David Brainerd gets a mixed reaction and reception among Christians today. He’s diary is largely responsible for that. Some see it as the writings, perhaps even ravings of a gloomy neurotic, while others see it as the story of a great Christian, under great trial, yet he persevered despite it all, and that being the reason why he is a great name in the Hall of Fame of Christian history, his perseverance.

Those of the former class, who are somewhat harsh, austere, uncharitable, people who may not understand the depths of the anguish within his soul, that made for such words that could be so angst-ridden probably just don’t get it. In many ways, he was a little like a Jekyll and hide. On the one hand, he had a sunny, engaging, even magnetic disposition, yet on the other hand he was prone to deep melancholia. When he was bright and outgoing and sunny, everyone thought him charming, and he could literally have people, eating out of his hand in the way of his attraction to them. Yet, his diaries expressed another side. A side that is not reported of him, at least as far as I have read, by those he interacted and engaged with.

The way on the side of his melancholia, is often spoken of among Christians, who have not walked where he walked, have not felt those depths within his soul, I find full of self-righteousness pride. You see Brainerd, didn’t just persevere, he didn’t just persevere against the odds, he went full speed ahead, when many a Christian today, with a mild cold becomes incapacitated. What right has anyone in the comfort of today’s world, getting fat on it, however hard they may labour for the Lord, to criticise a man, who sat alone in his hut, when he was a missionary to the Indians, who spat up blood daily, because he was riddled with tuberculosis, with none of the comforts, starved of companions, which the longing for, and them not being available to him, made for the ache within his soul, and in that state of health, could only make for a recipe for depression and melancholy, yet those same critics today, who with a mild summer cold, become briefly invalids, resting in their comforts, they cannot have a clue what the man felt, and experienced — so what right do they have to be so proud, and self-righteous, and look down upon him, as some kind of inferior Christian, who suffered neurosis, rather than him, being a human being, and suffering inhumanely, yet kept on doing what the Lord called him to, with much vigour and energy, and zeal, despite his physical frailty, and the very real outpourings of at times, a spirit in anguish, because he was dying without any of the deep needs, that any human being has, when that ill, being met. And yet, despite the lack of his own needs being met, in such unfavourable circumstances, he continued to give, and labour for the Lord, in the conversions of the Indians he was among. Removed from the soft comfortable option of today, for most people, who has the right to criticise a man, with such a spirit that he persevered on despite it all.

I relate to David Brainerd, as the only Christian I have read about, who if alive could understand the depths of anguish, I have felt within my own soul at times to be dying alone, and the ache within my soul for companions. See Brainerd, had no one he could talk to, so his diaries are the only outward expression of the pain within his soul at times that he could make. I have been blessed, the last several years, since I became ill, to have a couple of friends, who often listened to my outpourings of grief, melancholy, sometimes anger, and it has at times been problematic, yet another side of my character is much like Brainerd’s, and those friendships have strood the tests and trials, that such a depth of pain, and with so little comfort, or outlets for expressing myself could only make.

David Brainerd died in the home of Jonathan and Sarah Edwards aged only 28 years old. It’s a very detailed story of his life despite the brevity, one I cannot hope to do justice to, in simply a blog post. It was Brainerd’s wish, that upon his death, his diaries and miscellaneous writings should be destroyed. But shortly before his death, he was persuaded by friends to hand them over to Jonathan Edwards. A month or so, after David Brainerd died, Jonathan Edwards’ daughter, Jerusha, also died over a matter of five days illness. No one knew in those days, how highly contagious, tuberculosis was, and Brainerd and Jerusha had at once recognized in each other a kindred spirit, and in the few months that Brainerd stayed with the Edwards at the closing of his life they fell in love, so that in his sick room, she did all the nursing of Brainerd, insisted that she be at his side, night and day, and take on the job of caring for him, single-handedly. That’s close proximity, in such a contagious illness, bore devastating consequences, when she died, unexpectedly , of the same illness.

Up until that time, it had been quite remarkable, how Jonathan and Sara Edwards’s massive brood had all survived, when the rate of child and infant mortality was so very high then, and it was unusual to not lose at least one child, even in much smaller families, it seemed to be an indication of God’s blessing upon both the uncommon union of Jonathan and Sarah, and his work as a minister in Northampton. Jerusha died on Valentine’s Day, and her parents, felt that grief deeply, the sense of loss was enhanced and multiplied and brought back every year on that date, which in those days, was a time of merriment and parties, which for the Edwards’, that year, and each anniversary of it was turned into a time of mourning. The loss of a child must be a very particular kind of grief indeed.

But Jonathan Edwards, as ever wanting to be active in his labour for the Lord, rather than returning to whatever he was working on before Jerusha’s death, turned to the young man’s writings, his beloved daughter, had been so taken by. So he sorted through, edited and had published Brainerd’s diaries, as we know them today, which until this day is still his work that has outsold all the others, and did much, not only in giving us the figure of Brainerd, an example of perseverance against and despite the odds, and great encouragement to any Christian today in great trial, and also Brainerd’s story doing much for the mission field, as far as having a figure that is both noteworthy and memorable, but if not for Brainerd dying at Edwards house, his extraordinary, though short life, may never have been remembered, and so would never have been the inspiration to both the mission fields and the Christian church that it has become known as. And yet, Brainerd and Edwards had never formally met. The hand at Providence is very visible, in how Brainerd went to a comparative stranger’s house, expecting at the time that he would make a recovery from his illness, and the 17 weeks he spent their he so moved the family that it was obvious to the entire family that something marvellous was happening among them, and he died there, but not without in such a short time, capturing Edward daughter, Jerusha’s heart, which would a month after Brainerd’s death, take her life too, and the outcome of all that was the diary of David  Brainerd which ever since has been one of the Christian books, which steadfastly year after year, decade after decade, century after century, still continues to sell, and has outsold all Edwards other books, and has become a great gift to the church. The whole story is a very visible thing, of how we exist for God’s glory, and how all things work for good, for those who love the Lord. (Rom 8:28)

Edwards was to later write despite the loss of his child: I would not conclude my observations… without acknowledging with thankfulness the gracious dispensation of Providence to me and my family, in so ordering it that he should be brought to my house in his last sickness.