425
October 1925
TH E
K I N G ’ S
B U S I N E S S
John G. Paton: Servant of C h ris t Many periodicals come to the editor’s desk every month,— good, bad, indifferent. But the “Walther League Messenger” (official organ of the Walther League, the Young People’s Organization of the Lutheran Church) is always an inspiration, for it stands four square for the whole Word of 'God. In a recent number appeared the following splendid article on. the life of John G. Paton and we know our readers will appreciate the courtesy of the editor of “The Messenger” in giving us permission to reproduce it. ■ T WAS just 100 years ago on the 24th-of May last year that there was horn in a small cottage in Brae- head, in the picturesque county of Dumfries, Scot land, a child who was destined to play a tremendous part in the evangelization of the world. Like most men who the rudiments of Latin and Greek; for I had given my soul to God, and was resolved to aim at being a missionary of the Cross, or a minister of the Gospel.” But between this reso lution and its fulfillment lay a series oi trials and disappoint ments which would have kept many a young man from enter
have done great and worth-while things, this child was horn in a humble and unpretentious fam ily. His father gained his liveli hood by knitting stockings and his mother found the day all too short to provide for the many wants of her eleven children. Luxuries w ere, unknown in this Highland cottage; its furniture was crude and its living space offered few of the enjoyments which are considered essential today. But as crowded as the little cottage was, it was not too small for that room which many pretentious mansions today lack, the sanctuary. “Thither daily,” as one of his children wrote, “and oftentimes a day, generally after each meal, we saw our fa ther retire and ‘shut to the door’; and we children got to understand by a sort of spiritual instinct (for the thing was too sacred to be talked about) that prayers were being poured out there for us, as of old by the high priest within the veil of the Most Holy Place.” Cold-hearted unbelievers may laugh and calculating skeptics may shrug their shoulders; but the prayers of parents have been associated with some of the most striking miracles that the world has ever witnessed, and to
ing the Saviour’s service. On sev eral occasions young Paton was practically penniless; repeatedly he was brought into serious cir cumstances or confronted with temptations that would have led him off the path of his chosen calling; but in each instance there was a guiding hand to strengthen him. And shall we not say that the petitions of the God-fearing parents in the old homestead helped to move this hand so wonderfully and so mysteriously? After acquiring his education through these triais and discom forts, John Paton was called to act as missionary in the slums of Glasgow, which were notorious for the infidels and drunkards that congregated there; it was slow, up-hill work, too. “After nearly a year’s hard work, I had only six or seven non-church goers, who had been led to attend regularly.” But the work pros pered, a larger building was se cured, and hundreds now flock to the mission. Ten years were spent in Glas gow, but deep down in Paton’s soul an intense longing was as serting itself. He says: “I con tinually heard the. wail of the perishing heathen in the South Seas; and I saw that few were
Cuts from “John G. Paton" Courtesy George H. Doran Co. “ W ell Done, Thou Good and F aith fu l S ervant.“
caring for them, while I well knew that many would be ready to take up my work.” When, therefore, Paton’s church could find no missionary for its new post in the New Hebrides, he recognized the voice within him as the voice of God, and straightway went to the foreign mission office, offering himself for this position. Of the feelings that surged within after this crisis had been reached,, he records in his biography: “I returned to my lodging with a lighter heart than I had for some time enjoyed, feeling that noth ing so clears the vision and lifts up the life as a decision to move forward in what you know to be entirely the will of the Lord.” Friends, of course, tried to dissuade him. To one old Christian gentleman, whose crowning argument always was: “The cannibals! you will be eaten by canni bals!” Paton replied, “Mr. Dickson, you are advanced in
James Paton, praying in the recesses of that oaken cottage and pouring out his heart to the compassionate Ruler of all human destinies, there must be ascribed both the example and the reinforcement of prayer which enabled his illustrious and God-fearing son, John Paton, to complete his thirty years among the South Sea cannibals and to gain an im perishable place among the great mansions of God. The story of John G. Paton, the centennial of whose birth was widely observed in this country and abroad, is one of the most thrilling of all missionary biographies. . “When still under twelve years of age,” he writes, “I started to learn my father’s trade. We wrought from six in the morn ing till ten at night, with an hour at dinner-time and half an hour at breakfast and again at supper. These spare moments every day I devoutly spent on my books, chiefly in
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