Friday, April 26, 2024

It is the 26th of April 2024. Welcome to the Christian History Almanac, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org; I’m Dan van Voorhis.

Sometimes, the accidents of history and the Almanac topics come together as they have for this Friday episode- let me explain, this weekend we will be looking at the history of Christianity in India (now the most populous country in the world) and much of that story has to do with British Missions. And, it just so happens that one of the luminaries of Indian missions was a Scotsman, Alexander Duffy, who was born in Pitlochry (the gateway to the Highlands) on the 26th of April in 1806. Or the 25th? Honestly, the sources are like 50/50, and I wanted to do the Charles Fuller show yesterday and have this one lead into the weekend.

Duffy was destined for the ministry from a young age, his father encouraged him and at 15 he was off to what some call the finest University in all the land, the University of St. Andrews. There he would help form the Students Missionary Society and studied under the tutelage of the great Thomas Chalmers.

The convener of the Missionary Society for the church of Scotland wrote to Chalmers to ask if he knew of any student who might be trustworthy and capable of serving as the church’s first missionary in India. Chalmers recommended Duff, and upon his ordination in 1829, he was called, but the committee expressed a desire for him to be married. Alexander knew Anne Drysdale, who had wanted to marry a missionary, and the two were coupled and wed (it seems to have been a happy marriage that produced five children).

The two left for India by way of the Cape of Good Hope, and there they ran into a reef and were cast on a small island that, according to a biography, was inhabited by nothing but penguins and two dutchmen there to collect their eggs. They managed to find a second ship coming into the Indian Ocean that was wrecked by a cyclone. By the time they arrived in India (with all of their belongings lost), a local newspaper told of his surviving two shipwrecks and wondered what gods must favor him- an auspicious beginning for a missionary.

Calcutta would be his base and he noted that up to this time most of the converts had been from low-castes and outcasts. Duff was determined to use education as a means for reaching the upper classes who saw learning in the western science as desirable.

He would set up schools and within 2 years three Brahmins had converted, making a name for Duff (he impressed, among others, William Carey, there in the last years of his life). After 5 years of work he returned to Scotland where he found he was an effective and popular spokesman for Indian missions.

1843 saw the great schism in the Scottish church wherein many, including Duff, formed the Free Church of Scotland- on account of this, when Duff returned to India, he would not be given access to any of his old schools and churches.

Undeterred he would travel around the UK and then to United States, raising over 100,000 dollars for his ministry. Over the next two decades he would spend time alternating between work in India and traveling raising funds for schools. By 1865 he had over 2000 students enrolled in various schools set up since the schism. X Duff also learned from that schism to prize interdenominational relationships some of which would outlast him.

Back home, he would become a professor of theology at the new Free Church college, taking over from his deceased mentor, Chalmers. He would also serve for a time as the moderator of the General Assembly of the Free Church.

He seems to have underestimated the connection between education and conversion as the number of converts paled in comparison to the number of converts- tomorrow on the weekend show we will examine some of the difficulties in missions work in India.

Alexander Duff would die, traveling in England in February 1878, born on this day in 1806, the giant of missions in India and the Scottish Free Church legend was 71 years old.

The last word for today is from, well, I’m gonna cheat and jump to the reading for the Sunday, the 5th Sunday of easter (there are 7 in total!). This is from 1 John 4:

13 This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit. 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15 If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. 16 And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.

God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. 17 This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus. 18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

19 We love because he first loved us.

This has been the Christian History Almanac for the 26th of April 2024, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org.

The show is produced by a man partial to Henry K. Duffs Private Reserve; He is Christopher Gillespie.

The show is written and read by a man who once got lost in a forest in Pitlochrie as the sun was going down… scary times… I’m Dan van Voorhis.

You can catch us here every day- and remember that the rumors of grace, forgiveness, and the redemption of all things are true…. Everything is going to be ok.