It Is a Serious Task

Nor does He ever leave them unconsoled, and the Band pulled itself together and fought through that sinking of the spirits which makes us feel as if the bottom of things had been knocked out and nothing much mattered any more. Straight through the hot weather now upon them they worked steadfastly, preaching in hundreds of villages and towns, and rejoicing mightily when here and there they came upon ground already made soft with showers. In such ground they sowed the seed with a sure hope, and watched with grateful delight the ever new miracle of its upspringing (there is no missionary song like the 65th Psalm). But though they had these good hours sometimes, they never disguised the fact that as a whole the ground was very dry. ‘ To thisside-cow that side looks green,’ says the Tamil. ‘Far green cools the eyes.’ Far hills look blue. But the far green is probably tussocky elephant grass. Climb the hills, and you find them hard going.

Ragland was a man who had no use for paint where truth was concerned. Perhaps mathematics and paint do not run together. At all events he writes about things exactly as he finds them. Every now and then he strikes sharply against the much pleasanter view usually accepted now about the ‘ Spiritual East ’. Is it always remembered that Westcott’s rather over-emphasized remark touched only that rarest type of soul, the seeker after God, whose ritual does indeed express him? Be that as it may, here is the word of another Cambridge scholar, one who knew the people not from books only, but in the thousand contacts of life.

‘ I find it (the work) likely to prove not such as those I have spoken to in England and in India have thought, particularly interesting or exciting; but rather just what I expected myself from the first, quiet, humble plodding day after day, and returning again and again to the same dull-minded (or if quick-minded, gainsaying) people, and endeavouring to make them care about their souls and seek the Lord Jesus Christ; a work requiring very much patience and love, faith and perseverance. Oh that I might have all this!’

Pioneer work sounds splendid; there is glamour in the very word; there is usually none in the life itself. Hear another of God’s pioneers, Coillard of the Zambesi:

‘ The evangelization of the heathen world in the place where it is carried on, is certainly not a tissue of strange customs and adventures as thrilling as a romance; it is a desperate struggle with the Prince of Darkness, and with everything his rage can stir up in the shape of obstacles, vexations, oppositions, and hatred, whether by circumstances or by the hand of man. It is a serious task. Oh, it should mean a life of consecration and faith.’

But because they had entered into the field with earnest hope, and because they could not be satisfied with anything short of reality, and never (this is a Tamil word) showed brass for gold, Ragland and his colleagues searched themselves to find cause for the disappointments which did certainly meet them, and ever methodical, Ragland drew up a set of questions and answers probing into the matter.

First, as regards the Hindus, there were certain hindrances: their thorough worldliness, an almost universal forgetfulness of a future state (in spite of their doctrine of transmigration) and a great unwillingness to believe in it; their habits of idolatry and sensuality, for both can co-exist with the most intriguing philosophy; and in the domestic arrangements of some castes, allowed gross immorality. These he regarded as natural difficulties; but then, though confessedly great, they would prove as nothing before the power of God and His quickening Spirit. So he goes deeper: our preaching itself may be faulty. Is it always the Gospel? Always to the point? Do we avail ourselves of every opportunity and every mode of approaching the people?

Then, going deeper still: Do they see in us hindering things? Worldliness of mind? Levity? Impatience and anger? Selfishness?

And our friends, ‘ Do they not sometimes commend us too much?’

Bedrock questions these, and not out of date.

But, in spite of disappointment (‘ Blessed is he that expecteth nothing for he shall not be disappointed ’ was not a word cherished among them) the three who were left were very happy. They were often tired of the perpetual travelling under conditions which never grew restful. They were discouraged at times, being as we are. But they had the splendid unassailable happiness of freedom to pour themselves out to the very last drop, and they dearly loved one another.

‘ His ways with the Hindus were most impressive and tender,’ writes Meadows, ‘ he would put his two hands on their shoulders and plead with them.’ (These would be the peasant folk, others of course could not be touched, they would have felt it defiling.) And he tells how for himself and Fenn it was as if language would not yield strong enough words of love. It was the same with his Indian brothers and fellow-workers. ‘ Oh, may we all faithfully grow in pure and fervent love to one another. Our time of labour will soon be over, but then our time of fullest enjoyment of our Saviour’s love and one another’s love will only just be beginning,’ he wrote to one of them.

Such love is never forgotten in India. ‘ What was he like?’ I asked one of our oldest pastors, who had been, I was told, one of Ragland’s men. The dear old man was breakfasting with us, he had just told us the trog and towel story, and he turned where he sat beside me and looked at me with eyes that shone with the coming of a host of sweet memories. ‘ He was loving, he loved us much,’^ he said in Tamil after a long pause; ‘ without measure, without boundaries he loved us

To one who could so love, the longing to see a great turning of the people to the Lover of them all was no endurable faint desire but a consuming passion, and the chill of hope deferred was as ice to his hot heart. Not that there were no individuals; as we have seen a little church was soon gathered out, to which Every was to minister: but he longed to see crowds. Who does not? And it never becomes easier to see the greater number turn away unaffected as it would appear, and undesiring.

Still the joy when it does come is unearthly for sweetness. Oh the pure, the golden gladness of witnessing this Doing of the Spirit whether it be in the soul of man, woman or child. See the unyielding attitude, as the call and claims of our blessed Lord fall on an unwilling ear, the coldness towards His precious Death and Passion, the definite choice of sin change gradually or suddenly to a concern, a sense of need, the tenderness of penitence,, a longing after Jesus the Saviour of the world, an understanding of what is meant by that mysterious but how simple coming to Him for life, the acceptance of forgiveness and cleansingthrough His blood, the quick spreading of a glow of grateful love over the whole being, the eager offer of all the heart’s dearest, the apprehension of what is meant by access, and the loving, adoring, worshipful waiting for the crowning of our King, Who that has lived through it all but will rejoice with Ragland as he tells of one, a wealthy landowner, who, for no earthly reason but the pure love of Jesus, came to Him and followed Him through good report and ill? The teaching of such men was full of vivid moments. Who that has prepared such a one for baptism and the Lord’s Supper and His most joyful service will ever forget those hours?

But here again we come straight upon the innate honesty of the man. He knows how the Christian public at home springs upon quick results, and how well it likes the man who will give it what it wants, but he utterly refuses to convey false impressions. ‘ How many such converts may we expect to be given us? Will not nine out of every ten be persons brought to us and kept with us by motives more or less worldly, and at length, only after a long pressing of God’s word upon their hearts, brought just to such a measure of knowledge and correctness of walk and desire for salvation as to justify our admitting them to baptism? If we were to look only at what has been there would be no grounds for any high expectations (mathematics, here; hard facts, not sentiment). But are we to limit our expectations by what has been only? ’ No, verily.

These words were written in that great year, 1858. Echoes of what was happening in America had reached South India and stirred most ardent longings. Nothing could satisfy Ragland but souls. But like many another as earnest he never saw the fields white unto the harvest. He was trusted to go on without seeing what he longed to see; and he went on.

More than half beaten but fearless
Facing the storm and the nighty
Reeling and breathless but fearless
Here in the lull of the fights
I who bow not but before Thee

God of the fighting clan

Lifting my fists I implore Thee

Give me the heart of a man!

What though I stand with the winnerSy Or perish with those that fall?

Only the cowards are sinners,

Fighting the fight, is alL
Strong is my foe who advances.

Snapped is my blade, O Lord;

See their proud banners and laTtces,

But spare me the stub of a sword