James Gilmour in Mongolia

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This is the day that … James Gilmour was born, “a few miles from Glasgow”, Scotland, in 1843.

Few missionary stories reveal such hardship and danger and solitude … “I doubt if St Paul endured more for Christ than James Gilmour did…” was said at his memorial service in Peking.

Born to a devout Christian family, James’ mother taught him and his five brothers the scriptures and stories of missionary endeavour. A bright student he excelled in academics and keenly sought to serve God. He abhorred alcohol. He once poured a friend’s drink out the window, proclaiming, “Better on God’s earth than in His image”.

After studying at a Congregational theological college, Gilmour left for Mongolia in 1870 under the auspices of the London Missionary Society. He was ready to go abroad, saying, “to me the soul of an Indian seemed as precious as the soul of an Englishman, and the Gospel as much for the Chinese as the European.”

For 27 years he lived among the Mongolians (less than half of that time with a faithful wife who died on the field), seeking to point them away from their Buddhism to the Saviour.

Life was filled with danger, to which his response was, “Our death might further the cause of Christ more than our life could do.”

“Always he was busy,” writes A. Smellie, “healing the sick, talking with enquirers, selling Christian books, preaching the gospel …” (Torchbearers of the Faith, page 212).

He ate but once a day … walking from village to village with his luggage and Bibles and medicines on his back. In 1886 he records in his journal: “Preached to 24,000 people (this year), treated more than 5,700 patients, distributed 10,000 books and tracts … and out of all this there are only two men who have openly confessed Christ.”

During a brief furlough in Scotland he had this to say: “Just think! In a little town like this there are men preaching on every other street corner, and I am all alone in these hundreds of square miles in Mongolia. What you people are thinking of I cannot imagine!”

Judged by worldly standards his success was minimal. But when he died of typhus fever at the age of 48 he assuredly heard the Saviour’s “Well done, good and faithful servant!”

This post is based on the work of my late friend Donald Prout whose love for books and Christian history led him to collate a daily Christian calendar. I continue to work with Don’s wife, Barbara, to share his life work with the world. I have updated some of these historical posts and will hopefully draw from Don’s huge files of clippings to continue this series beyond Don’s original work. More of Don’s work can be found at www.donaldprout.com.

Sir James Young Simpson – Faith Trumps Science

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This is the day that … Sir James Young Simpson was born, “25 miles from Edinburgh”, Scotland, in 1811.

His mother was 40 years of age at the time, and his father was the village baker. And, to establish in our minds something of the superstitions of the world into which he was born, James’ grandfather had “buried a live cow to appease the Evil Spirit which seemed likely to empty his byre (cow-shed)!” (Journal of Christian Medical Fellowship, January, 1992, page 5).

But James Simpson would be one of that century’s great scientists, who would help bridge the gap between “old wives’ tales” and responsible medical practice. His medical studies led him to the pinnacle of fame – elected “Senior President of the Royal Medical Society of Edinburgh” at the age of 24.

After studying at Edinburgh University he was appointed to the faculty as Lecturer in Obstetrics and Gynaecology. And he found time to devote to his growing interest in archaeology – even being appointed Professor of Antiquities at the Royal Scottish Academy.

But the medical field was also encountering new discoveries. The use of ether to be used in the rendering of a patient unconscious during an operation had been tried. Likewise experiments with “nitrous oxide” (laughing gas).

But there were dangers also. A Liverpool chemist suggested the use of chloroform – a substance discovered some 10 years previous. On 4 November, 1847, Simpson and two colleagues experimented with it – on themselves. Six days later he was reporting to a medical meeting the advantages of this particular anaesthetic. And to answer his critics – religious critics who thought that women must suffer pain in childbirth – he argued that even God put Adam into a “deep sleep” prior to performing His divine surgery! He popularised the use of chloroform … and tried it out on a mother in labour. “She was so excited about the less painful birth that she named her baby girl Anaesthesia!”

Simpson was a member of the Church of Scotland – living at the time of the Disruption in that denomination, he threw in his lot with the Free Church of Scotland (1843).

Conversion, however, appears to have taken place in 1861, although some writers suggest a couple of years previous. Asked at a public meeting what was his greatest discovery, Simpson unhesitatingly replied: “That I have a Saviour” (Men of Destiny, by Peter Masters, page 38).

In 1862 we find him quoted as saying in an address, “I am one of the oldest sinners and one of the youngest Christians in this room” (Journal of the Christian Medical Fellowship, January, 1992).

Sir James Young Simpson died on 6 May, 1870.

This post is based on the work of my late friend Donald Prout whose love for books and Christian history led him to collate a daily Christian calendar. I continue to work with Don’s wife, Barbara, to share his life work with the world. I have updated some of these historical posts and will hopefully draw from Don’s huge files of clippings to continue this series beyond Don’s original work. More of Don’s work can be found at www.donaldprout.com.

Dan Crawford – Missionary to Africa

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This is the day that … Dan Crawford was converted in 1887.

Born in Scotland on 7 December, 1870, he was only four years old when his father died, and a meagre education followed.  He grew up a “guid laddie”(good boy), became a member of the local kirk, and then became a Sunday-School teacher.

At the age of 17, as he taught Sunday-School, the influence of another teacher gave him uneasiness of soul.  “For some weeks he was in great anxiety.  One evening he attended a mission hall and heard a plain working man, out of a full heart, tell of a Saviour’s love …”  Convicted by the preaching but still unwilling to yield to the Saviour, Dan now found himself confronted by his friend’s final plea.

“Dan,” said Mr Storer as he drew a line on the floor with a carpenter’s pencil, “you’ll not step over that line until you have trusted Christ.  Will you trust Him now?”

There was “a minute’s dead silence,” says the biographer.  Then Dan Crawford said:  “I will” and strode across the line.  And, adds E. Enock, “he never faltered from that moment.”

“Dan started right away to tell all around of his new found Saviour.  He would preach anywhere.  In the street he would stop, doff his cap, and start to tell out the Gospel …” (Gathered Sheaves, page 2).

He threw in his lot with the Brethren, took to open air preaching, fell in love with Grace Tilsley … but declined to propose as he was going to Africa as a missionary.  And because he had developed such a “bad cough” in his street preaching days – in all kinds of inclement weather – the doctor did not expect him to live more than 12 months.

On 23 March, 1889, Dan Crawford sailed for Africa, in the company of F.S. Arnot, and there as a missionary sent out by the Brethren Assemblies, he served his Lord for the next 37 years.  In 1898 Grace Tilsley joined him, and they were married on 14 September.

He “relied upon unsolicited gifts and preferred to work alone.”  He translated the Scriptures into a native tongue, and wrote Thinking Black, a classic missionary volume that anticipated “modern cultural anthropology” (Who’s Who in Christian History), and “became a valuable contribution in the field of missionary practices and principles.”

Bishop Stephen Neill, in his History of Christian Missions, devotes three pages to Dan Crawford and the impact he made, not only on the African peoples he evangelised, but on missionary strategy.

On 29 May, 1926, during a restless sleep, he knocked his hand on a raw-edged shelf beside his bed.  Blood poisoning set in and he died five days later.