Thoughts on the Life of William Carey
A Missionary's Musings on Dr. Timothy George's Biography of William Carey
In Faithful Witness: The Life of William Carey, Dr. Timothy George of Beeson Divinity School chronicles the life of the “Father of the Modern Missions Movement,” William Carey with all the scholarly stringency of a church historian and all the passion of a missions mobilizer. Such treatment of Carey’s life is befitting given that he lived his life with passion for the lost and devotion to true knowledge of God and his world as parallel guardrails.
Born August 17, 1761, to a village schoolmaster, Carey was no nobleman or church prodigy, yet he stood out among his five siblings as an astute learner with an affinity for the Holy Scriptures. After marrying Dorothy Plackett in 1781 and while working as a shoemaker in Piddington, England, Carey was converted to a living faith in Christ and soon convinced of believer’s baptism. He was baptized October 5, 1783. For years after he would grow in his newfound, evangelical faith through personal devotion, the teachings of notable Baptist ministers like Andrew Fuller, Thomas Scott, and John Ryland, Jr. as well as through pastoring two small Baptist churches. It was in the company of these men and churches, as well as by the deposit of Carey’s forerunners, that Carey’s life was enflamed in the cause of Christ among the nations.
Carey’s career as a cross-cultural missionary and the modern missions movement really began through concerted, humble prayer by these British Baptists in 1784 as well as the publication of several treatises on the mission of the Church, the crowning work being Carey’s own Enquiry. After several years of preparation in England and prayerful consideration, he and his associates, along with their families, set sail for India landing in Calcutta in 1793.
In the preceding chapters, George tells Carey’s story of “dangers, toils, and snares” that accompanied Carey and those associated with the mission, and these accounts dash any idealistic thoughts about missionary life in the 18th and 19th Centuries. Carey’s faithfulness to the cause of Christ through such adversity, however, eventually yielded great fruit.
In 1800 Carey and several associates along with their families formed the “Serampore Brotherhood.” This helped to give support to the struggling missionaries and proved to be the home base for decades of meaningful work preaching Christ in India. In October 1800, Carey saw his first convert in the baptism of one Krishna Pal.
The rest of Carey’s ministry is summarized rather briefly in Faithful Witness, but George does communicate the effect that Carey’s life and work had in winning India for Christ saying, “Carey himself was responsible for translating the entire Bible into Bengali, Ooriya, Marathi, Hindi, Assamese, and Sanskrit, as well as portions of it into 29 other tongues.” Carey’s mission was responsible for the creation of 103 schools, and was very influential in the opposition of ghat murders and the practice of sati.
Finally, George concludes his retelling of Carey’s story by describing the “Three Mrs. Carey’s, describing Carey’s faithfulness to the gospel to the end, and offering brief summative statements on Carey’s life and legacy. Here George emphasizes that the Church can glean from Carey’s life and work valuable teaching on the sovereignty of God, the finality of the Lord Jesus Christ, the authority of the Holy Scriptures, contextualization in evangelism and church-planting, holistic missions, Christian unity, and faithfulness to Christ.
It is difficult for me to understate the impact that this biography of Carey had on me while reading, and has on me even now.
My wife and I are called to minister to unreached peoples and places very near the region where Carey lived and worked. It is, therefore, easy for me to trace similarities in path, conviction, and desire.
First, I am convinced of the necessity of the lost world to hear of Christ as well as the Church’s role in meeting this need. To see the way in which Carey defended such biblical zeal in the face of reticent piety at home is inspiring and causes me to give thanks to God for such a witness.
Second, I also have an affinity for things of the natural world and seek to be a missionary who is fully open to the good creation that God has made while dealing straightforward with the corruption of sin. I have often found missionaries to be lacking in such an outlook on the world, both those I have met and those about whom I read. Sometimes, as is the case with David Brainerd, they see no lasting good in creation since it is fallen. Other times, missionaries view creation as merely the battlefield for souls with little value outside of that theater. Even as Carey was a zealous soul winner, he cared deeply about the natural world, its study, its enjoyment, and its preservation.
Third, like Carey, I fancy myself a student of church history with a desire for increased Christian unity as we plunge into the depths of our particular Christian traditions. As a Baptist in 18th Century England, Carey was no naive enthusiast who cared not for doctrinal differences between traditions, nor was he someone who did not feel the sting of ecclesial structures and traditions taking precedent over love for Christian brothers. Nevertheless, he was eager to work together with brothers and sisters who carried different convictions on baptism, the relationship between the church and state, methods of evangelization, etc. Wherever cooperation would not hinder the Gospel work, Carey was willing to reach out in love across dividing lines within the Church. This came from a deep commitment to learning about and walking in his particular faith heritage. George says, “Carey himself was a keen student of the history of missions. The second section of his Enquiry reviews former undertakings for the conversion of the heathen beginning with the book of Acts and continuing through the early, medieval, and Reformation periods of church history.”
Not only were Carey’s life passions analogous to many of mine, but his life is also a great challenge to me, and not only to me but to the entire Church of Jesus Christ.
Fourth, Carey’s bold obedience to his convictions, whatever the cost, convicts many of us today. We are often quieted or subdued in spirit by difficulties that would contradict our convictions. Carey, however, often risked everything for what he–through reasonable prayer and input–concluded was true and good. Such conviction led Carey to leave the Anglican church through taking believer’s baptism in a time when Baptists were significantly persecuted by their Anglican brothers. It caused him to sail for India without his wife and most of his children (though they decided to come after his initial false start), and it inspired him to fight injustice both at home and in India, even down to the type of food he purchased.
The shear output of his life calls the Church today to consider whether or not such fruit is even possible in our lives today. We surround ourselves with countless distractions every moment which make the formation of such a productive person impossible. Could I take the time necessary to learn Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, and Urdu? Could I learn about the climate, flora, and fauna of the place I am called to live in well enough to create a beautiful garden that will be a place of prayer for myself and many after? Do I have the disciplines to devote myself to private and communal prayer and study of the Scriptures? These questions arise in my mind when I think on Carey’s life. I am moved to throw off those things that cling to me and most modern churchmen and pursue a life fully lived in and for Christ and his world!
Fifth, Carey’s compassion and fidelity in both body and spirit to his troubled first wife, Dorothy, strikes me to the core as a married man–would I treat my wife with as much tender compassion as did Carey if she was so regularly dejected, so often mistreated me, and if she even attempted to take my life? He did. He knew that God’s call on his life was not necessarily to comfort and earthly bliss, rather meaningful, joyful service to God and neighbor. This did not only apply to Carey’s ministry to the “heathen,” but also to the ministry in his home, even to his tormented wife. Today, news headlines are filled with pastors, ministers, missionaries, and lay leaders who are thought well of by many but have abandoned their spouse to whom they have covenanted before God. Few of these men, if any, could justify such behavior as much as Carey could have in the world’s view. Yet, he did not stoop so low as many do today. I pray that I am a faithful man like William Carey and that God raises up many more faithful men and women.
Lastly, Carey’s commitment to gospel proclamation in word and deed is a challenge to all missionaries as well as their churches and sending organizations. George says, “Carey never permitted his involvement in movements for social reform to substitute for, or take precedence over, the clear proclamation of salvation through faith in Jesus Christ alone.” I have been in Christian communities that so emphasize gospel proclamation and spread in word that they often neglect, or allow for neglect from their disciples, gospel demonstration through holy living and loving community. Many hear the Good News of Jesus Christ and come to true faith in him, but long-lasting, structural change to a culture are impossible in some of these communities because gospel proclamation is assumed to be the only legitimate end of Christian ministry.
On the other hand, I have served alongside some ministries that are Christian, but no one ever speaks of Christ to one another or the lost around them. They affirm eternal damnation and the resurrection of the dead, but they betray through their reticence in Gospel proclamation that they do not care. No amount of meals provided, communities cleaned, or schools built will ever save people for God from eternal damnation. Only faith in Christ alone brought about through the preaching of the Word will do this. The Church today, like William Carey did in his day, must reject these polarities and follow the apostolic faith in the apostolic way–preaching Christ and him crucified while pouring themselves out for the poor. Nothing else will do.
I completely devoured this book, have been digesting it since, and I presume that it will be an account that I will continue to draw strength and new life from in the months and years to come, Lord willing. For years I avoided learning more about Carey. Why? I am not sure. It could be that I did not want to hear that this man who I knew did much for the gospel in India was not so saintly in reality. While still recognizing Carey’s faults, Faithful Witness: The Life and Mission of William Carey has shown me that he was, in fact, a man worthy of admiration and remembrance, a man who stands out in holy zeal. I pray that my life and ministry may be used like Carey’s to bring about the gospel to those who have never heard and to do whatever I can to set in motion work to this end that will long outlive my life and even my name. May I be found a “faithful witness” on that day when I can say with complete actualization, “A wretched, poor, and helpless worm, on Thy kind arms I fall.”
(This is definitely not a paid advertisement, ha!)
A wonderful inspiration of his life and yours.