"... I will sing unto the LORD, for he hath triumphed gloriously…" (Exod. 15:1).
Thursday, November 3. Spent this day in secret fasting and prayer, from morning till night. Early in the morning, I had some small degree of assistance in prayer. Afterwards, read the story of Elijah the prophet, I Kings 17,18, and 19, and also 11 Kings 2 and 4. My soul was much moved observing the faith, zeal, and power of that holy man and how he wrestled with God in prayer. My soul then cried with Elisha, "Where is the Lord God of Elijah!" Oh, I longed for more faith! My soul breathed after God and pleaded with Him that a "double portion of that spirit," which was given to Elijah, might "rest on me.
That which was divinely refreshing and strengthening to my soul was that I saw that God is the same as He was in the days of Elijah. Was enabled to wrestle with God by prayer in a more affectionate, fervent, humble, intense, and importunate manner than I have for many months past. Nothing seemed too hard for God to perform; nothing too great for me to hope for from Him.
I had for many months entirely lost all hopes of being made instrumental of doing any special service for God in the world. It has appeared entirely impossible that one so black and vile should be thus employed for God. But at this time God was pleased to revive this hope.
Afterwards read the third chapter of Exodus and on to the twentieth, and saw more of the glory and majesty of God discovered in those chapters than ever I had seen before. Frequently in the meantime I fell on my knees and cried to God for the faith of Moses and for a manifestation of the divine glory. Especially the third and fourth, and part of the fourteenth and fifteenth chapters, were unspeakably sweet to my soul. My soul blessed God that He had shown Himself so gracious to His servants of old. The fifteenth chapter seemed to be the very language which my soul uttered to God in the season of my first spiritual comfort, when I had just got through the Red Sea, by a way that I had no expectation of.
Oh, how my soul then rejoiced in God! And now those things came fresh and lively to my mind. Now my soul blessed God afresh that He had opened that unthought-of-way to deliver me from the fear of the Egyptians, when I almost despaired of life.
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David Brainerd (1718 - 1747)
Was an American missionary to the Native Americans who had a particularly fruitful ministry among the Delaware Indians of New Jersey. During his short life he was beset by many difficulties. As a result, his biography has become a source of inspiration and encouragement to many Christians, including missionaries such as William Carey and Jim Elliot, and Brainerd's cousin, the Second Great Awakening evangelist James Brainerd Taylor (1801–1829).On 1 April 1743, after a brief period serving a church on Long Island, Brainerd began working as a missionary to Native Americans, which he would continue until late 1746 when worsening illness prevented him from working. This illness, generally considered to be tuberculosis, had begun to affect him at Yale, but worsened when he entered the mission field. In his final years, he also suffered from a form of depression that was sometimes immobilising and which, on at least twenty-two occasions, led him to wish for death. He was also affected by difficulties faced by other missionaries of the period, such as loneliness and lack of food. 'Let every preacher read carefully over the Life of David Brainerd'. - John Wesley
David Brainerd was an American missionary to the Native Americans. He was orphaned at fourteen and had an experience that intensified his dedication to Christianity at age 21 in 1739. Shortly after, he enrolled at Yale, but was expelled his junior year for privately saying of a college tutor, "He has no more grace than this chair".
He then prepared for the ministry, being licensed to preach in 1742, and early in 1743 decided to devote himself to missionary work among the Native Americans. He worked first at Kaunaumeek, an Indian settlement about 20 miles from Stockbridge, Massachusetts, and subsequently, until his death, among the Delaware Indians in Pennsylvania (near Easton) and New Jersey (near Cranbury).
His heroic and self-denying labors, both for the spiritual and for the temporal welfare of the Indians, wore out a naturally feeble constitution, and on October 9, 1747 he died at the house of his friend, Jonathan Edwards, in Northampton, Massachusetts.
Missionary to the American Indians. David Brainerd was born April 20, 1718, at Hatham, Connecticut. His early years were spent in an atmosphere of piety though his father died when David was nine and his mother died five years later. As a young man he was inclined to be melancholy, with the welfare of his soul ever before him. His entire youth was divided between farming, reading the Bible, and praying.
Early in life, he felt the call to the ministry and looked forward almost impatiently to the day when he could preach the Gospel. His formal education consisted of three years at Yale, where he was an excellent student until ill health forced him to return home. He completed his studies privately until he was fitted and licensed to preach by the Association of Ministers in Fairfield County, Connecticut. He turned down the offers of two pastorates in order to preach the Gospel to the American Indians.
Jonathan Edwards wrote of him, "And, having put his hand to the plow, he looked not back, and gave himself, heart, soul, and mind, and strength, to his chosen mission with unfaltering purpose, with apostolic zeal, with a heroic faith that feared no danger and surmounted every obstacle, and with an earnestness of mind that wrought wonders on savage lives and whole communities."
Brainerd did his greatest work by prayer. He was in the depths of the forests alone, unable to speak the language of the Indians. But he spent whole days in prayer, praying simply that the power of the Holy Ghost might come upon him so greatly that the Indians would not be able to refuse the Gospel message.
Once he preached through a drunken interpreter, a man so intoxicated that he could hardly stand up. Yet scores were converted through that sermon.
Plagued by ill health and the hardships of the primitive conditions, he died at the early age of 29, at the home of Jonathan Edwards, to whose daughter he was engaged.
After his death, William Carey read his diary and went to India. Robert McCheyne read it and went to the Jews. Henry Martyn read it and went to India. Though it was not written for publication, his diary influenced hundreds to yearn for the deeper life of prayer and communion with God, and also moved scores of men to surrender for missionary work.