The Life and Diary of David Brainerd (For Teens)

A young American missionary, born in Haddam, Connecticut, in 1718. He was expelled from Yale in 1742, became a missionary to Native American peoples in New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, saw a remarkable awakening among the Delaware at Crossweeksung in 1745, and died of tuberculosis in 1747 at the home of Jonathan Edwards, aged twenty-nine.

After Brainerd died, the pastor and theologian Jonathan Edwards published an account of his life built around Brainerd’s private diary and his public journal of his missionary work. It became one of the most influential missionary books ever written.

His diary records long seasons of deep sadness, discouragement and wishing to die, and Edwards himself wrote that Brainerd was naturally “prone to melancholy and dejection of Spirit.” Today we might call some of it depression. This book does not hide that. If you feel that way, please talk to someone you trust, and get help straight away if you are thinking of harming yourself.

That was the word English colonists used in the 1700s for the Native American peoples. Brainerd worked among several of them, especially the Delaware, also called the Lenape. This retelling uses today’s names except inside his own quotations.

No. He often went without food and sleep and pushed his sick body hard, and he was already ill with tuberculosis. Admire his love for God and for people, but look after your body: eat, rest, and see a doctor when you are ill. Even Edwards did not think everything in the diary was a pattern to copy.

No. It is a retelling for teenagers in plain modern words, following the main events of the diary and keeping Brainerd’s own words where they say it best. The full Life and Diary of David Brainerd is also available.