David Brainerd Diary Quotes: His Own Words, Entry by Entry
David Brainerd kept a diary from his college years until a week before he died in 1747. He wrote it for himself alone, and he didn't want it published. Jonathan Edwards persuaded him to leave the papers in his hands, and after Brainerd's death he built a book around them. That book, The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, Chiefly Extracted from His Diary, is free to read in TheWay Library.
Below are twenty-one quotations, in order, each copied word for word from the book, with the date of the entry (where there is one) and a link to the chapter where you'll find it. Brainerd's spelling and punctuation are kept as printed. If you want the story behind them first, read Who Was David Brainerd?
Student years, 1740 to 1742
December 9, 1740. Brainerd was a student at Yale, recovering from illness and enjoying what he called seasons of communion with God. From chapter 1:
Oh! one hour with God infinitely exceeds all the pleasures and delights of this lower world.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 1 (Dec. 9, 1740)
April 1, 1742. Just expelled from Yale and studying for the ministry, he writes about grace. From chapter 2:
O if ever I get to heaven, it will be because God pleases, and nothing else; for I never did any thing of myself but get away from God!
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 2 (April 1, 1742)
April 20, 1742. His twenty-fourth birthday. This is one of the lines most often quoted from him:
I hardly ever so longed to live to God, and to be altogether devoted to him; I wanted to wear out my life in his service, and for his glory.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 2 (April 20, 1742)
April 28, 1742. After two hours of prayer in his "usual place of retirement":
I had no more value for the favor of men, than for pebbles. The Lord was my ALL, and that he over-ruled all, greatly delighted me.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 2 (April 28, 1742)
May 13, 1742. Traveling in Connecticut, he couldn't find a quiet place to pray, and he missed it:
O, the closest walk with God is the sweetest heaven that can be enjoyed on earth!
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 2 (May 13, 1742)
A licensed preacher, 1742
August 15, 1742. Shortly after he was licensed to preach. From chapter 3:
O, who can conceive of the sweetness of communion with the blessed God, but those who have experience of it! Glory to God for ever, that I may taste heaven below.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 3 (Aug. 15, 1742)
October 21, 1742. Brainerd often wrote about living with eternity in view. This is the best known of those lines:
O I love to live on the brink of eternity, in my views and meditations! This gives me a sweet, awful and reverential sense and apprehension of God and divine things, when I see myself as it were, standing before the judgment seat of Christ.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 3 (Oct. 21, 1742)
November 4, 1742. On humility, a theme that runs through the whole diary:
Saw much of my nothingness most of this day … O it is sweet lying in the dust!
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 3 (Nov. 4, 1742)
Alone at Kaunaumeek, 1743
May 18, 1743. His first mission post was a small Indian settlement in the woods of New York. From chapter 5:
I live in the most lonesome wilderness; have but one single person to converse with that can speak English. … I lodge on a bundle of straw, my labor is hard and extremely difficult, and I have little appearance of success to comfort me.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 5 (May 18, 1743)
He goes on to say the hardships weren't the worst of it: "that which makes all my difficulties grievous to be borne, is, that God hides his face from me."
August 1, 1743. While building his own hut:
Felt a little sweetness of religion, and thought that it was worth while to follow after God through a thousand snares, deserts, and death itself.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 5 (Aug. 1, 1743)
August 4, 1743. Practical counsel on the use of time:
Filling up our time with and for God, is the way to rise up and lie down in peace.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 5 (Aug. 4, 1743)
September 14, 1743. Commencement day at Yale, when his classmates received the degree he'd been denied:
God enabled me with calmness and resignation to say, “the will of the Lord be done.”
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 5 (Sept. 14, 1743)
The Forks of the Delaware, 1744
July 21, 1744. He learned that the Indians planned an idolatrous feast the next day, and spent the evening in prayer. From chapter 6:
Indeed, I had no notion of joy from this world; I cared not where or how I lived, or what hardships I went through, so that I could but gain souls to Christ.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 6 (July 21, 1744)
Revival at Crossweeksung, 1745 and 1746
August 8, 1745. The day the revival broke out among the Delaware Indians in New Jersey. From his public journal in chapter 7:
I stood amazed at the influence which seized the audience almost universally; and could compare it to nothing more aptly than the irresistible force of a mighty torrent, or swelling deluge.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 7 (Aug. 8, 1745)
June 19, 1746. One year after his first sermon at Crossweeksung. From chapter 8:
This day makes up a complete year from the first time of my preaching to these Indians in New-Jersey. What amazing things has God wrought, in this space of time, for this poor people!
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, chapter 8 (June 19, 1746)
In his general remarks at the close of the journal, he names what he preached:
I have in general, ever since my first coming among the Indians in New-Jersey, been favored with that assistance which to me is uncommon, in preaching Christ crucified, and making him the centre and mark to which all my discourses among them were directed.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, General Remarks
The last year, 1747
May 24, 1747. Sick with consumption, he wrote this warning about shallow religion. From chapter 9:
Much more of true religion consists in deep humility, brokenness of heart, and an abasing sense of barrenness and want of grace and holiness, than most who are called Christians imagine.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, Chapter IX (May 24, 1747)
July 26, 1747. Back at Northampton after nearly dying in Boston:
This day I saw clearly that I should never be happy; yea, that God himself could not make me happy, unless I could be in a capacity to ‘please and glorify him for ever.’
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, Chapter IX (July 26, 1747)
September 19, 1747. Three weeks before his death, walking a little near evening:
I do not go to heaven to get honor, but to give all possible glory and praise. … O I was made for eternity, if God might be glorified!
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, Chapter IX (Sept. 19, 1747)
That same evening, Edwards records, he spoke to the family about what heaven meant to him:
My heaven is to please God, and glorify him, and to give all to him, and to be wholly devoted to his glory; that is the heaven I long for.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, Chapter IX
October 2, 1747. The last entry in the diary, dictated to his brother Israel a week before his death:
I felt sweetly disposed to commit all to him, even my dearest friends, my dearest flock, my absent brother, and all my concerns for time and eternity. O that his kingdom might come in the world.
The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, Chapter IX (Oct. 2, 1747)
Edwards adds: "Here ends his diary."
Reading the diary well
A few things help when you read these lines in the book.
- Read the low days too. Brainerd records dark weeks as faithfully as bright ones. Edwards warns in his preface that Brainerd was prone to melancholy, and that he learned over time to tell it apart from true sorrow for sin.
- Notice how often joy follows prayer. Many of the brightest entries come at the end of a day he set apart for fasting and prayer. We gather those passages in David Brainerd's Prayer Life.
- Watch his aim. From conversion to death, the thread is the glory of God, not his own comfort.
For an overview of the whole book, see The Life of David Brainerd: A Summary. Or go to the book's page and start reading.