yet will cling to Thee.
Hide Thou Thy face, yet,
Help in time of need,
I will not let Thee go!” ―Desszler.
“To the eye of reason,” says Brainerd, “everything that respects the conversion of the heathen is as dark as midnight.” Such was his conclusion as he began his missionary campaign at the Forks of the Delaware. The grand purpose which had called him there filled his thoughts by day and his dreams by night; his spirit was straitened until the end of his coming was accomplished. Constantly he speaks of his “poor Indians,” going to and fro among them preaching the glad tidings of a Savior, and when all the woods were hushed in midnight gloom, his voice could be heard entreating the Lord to save their souls. He had so completely severed himself from the outside world, that its concerns interested him no more; one thought, one aim, one desire, burning as a sacred passion, strove in his soul. “I was much assisted in prayer,” he tells us of one night, “for dear Christian friends, and for others that I apprehended to be Christless, but was more especially concerned for the poor heathen, and those of my own charge; was enabled to be instant in prayer for them, and hoped that God would bow the heavens, and come down for their salvation.”
The difficulties in his way were great-his inexperience with the language especially, as it was split up into so many dialects; his poor, failing health, the spirit forever outrunning the flesh; and the ignorance of the Indians, rendered still more an obstacle by their familiarity with white men, who treated them with brutality, deceived them, and left an impression then, as now, that the God of the palefaces was no friend of the poor redskin. Grasping traders and unscrupulous colonists had so pushed the Indians into hostility that it was some time before Brainerd could win their confidence, and make them feel that, with a brother’s yearning love, he sought not theirs but them.
We see him busying himself to make them more comfortable in their settlements, traveling miles on horseback to negotiate with the white people for land, on which they, might dwell in peace.
One Saturday evening he had been spending some time, as was his custom, in the woods meditating, and examining his own heart, when, on his return to the encampment, he heard that on the morrow a great feast was to be held, with idolatrous practices. His mind was in anguish about it. “I thought that I must in conscience go and endeavor to break them up, and knew not how to attempt such a thing. However, I withdrew for prayer, hoping for strength from above.” That night he spent in such an agony of supplication as can scarcely be described. When he rose from his knees, he could scarcely stand for very exhaustion, the perspiration stood on his forehead, he had cried to God until voice utterly failed, and Nature exhausted seemed, as he thought, to be giving way. Then came to him such a wonderful sense of confidence in God, and entire surrender to His will, as he never forgot to his dying day. He speaks of it as a season altogether “inexpressible” “All things here below vanished, and there appeared to be nothing of any considerable importance to me but holiness of heart and life, and the conversion of the heathen to God. All my cares, fears, and desires, which might be said to be of a worldly nature disappeared, and were, in my esteem, of little more importance than a puff of wind. I exceedingly longed that God would get to Himself a name among the heathen, and I appealed to Him, with the greatest freedom, that He knew I preferred Him above my chief joy.’ Indeed, I had no notion of joy for this world, I care not where or how I lived, or what hardships I went through, so that I could but gain souls to Christ. I continued in this frame all the evening and all the night. When I was asleep I dreamed of these things, and when I waked (as I frequently did), the first thing I thought of was this great work of pleading for God against Satan.”
When the day dawned he hurried to the woods to pour out his soul again to God, and emerge into the open again, with “a strong hope that God would bear the burdens and come down and do some marvelous work among the heathen.”
After three miles’ riding he reached the Indians, who were dancing wildly, and engaged in the frantic leaping’s and shouting’s which is still one of the distinguishing and terrifying characteristics of their worship. Brainerd went right into the midst of them, and with the blessing of the Divine companionship clothing him with grace and power, he persuaded them to cease and break up their gathering, so far, indeed, succeeding, that the Indians, who were frolicking about their medicine men, grouped themselves around the young Puritan, and listened with rapt attention to the Word of the Lord. Strange to say, after this remarkable answer to prayer, the preacher slowly wended his way home, disconsolate and buffeted by the insinuations of the evil one. “I was very weak and weary, and my soul borne down with perplexity, but was mortified to all the world, and was determined still to wait upon God for the conversion of the heathen, though the devil tempted me to the contrary.”
After this followed three weeks of illness, intense pain, in the midst of which he managed to crawl to his Indians to speak to them, but in truth he was sick and ready to die. He would sit amongst them, Bible in hand, pondering the Word of Life. Here we see the hero spirit in this faithful witness. Suffering made his work apostolic; with scarcely an exception he shared the same trials of him who speaks of being “in journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils on the sea, in perils amongst false brethren, in weariness and painfulness, in watching’s often, in hunger and thirst, in fasting’s often, in cold and nakedness.”
At last he is so enfeebled that he cannot leave his hut, and the uncertainty of his mind begins to fill him with alarm. What infinite tenderness lies in these words which he scrawled upon paper as he lay there alone, save for his God.
“I am obliged to let all my thoughts and concerns run at random, for I have neither strength to read, meditate or pray, and this naturally perplexes my mind. I seem to myself like a man that has all his estate embarked in one small boat, unhappily going adrift down a swift torrent. The poor man stands on the shore and looks, and laments his loss. But alas! though my all seems to be adrift, and I stand and see it, I dare not lament, for this sinks my spirit more and aggravates my bodily disorders. I am forced, therefore, to divert myself with trifles, although at the same time I air afraid and often feel as if I was guilty of the mismanagement of time. And oftentimes my conscience is so exercised with the miserable way of spending time, that I have no peace, though I have no strength of mind or body to improve it to better purpose, and hope that God will pity my distressed state!”
God did so, and Brainerd sets forth upon a missionary journey of four hundred and twenty miles, and then after a few days’ rest, with recovered strength he goes forth to meet his friend Byram, who was to be his companion on an expedition to the Indians at Susquehannah. This journey was adventurous and fraught with danger. They traveled mile after mile through a wilderness which Brainerd calls “hideous and howling,” then reaching a mountain range they had to find or make a track over their brows, and through the awful gorges and chasms at their feet. One dark night just where a precipice was near, Brainerd’s horse trapped its leg between the rocks and threw its rider, fortunately without injury to him, but he had to kill the horse, as with her legs broken he knew there was no help for it in such a desert place. Here halting for a space they gathered a few bushes and made a fire, and then heaping up some slight shelter from the biting wind they committed themselves to their God, and fell asleep upon the turf.
“Through the day Thy love hath spared us;
Wearied we lie down to rest,
Through the silent watches guard us,
Let no foe our peace molest,
Jesus, Thou our guardian be,
Sweet it is to trust in Thee.
“Pilgrims here on earth, and strangers,
Dwelling in the midst of foes,
Us and ours preserve from dangers,
In Thine arms may we repose,
And when life’s short day is past,
Rest with Thee in heaven at last.”
Their reception by the Indian encampment was cordial and satisfactory. Brainerd courteously saluted the king or chief, and forthwith preached to the large crowd of braves who, with their squaws, gathered round. The following day he preached again, and asked them to put off a grand hunting expedition, for which they were preparing, in order that he might continue for a few days more to instruct them in the truths of Christianity. This they consented to do, but he was a little astonished and “rather damped,” as he says, to find some of the leading Indians entering into argument with him, and raising strong objections to Christianity. What these objections were is an interesting inquiry, and fortunately amongst the other valuable memoranda which Brainerd left behind him, is a statement of the difficulties which the Indian feels standing in the way of his accepting the Gospel.
The first of these is a sorrowful fact, the objection which not only these poor Indians of a hundred and fifty years ago felt well-nigh insurmountable, but which, amongst the heathen and the civilized alike, is the difficulty to-day. The following words of Brainerd, sounding like a far-off appeal to Christians across the dim waste of years, is painfully, pitifully true, and needed in the mission world to-day. He tells us that these Indians have a rooted aversion to Christianity, and abhor even the Christian name. Why? “This aversion to Christianity arises partly from a view of the immorality and vicious behavior of many who are called Christians. They observe that horrid wickedness in nominal Christians, which the light of nature condemns in themselves, and not having distinguishing views of things, are ready to look upon all the white people alike for the abominable practices of some. Hence, when I have attempted to treat with them about Christianity, they have frequently objected to the scandalous practices of Christians. They have observed to me that the white people lie, defraud, steal, and drink worse than the Indians; that they have taught the Indians these things, especially the latter of them, who before the coming of the English knew of no such thing as strong drink; that the English have by these means made them quarrel and kill one another, and in a word brought them to the practice of all those vices which now prevail amongst them.”
Another objection to Christianity preferred by these Indians is still a difficulty in many fields of work today, that is the “fear of being enslaved.” When Brainerd told these people that Christianity was for their good, they would remind him of their losses of land, of liberty; that the white men were so strong, and had such means of killing them, that they were suspicious that the missionary had only been “sent out to draw them together under a pretense of kindness to them, that they may have an opportunity to make slaves of them, as they do of the poor negroes, or else to ship them on board their vessels, and make them fight with their enemies, etc.” They are very suspicious, not without reason too, of the friendship of the white man. “He never would,” they said, with a cautious shake of the head, “take all these pains to do us good, he must have some wicked design to hurt us in some way or other.”
Brainerd enters very fully into another and more serious objection, “their strong attachment to their own religious notions (if they may be called religious), and the early prejudices they have imbibed in favor of their own frantic and ridiculous kind of worship.” He was evidently not impressed very favorably with the practices of the native religion. He tells us that he finds a belief existing that all birds, beasts, and reptiles must be reverenced, because they are possessed with a Divine power to do good or evil to mankind, “whence such a creature becomes sacred to the persons to whom he is supposed to be the immediate author of good, and through him they must worship the invisible powers, though to others he is no more than another creature. And perhaps another animal is looked upon to be the immediate author of good to another, and consequently he must worship the invisible powers in that animal. I have seen a Pagan burn fine tobacco for incense in order to appease the anger of that invisible power which he supposed presided over rattlesnakes, because one of these animals was killed by another Indian near his house.” Before the coming of the English they had a belief in four deities, occupying the four corners of the earth, but when they saw the pale faces they reduced the number to three, one creating English, another Negroes, and the third themselves. They had peculiar notions about the future state, believing implicitly that the chichung (i.e., the shadow), or what survives death, goes southward to a place of perfect happiness and content. A curious circumstance was that these Indians held a notion that sins and offenses were only as regards themselves, and it never occurred to them that they could fail of a happy hereafter from any want of religious observance or belief. “I remember,” says Brainerd, “I once consulted a very ancient but intelligent Indian upon the point for my own satisfaction, and asked him whether the Indians of old times had supposed there was anything of the man that would survive the body. He replied, Yes.’ I asked him where they supposed its abode would be? He replied, “It would go southward.” I asked him further whether it would be happy there? He answered, after a considerable pause, ‘ that the souls of good folks would be happy, and the souls of bad folks miserable.’ I then asked him who he called bad folks? His answer (as I remember) was, those who lie, steal, quarrel with their neighbors, are unkind to their friends, and especially to aged parents, and, in a word, such as are a plague to mankind.”
Akin to this loyalty to religious beliefs, is the immense influence of their pow-wows or magicians.
however, of all their pretensions, calling it a mystery of iniquity, and altogether of Satan. One fact, however, he mentions is worthy of a brief record here, being the confession to him made by one of these powwows after his conversion. He explained to the missionary how the spirit of divination came upon him. “He was admitted into the presence of a wonderful being, who loved, pitied, and desired to do him good. The interview took place in the upper heaven, this being was shining as the brightest day, and in him was reflected all the world. By his side stood his shadow or spirit (chichung), lovely as the man himself, and after declaring who should be this Indian’s mother, he was asked to choose what he should be in life. First to be a hunter, and afterward a pow-wow was the reply. Whereupon the great man told him he should have what he desired, and that his shadow should go along with him down to earth and be with him forever. There was, he says, all this time, no words spoken between them. The conference was not carried on by any human language, but they had a kind of mental intelligence of each other’s thoughts, dispositions, and proposals. After this he says he saw the great man no more, but supposes he has come down to earth to be born, but the spirit or shadow of the great man still attended him, and ever after continued to appear to him in dreams and other ways, until he felt the power of God’s Word upon his heart, since which it has entirely left him.”
These statements, selected from many more which Brainerd has preserved, will show the material with which he had to deal in preaching to the Indians.
They also show that in times past as in times present, the human heart, both among the heathen and the civilized, is pre-occupied with false notions and bewildering speculations forming a barrier to the entrance of the Word. But then, as now, when the Gospel is faithfully preached and sincerely received, it is the power of God unto salvation freeing the soul from slavish superstitions, and clothing it with a robe of clear faith and sweet love. But to those who accepted Christ persecution followed, and the powwows would dance before the young convert in a frenzy of threatening rage.
The history of this devoted missionary is full of evidence of the power of Christianity to effect, as nothing else can, this radical change in human nature. No material could be perhaps more unpromising in many respects than these wild Indian tribes, who were addicted to many brutalities as well as the practice of most heathenish superstitions. While Brainerd was spending his night-watches in the lonely woods, he was in danger not only of wild beasts but of the almost wilder men who roamed abroad, exulting in the trophies of scalped victims, and ready for any act of savagery in their thirst for blood. Unto such as these the missionary poured out the message of his soul, denouncing without fear the blind idolatry of their festivities, and preaching to them an undiluted Gospel which counted them as all under sin and condemnation. We have seen from his own testimony how this made the medicine men his enemies; the hope of their gains was gone, their hold upon the superstitious Indians was relaxed as the light of Christ’s Gospel dawned in the hearts of the people. But undaunted Brainerd went on, strong in a sense of being where duty called him, stronger still and more assured in the knowledge that God stood by him and would not desert His witness in the face of the foe.
“With force of arms we nothing can,
Full soon were we downridden;
But for us fights the proper Man,
Whom God Himself hath bidden.
Ask ye who is this same?
Christ Jesus is His name,
The Lord Sabaoth’s Son;
He and no other one
Shall conquer in the battle.” ―Luther