David Livingstone — Missionary Pioneer
David Livingstone -Missionary Pioneer
David Livingstone
was a great
missionary pioneer pathfinder
whose greatest desire was granted only after his death:
The cessation of the slave trade and the opening up of Africa to Christianity and lawful commerce.
He had the grace to see that his Mission was part
of a Divine plan to
Livingstone’s great
goal of bringing to
the world’s attention
the plight of the
Islamic slave trade
in Africa
set many souls free from slavery,
both physical and spiritual.
This was achieved largely through the work of his
convert, American journalist
Henry Morton Stanley.
David was brought up in a pious but poverty stricken home in Scotland. He was an avid reader and borrowed extensively from
the local library.
By age 9 he had already committed to memory
Psalm 119 and won a copy of
the New Testament
as a reward.
By age 10 David was employed 14 hours a day, 6 days a week
at the local cotton spinning factory.
David managed to read in the factory by placing his book on a portion of the spinning jenny so that he could catch sentence after sentence as
he passed at his work.
He maintained fairly
constant study, undisturbed by the roar of the machinery.
His conversion at age 12
inspired him to resolve
to devote his life
to the alleviation
of human misery.
Three themes dominated his life: evangelisation, exploration and emancipation.
He wrote at the
time:
“That the salvation of men ought to be the chief desire and aim of every
Christian.”
He therefore made a resolution: that he would give to the cause of missions all that he might earn beyond what was required for his subsistence.
After 10 years of daily drudgery at the cotton mill, David set out to study Theology and Medicine.
Medical science in the 1830’s
was, by today’s standards,
primitive.
Surgical operations were performed at hazardous speeds
because of the lack of anaesthetics.
Chloroform and ether were not introduced until several years later and the discovery of antiseptics lay 25
years ahead.
The study of chemistry was growing, but physics had hardly started, and biochemistry and bacteriology were
unknown.
Nothing at all was known about the tropical diseases he was to encounter,
such as malaria
and blackwater fever.
It was not in Livingstone’s
character to relax.
He took his task and calling
most seriously
and whatever he did he performed thoroughly.
He was uncompromising,
diligent and inflexible
in his adherence to his word.
Friends described him as: “a man of resolute courage”; “fire, water, stonewall would not stop Livingstone in the
fulfillment of
any recognised duty.” It took him 3 months by sailing ship to reach
Cape Town
and another 4 months by ox cart before he even reached Robert Moffat’s mission station at Kuruman where he would begin his work for the Lord in Africa.
When he landed in South Africa, on 17 March 1841, David Livingstone was coming to a continent that was plagued with problems.
Africa was still a place of mystery to the Europeans. The Arabs, south of the Sahara never ventured far
from the coast inland.
The rivers were riddled with rapids and sand bars.
Most of the
tribes
inhabiting the
interior of
Africa were still unknown. Many maps of that time had
words like
Unknown and Unexplored
territory
written across huge sections of the interior
of Africa.
The deadly malaria disease was widespread and inhibited travel.
Entire expeditions of 300 to 400 men had been wiped out by malaria. The African terrain was difficult to negotiate. Floods,
tropical forests and swamps thwarted wheeled transport.
Livingstone soon acquired a reputation for fearless faith – particularly when he walked to the Barka tribe – infamous for the murder of 4 White traders whom they
had mercilessly poisoned and strangled.
As the first messenger of mercy in many regions, Livingstone soon received further challenge.
Chief Sechele pointed to
the great Kalahari desert:
“you never can cross that country to the tribes beyond; it is utterly impossible even for us
Black men.”
The challenge of
crossing this obstacle
began to fascinate
Livingstone.
Livingstone wrote:
“I shall try to hold
myself in readiness to go anywhere, provided
it be forward.”
He is reported to have had a steadfast manner and folk knew where they stood with him. Livingstone’s plans to establish a Bible college for Africans was frustrated. However,the Sovereignty of God was seen in this.
Had Livingstone’s wishes been carried out, he might have spent his life’s work training in a Bible college rather than traversing
Africa and dealing a death blow to the slave trade.
His three great daily challenges he described as: heat, harsh conditions and hardness of hearts.
“I hope to be permitted to work as long as I live beyond other men’s line of things and plant the
seed of the Gospel where others have not
planted.
But every excursion for that purpose will involve separation from my family for periods of 4 or
5 months.”
“I am a missionary,
heart and soul.
God had an only Son,
and He was
a missionary
and physician.
A poor, poor imitation
of Him I am,
or wish to be.
In His service
I hope to live,
in it I wish to die.”
During his first missionary journey with his wife and children, their 4th child,
Elizabeth, was born.
Within a few weeks she had died and the rest of the family were sick. He received much criticism for the “irresponsibility” of taking a wife and 4 children on a missionary journey in the wilderness.
Later he was criticised for sending his family back to Britain while he pioneered the hinterland of Africa.
When his wife rejoined him for his second great missionary expedition in the Zambezi valley she died of malaria.
“I shall open up a path in to the interior or perish.” He declared. “May He bless us and make us
blessings even unto death.”
“Shame upon us missionaries
if we are to be outdone by slave traders!” “If Christian missionaries and Christian merchants could remain throughout the year in the interior
of the continent, in 10 years, slave dealers
will be driven out of the market.”
Battling rains, chronic discomfort, rust, mildew and rot, totally drenched and fatigued, laid low by fever, Livingstone continued to persevere across the continent. Hostile tribes demanded
exorbitant payment for crossing their territory.
Some tense moments were stared down by Livingstone, gun in hand. Trials tested the tenacity of the travel
wearied team
“Can the love of Christ not carry the missionary where the slave trade carries the trader?” After 2 years pioneering across the hinterland of Africa,
Livingstone reached Luanda.
The “Forerunner” ship was ready to take him to England.
Sussi & Choma, two of Livingstone’s faithful However, Livingstone chose to
porters. return overland to bring his guides
and porters back to their village.
Rather than risk their being sold unto slavery in Portuguese West Africa, he preferred to take another 2 years crossing the continent that had almost killed him on his first journey!
However, had Livingstone chosen to return he
might well have ended his ministry!
The ship sank with all hands lost (and with his journals)! By God’s grace, Livingstone still had a copy of his journals that he had laboriously written out – just in
case!
“These privations, I beg you to observe, are not sacrifices.
I think that word ought never to be
mentioned in
reference to anything we can do for Him who though He was
rich, yet for our
sakes became poor.” Often Livingstone endured excessive and unnecessary suffering and deprivation hacking through dense jungle on foot because lack of funds prevented him
from affording the “luxury” of a canoe!
Livingstone often saw the sickening sights of the Islamic slave trade: burned out villages, corpses floating down rivers and long lines of shackled slaves being herded through the bush.
Livingstone’s mere presence often sent the Yao slave raiders scurrying into the bushes.
Many hundreds of slaves were set free by Livingstone and his co-workers.
On one occasion
a war party of Yao warriors
attacked
the missionary party. While attempting to avoid confrontation, the team
found themselves
cut off and surrounded
by the aggressive
and blood thirsty mob. Finally, Livingstone was forced to give the command
to return fire.
The slave traders fled.
This incident led to much criticism in England. Charles Livingstone, his brother, on hearing one outburst from Britain
replied:
“…if you were in Africa and saw a host of murderous
savages aiming their heavily laden muskets and poisoned arrows at you, more light might enter your mind... and if it didn’t, great daylight would enter your
body through arrow and bullet holes!”
It was
Livingstone’s great desire to see the slave trade cease. Firstly, there was the internal slave trade between hostile tribes.
Secondly, there were slave traders from the coast, Arabs or Portuguese, for whom local tribes were encouraged to collect
slaves by marauding raids.
Thirdly, there were the parties sent out from Portuguese and Arab coastal towns with cloths, beads, muskets and ammunition to
exchange for slaves.
Incidentally,
Livingstone inspired
the shortest war
in history – in 1873 – when the British Navy presented an ultimatum
to the Sultan of Zanzibar
to close their flourishing
slave market.
When the Sultan refused, his palace was shelled – resulting in a record breaking
surrender
within the hour!
In his writings and public speaking engagements, Livingstone regularly
spoke on his twin
concerns – to enlighten people on the evils of the slave trade, and to spread the Christian Gospel amongst the
heathen.
Although he was renowned for his
exploration, in his mind it was only a means to evangelism and to “disciple the nations.” Dr. Livingstone believed in comprehensively
fulfilling the Great Commission –
ministering to body,
mind and spirit.
Along with his Bible, surgical kit and medicine chest, Livingstone always carried a microscope and sextant – with which he observed God’s spectacularly diverse creation with awe and
wonder.
His books are filled with fascinating scientific, medical, botanical, anthropological and geographic observations and
details.
Livingstone was the first to map the great Zambezi river and many other parts of the vast hinterland of Africa.
He was one of
the first
scientists to
make the
connection
between
mosquitos and malaria, and he pioneered the
use of
quinine as a treatment – often experimenting
on himself!
The challenge of Livingstone rings out
to us today:
“Can that be called a sacrifice which is simply paid back as a small part of a great debt owing to our God, which we can never repay... it is emphatically no sacrifice. Say rather, it is a privilege!” A mission organisation wrote to David Livingstone asking: “Have you found a good road to where you are? If so, we want to send other men to join you.”
Livingstone replied: “If you have men who will come only if they know there is a good road, I don’t want them. I want men who will come even if there is no road at all.”
The optimistic eschatology of Livingstone the Liberator,
comes as a stern rebuke to the prevailing
escapist eschatology of defeat and retreat.
This strategy of ministering to body, mind and soul
was enormously successful.
Dr. David Livingstone combined his medical
training with his
Theological education and a vision for establishing lay
leadership Bible training centres
throughout Africa to
minister to body, mind and spirit.
His painstakingly detailed and accurate Geographic research and mapmaking on his pioneer explorations and his published research were foundational in opening up Africa to Christianity
and destroying the Islamic slave trade.
Despite the crushing losses of his fourth child, Elizabeth, and his wife, Mary, to diseases in the field and many debilitating illnesses, attacks by wild animals and Muslim slave raiders, criticism from home, and the physical strain of hacking his way through dense tropical jungles, walking from coast to coast across Africa, yet Livingstone persevered: “Nothing earthly will make me give up my work in despair. I encourage myself in the Lord, my God,
and go forward.”
A Vision of Victory
The tribulations so willingly endured by so many missionary pioneers should provoke us to ask: what could have inspired
them to have continued on in the face of
such overwhelming obstacles and hardships?
Livingstone wrote that we need to be:“Uncommon Christians, i.e. imminently holy and devoted
servants
of the Most High.”
“Let us seek that
selfishness be extirpated,
pride banished,
unbelief driven from the mind, every idol dethroned, and everything hostile to holiness and opposed to the Divine will
crucified;
that holiness to the Lord may be engraved on the heart and evermore characterise our whole
conduct.”
“We have still a debt of gratitude to Jesus ... and there is no greater privilege on earth, than
after having our own chains broken off, to go forth and proclaim liberty to the captives, the opening of the prison to them that are bound.” David Livingstone was inspired by an optimistic eschatology.
Like most of the
missionaries of the 19th Century, Livingstone was a post-millennialist
who held to
the eschatology
of victory:
“Discoveries and
inventions are culminative ... Filling the earth with the glory of the Lord. All nations will sing His glory and bow before Him ... our work and
its fruit are culminative. We work towards a new state of things. Future missionaries will be rewarded by conversions for every sermon. We are their pioneers and helpers Let them not forget the watchmen of the night, who worked when all was gloom and no evidence of success in the way of conversions cheers
our path. They will doubtless have more light than we,
but we serve our Master earnestly and
proclaim the same Gospel
as they will do.”
“A quiet audience today. The seed is being sown, the least of all seeds now, but it will grow into a mighty tree. It is as if it were a small stone cut out of a mountain, but it will fill the whole earth (Daniel 2:34-45).” “We work for a glorious future which we are not destined to see, the golden age which has not yet been, but will yet be. We are only morning stars shining in the dark, but the glorious morn will break – the good time coming yet.” “The dominion has been given by the power of commerce and population unto the people of the saints of the Most
High. This is an
Everlasting kingdom, a little stone cut out of the mountain without hands which will cover the
whole earth.
For this time we work.” “By different agencies, the Great Ruler is bringing all things into a focus. Jesus is gathering all things to Himself
and He is daily
becoming more and more
the centre
of the world’s hope and of the world’s fears.”
His steadfast example has been used by the Lord to inspire hundreds of men and women to devote their lives
to African missions.
On 18 April 1874, Henry Morton Stanley was one of the pallbearers for the funeral of Dr. David Livingstone at Westminster Abbey.
Stanley was given the foremost position on the right.
Mary Slessor, for example, went to Calabar (present day Nigeria) and ended the practice of murdering twins
(believed by
animists to be
bewitched.)
Peter Cameron was inspired to return to Africa after his first mission failed, when he read the inscription on the tomb of
Livingstone in
Westminster Abbey: “Other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must
bring...”
Frontline Fellowship
PO Box 74 Newlands
Cape Town South Africa E-mail: [email protected] Web: www.frontline.org.za