When Gordon and I emigrated from South Africa to the UK at the turn of the millennium, we had the heart-tearing decision: what to do with all our books in the light of each allocated 23kg of luggage on our flights! The pain of parting with our books was greatly eased when we took them off, box by box by box, to the Bible College in Port Elizabeth. There, some students were so poor that they were given breakfast before starting with their Bible training. It really is really more blessed to give than to receive!
In any case………among those books was a green copy of the the Autobiography of John Paton. Oh! - this book has made such an indelible impression on both of us, that every so many years, it just overtakes our memories with force, and we willingly return to it. That time has come again, this week. I put out feelers on face book: “Have you read….?” – and waited with bated breath. And they popped up – from Japan, New Zealand, South Africa and the UK!
John G. Paton, born in Scotland in 1824, was a missionary to the New Hebrides, today called Vanuatu, in the South Seas. His Autobiography is still in print almost 120 years after it was first published, and is available as free reading on-line. He came from a humble but godly home, one of 11 children, whose father 3 times a day went into his prayer closet and prayed aloud and the children knew and witnessed how their father walked with God. The time came for the young Paton to leave home and go to Glasgow to attend divinity school and become a missionary in his early twenties. From his hometown of Torthorwald to the train station at Kilmarnock was a 40-mile walk. (Phew!) John and his father walked the first 6 miles together - a scene that would be embedded in John Paton’s heart for the rest of his life.
(Personally I prefer modern and contemporary writing style – but “The Parting” never ceases to move my heart).
THE PARTING
“My dear father walked with me the first six miles of the way. His counsel and tears and heavenly conversation on that parting journey are fresh in my heart as if it had been but yesterday; and tears are on my cheeks as freely now as then, whenever memory steals me away to the scene. His tears fell fast when our eyes met each other in looks for which all speech was vain!
He grasped my hand firmly for a minute in silence, and then solemnly said: "God bless you, my son! Your father's God prosper you, and keep you from all evil!" Unable to say more, his lips kept moving in silent prayer; in tears we embraced, and parted.
I ran off as fast as I could; and, when about to turn a corner in the road where he would lose sight of me, I looked back and saw him still standing with head uncovered where I had left him gazing after me. Waving my hat in adieu, I was round the corner and out of sight in an instant.
But my heart was too full and sore to carry me further, so I darted into the side of the road and wept for a time. Rising up cautiously, I climbed the dyke to see if he yet stood where I had left him; and just at that moment I caught a glimpse of him climbing the dyke and looking out for me!
He did not see me, and after he had gazed eagerly in my direction for a while he got down, set his face towards home, and began to return, his head still uncovered, and his heart, I felt sure, still rising in prayers for me.
I watched through blinding tears, till his form faded from my gaze; and then, hastening on my way, vowed deeply and oft, by the help of God, to live and act so as never to grieve or dishonour such a father and mother as He had given me.
The appearance of my father when we parted has often through life risen vividly before my mind, and does so now as if it had been but an hour ago. In my earlier years particularly, when exposed to many temptations, his parting form rose before me as that of a guardian Angel. It is no pharisaism, but deep gratitude, which makes me here testify that the memory of that scene not only helped to keep me pure from the prevailing sins, but also stimulated me in all my studies, that I might not fall short of his hopes, and in all my Christian duties, that I might faithfully follow his shining example.”
John G Paton, missionary to the New Hebrides went there after the ones who went before him 19 yeas previously were eaten within minutes of arriving on the cannibalistic island. In 1839 John William and James Harris from the London Missionary Society landed in the islands. They found a place with absolutely no Christian influence and totally heathen. Both eventually were killed and eaten by the cannibals on the island of Erromanga only minutes after going ashore. John Paton, later writing of this event said, “Thus were the New Hebrides baptized with the blood of martyrs; and Christ, thereby, told the whole Christian world that He claimed these islands as His own.”
In 1842 the London Missionary Society sent another team to the New Hebrides to the Island of Tanna. Within seven months the missionaries were forced to flee. In this context on April 16, 1858, John Paton, then 33 years of age, sailed for the New Hebrides (via Australia) with his wife Mary. The couple landed on the Island of Tanna on November 5. Tanna was a beautiful South Pacific island but lurking with dangers. The first night behind him on the Island of Tanna, John was ready to do a great work for Christ in reaching these pagan people with the Word of God.
“Missi” (Dr. Paton) is neither graphic nor morbid, the book includes life and death, superstition, the horror of cannibalism, great losses and great triumphs, trials and tribulation, and the overwhelming Presence of God in the midst of it all. In the native world of revenge and bloodletting.
John Piper writes:
“ One of the most powerful paragraphs in his Autobiography describes his experience of hiding in a tree, at the mercy of an unreliable chief, as hundreds of angry natives hunted him for his life. He began his Autobiography with the words, “What I write here is for the glory of God”. God gets glory when his Son is exalted. And his Son his exalted when we cherish him above all things. That is what this story is about.”If you are interested, please click on this link, to find John Paton’s free Autobiography on-line.
And for children: Food for Cannibals: The Story of John Paton - rewritten for young readers.
