Chapter 27 · 7 min read
Appendix B: Chapter-by-Chapter Study and Reflection Guide
“But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deluding your own selves.”
— James 1:22, ASV
This guide is for personal reflection, small groups, or a reading course of about twenty-four weeks. Its purpose is not to make Samuel Crowther an object of admiration, but to let his life hold up a mirror in which readers can examine their own discipleship under Scripture. Groups may find it helpful to begin each session with the chapter’s opening verse and to end with prayer. Several chapters raise hard questions about slavery, race, mission, and the failures of the Church. They are meant to be discussed honestly, not settled quickly.
Introduction - The Bishop and His Biographers
Central idea
Crowther’s own letters and journals are the surest guide to his life; later biographers added legend on one side and prejudice on the other.
Scriptures to revisit
Reflection
1. Why does it matter whether a Christian biography is accurate? 2. How can we honour a hero without hiding his faults or his wrongs?
Chapter 1 - Ajayi of Osogun
Central idea
God knew and shaped a boy born into a world of war and slave-raiding, before anyone recorded his birthday.
Scriptures to revisit
Psalm 139:13-16; Acts 17:26-27.
Reflection
1. What does it mean that God knows us before anyone else does? 2. What in your own background has God used that you once thought was only a loss?
Chapter 2 - The Unhappy, Blessed Day
Central idea
The day he was enslaved was the day God began to lead him, though he did not know it.
Scriptures to revisit
Genesis 50:20; Matthew 6:13; Romans 8:28.
Reflection
1. Crowther called the day of his capture both “unhappy” and “blessed.” Can both be true? 2. How should we speak about great evils that God has brought good out of?
Chapter 3 - Myrmidon
Central idea
Freedom came to him through strangers on a British warship, an act of justice he never forgot.
Scriptures to revisit
Reflection
1. Who has been an instrument of freedom in your life? 2. What does it mean to “proclaim liberty to the captives” today?
Chapter 4 - Samuel Crowther
Central idea
In Sierra Leone the rescued boy became a new person in Christ, with a new name, a new calling, and a wife who shared his story.
Scriptures to revisit
2 Corinthians 5:17; John 8:36.
Reflection
1. What changed, and what did not change, when Ajayi became Samuel? 2. Why did he call the service of Christ “perfect freedom”?
Chapter 5 - The Niger, 1841
Central idea
A disastrous expedition convinced him that Africa must be evangelised chiefly by Africans.
Scriptures to revisit
Acts 1:8; 1 Corinthians 1:27-29.
Reflection
1. What can be learned from a mission that failed? 2. Who are the people best placed to carry the gospel in your own community?
Chapter 6 - “Who Maketh Thee to Differ?”
Central idea
His ordination made him a sign of what Africans could do, and he answered praise by pointing to grace.
Scriptures to revisit
1 Corinthians 4:7; Luke 14:22.
Reflection
1. How do you respond to praise? 2. What did the Shango drummer’s charge teach Crowther, and what does it teach the Church?
Chapter 7 - The Helper of the Fatherless
Central idea
God brought him back to his own people and gave him his mother again after twenty-five years.
Scriptures to revisit
Reflection
1. Have you seen God restore something you thought was lost for ever? 2. What did his mother mean when she said, “You are no longer my son, but the servant of God”?
Chapter 8 - In Our Own Language
Central idea
He gave the Yoruba the Scriptures in their mother tongue and a written language to read them in.
Scriptures to revisit
Reflection
1. Why does it matter to hear God’s word in your own language? 2. How might translation be a form of love?
Chapter 9 - The Pleiad
Central idea
A voyage in which no one died showed the Niger could be opened, and showed his patient method with chiefs and Muslims.
Scriptures to revisit
Psalm 121:7-8; Colossians 4:5-6.
Reflection
1. How did Crowther speak with Muslims and with chiefs? 2. What can we learn from his patience?
Chapter 10 - Wrecked at Jebba
Central idea
A shipwreck left him stranded for a year, and he kept working.
Scriptures to revisit
2 Corinthians 4:8-9; Philippians 4:11-13.
Reflection
1. How did Crowther use his time while stranded? 2. What would it look like for you to keep faith through a long interruption?
Chapter 11 - Africa’s Own Children
Central idea
Venn and Crowther shared a vision of African churches supporting, governing, and extending themselves.
Scriptures to revisit
Reflection
1. What is a “self-supporting, self-governing, self-extending” church? 2. Is your church raising up its own leaders?
Chapter 12 - “I Am Not Worthy”
Central idea
He accepted the bishopric reluctantly, and his consecration was both a triumph and a sign of limits.
Scriptures to revisit
Reflection
1. Why did Crowther refuse at first? 2. What do the newspaper reactions reveal about the prejudices of the time, and of ours?
Chapter 13 - A Bishop in a Canoe
Central idea
As bishop he lived dangerously, and in captivity he was fed by slaves.
Scriptures to revisit
Reflection
1. What did the kindness of Abokko’s slaves mean to him? 2. Why did he wish he had died instead of Fell?
Chapter 14 - Sympathy with All Classes
Central idea
His charges to his clergy taught the gospel first, preaching like Christ, and sympathy instead of scorn.
Scriptures to revisit
Reflection
1. What does it mean to preach “with sympathy” to people of other religions? 2. Where does his teaching show him to be a man of his time?
Chapter 15 - Cotton Gins and Gin
Central idea
He hoped honest trade would end the slave trade, and he fought the liquor traffic alongside a Muslim emir.
Scriptures to revisit
Reflection
1. Why did Crowther call the cotton gin “our gun”? 2. Where do trade and faith meet in your own life?
Chapter 16 - The Delta Churches
Central idea
Persecution in the Delta produced strong, self-supporting churches.
Scriptures to revisit
Reflection
1. How did persecution strengthen the Delta churches? 2. Where might you need to say, “I cannot do it, and I dare not do it”?
Chapter 17 - Asano
Central idea
Behind his journeys stood a wife and family who made them possible.
Scriptures to revisit
Song of Songs 8:6-7; Proverbs 31:28-29; Joshua 14:10-11.
Reflection
1. Who made your own work possible, unseen? 2. What is the “hill country” you are still asking God for?
Chapter 18 - The Gathering Storm
Central idea
The mission had real problems, and his gentleness was both a virtue and a weakness.
Scriptures to revisit
Galatians 6:1; 2 Corinthians 11:28.
Reflection
1. When does mercy become neglect? 2. Why is it important not to leave the Onitsha crime out of the story?
Chapter 19 - Onitsha, 1890
Central idea
Young missionaries humiliated an old African bishop and his clergy, and the society’s own historian later called them “too severe.”
Scriptures to revisit
Psalm 55:12-14; 2 Timothy 2:21; James 1:19-20.
Reflection
1. What went wrong at Onitsha, on both sides? 2. How can zeal for purity become a sin?
Chapter 20 - The Delta Pastorate
Central idea
The Delta churches answered injustice by taking responsibility for themselves, not by leaving the Church.
Scriptures to revisit
Isaiah 54:2; 1 Corinthians 3:6.
Reflection
1. Why does it matter that the Delta Pastorate was not a secession? 2. How should Christians respond when their church wrongs them?
Chapter 21 - “Good Night”
Central idea
He died humbly, without bitterness, still willing to learn.
Scriptures to revisit
Reflection
1. What do his last letter and his last words tell you about him? 2. How would you like to finish your own course?
Chapter 22 - A Weaned Child
Central idea
His character was marked by humility, prayer, patience, and gratitude, though his deference to Europeans had a cost.
Scriptures to revisit
Psalm 131:1-2; Philippians 2:3; Nehemiah 2:4.
Reflection
1. How do you read his letter “I know my place as negro”? 2. What is the difference between humility and letting others wrong you?
Chapter 23 - Essentially African, Essentially Missionary
Central idea
His work seemed to die with him, but it bore fruit in the churches of Africa.
Scriptures to revisit
Revelation 7:9; John 12:24; Psalm 68:31.
Reflection
1. What does Archbishop Welby’s apology teach about institutional repentance? 2. What seed are you sowing that you may not see grow?
Chapter 27 complete
Appendix B: Chapter-by-Chapter Study and Reflection Guide