David Brainerd

David Brainerd

David Brainerd was a missionary to the American Indians in New Jersey, particularly the Delaware Indians. He was born in 1718, in Connecticut, one of ten children whose parents passed away by the time he was nine years old. He lived with an older sister, tried his hand at farming, and had a conversion experience at age 21 – after a long period of spiritual travail, common in Puritan-style conversion stories of his day.

David enrolled in Yale to begin to prepare for what he thought would be a pastorate. During his second year, he contracted Tuberculosis and had to drop out. When he returned the following year, he found that many of the students had been caught up in the enthusiasm surrounding the Great Awakening and were very excited about their faith. This enthusiasm had been stoked by preachers like George Whitfield who had visited the area. David found himself caught up in this spiritual fervor and embraced it wholly. The enthusiasm of the students let the Yale trustees to pass a rule saying, “if any student of this College shall directly or indirectly say, that the Rector, either of the Trustees or tutors are hypocrites, carnal or unconverted men, he shall for the first offense make a public confession in the hall, and for the second offense be expelled.”

The day that rule was made public, the Yale trustees brought the President of Princeton College, the famous Jonathan Edwards, to speak to the students at that year’s Commencement, presuming Edwards would support their position. Instead, Edwards’ speech fully supported the students and gently rebuked the Yale staff. This buttressed the students in their enthusiasm and a tension arose between students and staff.

In the following term, Brainerd was with a few students talking about a prayer one of their professors offered that morning. David commented about the professor, “He hath no more grace than a chair.” While probably good for a laugh among college kids, the professors of Yale used it as an excuse to make an example of the students, and had David expelled. This action shamed David and seemed to haunt him for much of his remaining life. He wrote a lengthy apology, both to the professor and to the school. Despite this, he was never allowed to reenter school.

Not having an education from an ‘approved’ school closed the doors to the Pastorate in his day. Through a series of events, David accepted an offer to be missionary to the Delaware Indians, then inhabiting parts of New Jersey.

In different areas of New Jersey, over the course of three years, Brainerd began a mission school, translated part of the Psalms into the Indian tongue, and planted a few churches within Indian communities, the main church reaching 130 members within a year of its founding. During this time, David’s enthusiasm for his ministry took quite a toll on his body. He again contracted Tuberculosis and suffered other illnesses. In addition to this, he battled frequent crippling bouts of depression – indicating in his journal at least 22 times in that period that he wished for death. He also faced the normal obstacles of missionaries in his day: loneliness, lack of food and supplies, and funding shortages.

With his successes came offers from churches that had heard of his work, all of which he refused, having fully committed himself to his missions ministry. He wrote in his journal:
“[I] could have no freedom in the thought of any other circumstances or business in life: All my desire was the conversion of the heathen, and all my hope was in God: God does not suffer me to please or comfort myself with hopes of seeing friends, returning to my dear acquaintance, and enjoying worldly comforts.”

After less than four years on the missions field, Brainerd again contracted Tuberculosis. He traveled with great difficulty to Northampton, Massachusetts, and stayed with Jonathan Edwards – by this time a close friend of his. He stayed with them for just under a year in great pain before he passed away at age 29. Edwards’ daughter, Jerusha, age 17 was his nurse during this time. Jerusha contracted Tuberculosis from taking care of David, and she died a few months after he did. There is some indication that David and Jerusha had a romantic involvement. They are buried next to each other.

When David was close to death, he made a request of Jonathan Edwards to burn his journals. He felt that doing anything else was tantamount to pride. Edwards pleaded with him to allow him to read and publish those journals. David eventually relented, requesting of Jonathan that he do with his journals whatever he thought would be of the most value for the propagation of the Gospel.

After David’s passing, Jonathan Edwards took a break from the theological dissertation he was writing to publish David’s journals. He added a little commentary and stripped out much of the writing of David’s periods of despair, but left the rest to speak on its own. It’s a powerful read – full of a man’s struggle to get his heart right with God and the joy of His service. It dramatically shows David’s single-minded purpose of ministry in the face of incredibly personal trials and difficulties.

The Life of David Brainerd is the most widely read of Jonathan Edwards’ books. Only his sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God has been read more. Edwards published the journals in 1749, about two years after David’ death. It immediately became very widely known and read. Brainerd’s journals became the inspiration for such notable missionaries as Adoniram Judson, the first American Baptist missionary, Hudson Taylor, and Jim Elliott. John Wesley of England encouraged all his pastors to read the book.

Yale’s Divinity School has a building called “Brainerd Hall” – named after the student they once expelled.

The Life of David Brainerd, Jonathan Edwards, Baker Book House, 1985 reprint.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Brainerd