DAVID BRAINERD - REVIVALIST!
Posted by: prophetic <prophetic@...>
by David Smithers
"You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your
soul, and with all your strength." (Deut. 6:5). By the grace of God,
David Brainerd obeyed this first and great commandment. He
prayed with sacrificial passion, pursued perfect holiness and called
sinners to repentance; all because he fervently loved the Lord Jesus Christ.
Sad to say, some Christians may have a difficult time understanding
David Brainerd's zeal and love for JESUS. "To him the material and
physical world had little value. He was of the race of the early
martyrs. To him all things were naught that he might attain a
deeper spiritual fellowship with God." Brainerd's diary states,
"Thirsting desires and longings possessed my soul after perfect
holiness. God was so precious to my soul that the world with all
its enjoyments appeared vile. I had no more value for the favor of
men than for pebbles."
He spent a great deal of time in prayer and frequently set aside
days for prayer and fasting. He loved to retire into the woods to
be alone with God. "Prayer became Brainerd's priority and it was
his joy to spend two hours at a time in secret communion with
Christ. He would rise early in the morning and get alone with God
to enjoy His presence. He thirsted for God, the living God and he
was not disappointed!"
Determined to share Christ, Brainerd embraced a life of self-denial
and sacrifice. He spent as much as twenty hours a week on
horseback. His diet consisted of hasty pudding, boiled corn, bread
baked in the ashes, and sometimes a little meat and butter. His
home was a small log room complete with a heap of straw laid
upon boards for a bed.
David Brainerd consistently and fervently interceded for the lost
souls of the American Indians. Often he would travail with such
earnestness that when he rose from his knees he was covered
in sweat and could hardly walk straight. Like the persistent
widow in Luke 18, David Brainerd's prayers were finally answered.
Entire camps of Indians were converted by the power of God as
he proclaimed a message of repentance and grace.
"Old men and women who had been drunken wretches for years,
and little children not more than six or seven years of age appeared
in distress for their souls. There was almost universal praying and
crying for mercy. Many could neither go nor stand."
The countless hours spent in prayer and fasting, his faithfulness
in spite of physical weakness and having to endure the most
terrible hardships, were now rewarded openly. The fire of the Lord
fell. The remarkable thing was that all this happened at a time
when he confessed that his hopes were at their very lowest. He
had seriously entertained thoughts of giving up while on the very
brink of glory and blessing.
Brainerd now saw a remarkable change in the lives of the Indians.
He recorded in his diary, "I know of no assembly of Christians
where there seems to be so much of the presence of God, where
brotherly love so much prevails . . . "
David Brainerd poured a lifetime of holy passion, prayer and
preaching into four short years. He ministered from 1743-1747,
dying of tuberculosis at the age of 29, "Brainerd once wrote in
his diary, I longed to be a flame of fire continually glowing in the
divine service and building up of Christ's kingdom to my last
and dying breath." That prayer was abundantly answered.
-Source-
watchword.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=16&Itemid=23