Choughtful Moments

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 7, Issue 9, 24 September 1943, Page 2

Choughtful Moments

(Supplied by the Whakatone Ministers' Association).

JOHN WILLIAMS

(Extracts from an article by Dr F. W. A Boreham)

The boys who were born in the closing years of the e ghteenth century were swept off their feet by the romantic exploits of Captain Cook. That intrepid navigator had fired their fancies with the vision of a new world. His adventurous voj r age, his sensational discoveries, and his tragic death, were the talk of the* tims. In every playground in Eng'and. school boys were dreaming feverish day dreams of coral reefs and cannibal is'ands away in Southern Seas, William Carey who one of those boys, John Williams another ... It was on the first Sunday evening in the New Year, January 3,, 1814 . . . Soon after dusk a cold sleet had fallen; but the weather had cleared, and throngs of people, hurrying this way and that, were responding to the melodious invitation of the bells. On her way to Church, passing along City Road, Mrs Tonkin was struck by the appearance of a -tall young fellow who seemed to be lounging aimlessly at the street corner.

He was a lad of about eighteen, stalwart and sinewy, already giving promise of vast physical energy. As the lamp light fell upon his fine open countenance, she turned and fastened upon him a second and more penetrating glance. Then, pausing, she went back to him. He explained that he. had made an pointment with some friends, to meet at this corner, and to spend the evening at a tavern at Highbury. His companions, however, had failed to put in an appearance, and he was feeling vexed and disappointed. "My course of life at this period.," he wrote afterwards, "was very wicked, though not flagrantly immoral." Mrs Tonkin urged him to accompany her to Moorfields Tabernacle.. With a little persuasion he. consented. Twenty-four years later, on the

OUR SUNDAY MESSAGE

■occasion of his visit to England, he stood in the pulpit of that very building and told a crowded congregation of that youthful yet momentous experience of his. U I have in my view at the present moment," he said, "the door by which I entered, and the exact seat that I then occupied. I have also a distinct impression of the powerful sermon that was that evening preached by the excellent Mr East. That good man took for his text that night one of the most impressive questions of inspired writ: "What shall it Profit a Man., if He shall Gain the Whole World, and lose his own Soul?" God was pleased in His own gracious Providence to influence; my mind so powerfully that I forsook all my worldly companions, and became a Christian."

It was thus that the supreme issues of human life—the world and the soul—HlS world, and HIS soul were suddenly presented for his. contemplation. John Williams resolved that Sunday night that his immortal soul should on no account be lost; and he resolved at the same time to win a larger world than the paltry world on which, up to that moment, his heart had been set. . . . John Williams was just the man for the moment; he seemed to have been built on purpose. Sailing in the wake of our greatest navigator he caught so perfectly the spirit qf his illustrous predecessor, that he was able to continue and complete his work. He discovered Paratonga, an island that had. eluded the sharp eye and tireless researches of Captain Cook and his companions. In boats that he himself had built, he sailed from island to island at the gateways of the day. As soon as he had. established a footing on one group., he pushed on to another. When the authorities in England questioned his wisdom in roaming like a viking round the Pacific, he told them frankly that no other programme would appease his conscience. Christ died for the whole, wide world, and he must let the whole world know. . • .