Adoniram Judson
“By awesome deeds you answer us with righteousness, O God of our salvation, the hope of all the ends of the earth and of the farthest seas.” —Psalm 65:5
This month I would like to introduce you to the life and ministry of Adoniram Judson, the first foreign missionary sent from the American colonies to a foreign land. Adoniram was born in Massachusetts, August 1789. He was the son of a strict, old-line congregationalist minister. Judson Sr. was more than once dismissed from his ministerial role for disagreement with the congregation. He was a stern man, but an earnest Christian. Growing up Adoniram feared his father but was also spurred on by him. Adoniram was a brilliant student from early in his career, always meticulous and well spoken. He particularly excelled at language and math. He eventually went on to be valedictorian of his class at Rhode Island College.
However, at college Judson was deeply influenced by Deism (a perspective that God is not personal but removed from the workings of daily life – ultimately a non-Christian perspective on God) through a fellow student named Jacob Eames. Through the influence of Eames, Judson decided to forsake his father’s desire that he enter ministry, and eventually left the Christian faith all together. Leaving his hometown to pursue the life of a rebellious son in the city broke the heart of his parents. Judson joined a vagabond acting troop and ran the opposite direction of everything he had ever been taught. He and his friends would run up hotel and bar tabs, then skip town leaving debts behind as they went.
On one occasion he was sleeping at an inn with thin walls and could hear the occupant of the next room wheezing and gasping all night. Strangely his thoughts wandered to the soul of the man, as to whether this man was prepared to die. From there he began to consider whether he himself was prepared to die? In his thinking, Judson could not escape the knowledge that his father was certainly prepared to die. He knew his father would welcome death someday as an entrance into the eternal kingdom of God.
Upon waking the next morning all these thoughts began shifting to the back of his mind as he went downstairs and prepared to skip out of the inn. However, before he left, he inquired of the inn keeper about the health of the man in the room next door. The inn keeper informed Judson that the young man had died late in the night. Judson asked if he knew the man’s name. His name was Jacob Eames! The very same college friend of Judson’s, who Judson knew openly rejected the salvation of Jesus and most certainly was not prepared to die. This news rocked Judson. He knew that if there was a hell this friend was now there. This event changed the course of his entire life, brought him back to earnest Christian faith, and ultimately to give his whole life in an effort to reach lost souls in Burma (modern Myanmar).
In quick succession Judson was called by God to reach the people of the Empire of Burma. At the time it was known as The Golden Empire because the king of that kingdom referred to himself as the Golden One. To support his efforts and calling a missionary board of support was formed, he was commissioned by the churches, and sent as a congregational missionary. Before his sending he proposed marriage to a young woman named Nancy. What a courageous and godly woman she was! Below is a short portion of the letter written to her father where Judson asks for her hand in marriage, “I have now to ask, whether you can consent to part with your daughter early next spring, to see her no more in this world; whether you can consent to her departure, and her subjection to the hardships and sufferings of missionary life; whether you can consent to her exposure to the dangers of the ocean; to the fatal influence of the southern climate of India and to every kind of disease …” Nancy did accept this grim proposal and became a fellow missionary to the Burmese, never again returning to the US.
Their ministry is absolutely fascinating, and I encourage you to read about it in full. On the way to Burma, Adoniram became convinced from scripture that infant baptism was not biblical. Once in India, Nancy became convinced of the same and they were both baptized by immersion as believers. This theological change caused the Congregational mission board to revoke their support for Adoniram and Nancy, marooning them in India. They were eventually supported by Baptist mission efforts and continued to Burma.
Upon reaching Burma, their base of operations was mostly out of the port city of Rangoon. But similar to Hudson Taylor, after years of operating out of the port they felt the necessity to enter the interior of the country. During their many years of ministry they were intensely persecuted, jailed (once being hung by his feet for an extended period of time), endured all manner of sickness, but also accomplished so much. They were eventually admitted to the “golden feet” of the king and enjoyed widespread influence in the interior capital city. They eventually saw countless people come to salvation and be baptized. Adoniram translated the large portions of Scripture into the very foreign language of Burmese (picture above) and completed much work on a comprehensive English / Burmese language dictionary.
Adoniram died in 1850 still at his missionary work. He believed in the “Devoted Life.” Though he did return once to America after Nancy’s death, he returned to Burma and continued in his calling until his own death. As with all missionaries and ministers, Adoniram was not a perfect person, but he was courageous, authentically devout, brilliant, and faithful to the end. Reading about he and Nancy will inspire and humble you. I encourage you to get a biography and learn more about their devoted Christian lives!
Recommended Reading: “To The Golden Shore” by Courtney Anderson
Let us be faithful to do our part to take the gospel to all nations,
Pastor Vic