Scores of Casks

“And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then I said, Here am I; send me.” — Isaiah 6:8 (ASV)

The mission Mary's mother followed so closely did not begin in Scotland. It began in Jamaica, among people who had been enslaved. Many Africans taken to the Caribbean had been shipped from the Bight of Biafra, and many had passed through Calabar. When slavery ended in the British colonies in the 1830s, freed Jamaicans who had become Christians began asking whether the gospel that reached them in captivity could go back to the land their parents came from. In 1843 the king and chiefs of the Efik towns of Calabar sent an invitation, offering land and a welcome. In 1846 a minister named Hope Waddell led a small party there, including Jamaicans of African descent.

So the Calabar mission was first imagined by freed Africans, invited by African rulers, and carried out with the help of both.

Mary's mother longed for her son John to be a missionary. But John's health failed. He emigrated to New Zealand for a warmer climate and died soon after landing. Mary grieved, and a quiet question formed: could she take her brother's place? She told no one for a long time.

She knew what people said about West Africa. It was called the white man's grave. Fever killed Europeans so fast that the mission graveyards were full of young men and women who hadn't lasted a year. A fellow student remembered her answer: Calabar was the post of danger, and therefore the post of honour. Few would volunteer, so she would.

In 1874 news came that the explorer David Livingstone had died in Africa, and Scotland was stirred. Mary decided it was time. Her sisters were now working, and she planned to send money home from Africa so her mother would not suffer. In May 1875 she offered herself to her Church's Foreign Mission Board and was accepted as a teacher for Calabar. She was twenty-six, a factory worker with little education, terrified of public speaking.

The night before she left Dundee for training in Edinburgh, in March 1876, a friend found her crying at the entrance of the close where she lived. “Good-bye,” she said. And then, with passion: “Pray for me!”

In Edinburgh she gave her first talk, to a meeting of women. She took Pilate's question about Jesus, “What then shall I do unto Jesus who is called Christ?” Christ was standing before them just as he stood before Pilate, she told them. “Dear women,” she said, “you must do something with Him: you must reject Him or you must accept Him. What are you going to do?” No threats about hell-fire. Just the question, left with them.

She sailed from Liverpool on 5 August 1876, on a steamer called the Ethiopia. Two friends from Dundee watched the cargo being loaded. Much of it was casks of spirits for the West African trade. “Scores of casks!” she said. “And only one missionary!” It was a joke, and it was also a judgement. The daughter of Robert Slessor knew exactly what drink did to a home. She was about to see what it did to whole communities.

Look at the order in Isaiah's call. He didn't volunteer because he felt brave. He first saw how holy God was and cried, “Woe is me!” Only after he had been forgiven did he hear the question and say, “Here am I; send me.” Mary wasn't a heroine when she said yes. She was a frightened young woman who knew how much God had done for her.

You don't need to feel ready, gifted or fearless to be useful to God. You need to have been loved by him, and to know it.

One thing to do this week: ask God Isaiah's question in your own words: “Is there somewhere you want to send me, even somewhere small?” Then do the first small thing that comes to mind, like a message to someone who is lonely or an offer of help.