Born in Texas in 1879 to former slaves, Eliza Davis came to faith at an early age and strove to get an education to become a teacher. She achieved her dream and became a teacher at Central Texas College, a Christian college in central Texas. In 1911, in her early 30s, she heard a missions speaker challenge the students to mission work in Africa.
That night, she had a dream of Africans passing before the judgment seat of Christ saying, “But no one ever told us You died for us.” She immediately made known her intentions to go to Africa as a missionary. Missions leaders were reluctant to send a black woman as a missionary and initially refused her application. However, after three years of determination, Eliza departed for Liberia to begin her ministry.
Refusing to settle in the capital, Monrovia, she traveled to the more rural interior where there were few churches or missionaries. With one partner, she opened a school called the Bible Industrial Academy, where they taught children to read and gave them job and life skills. After two years of labor, 50 children attended the school and more than 1,000 people in the area had made professions of faith. As the school grew, she also trained young Liberians to become teachers and missionaries themselves.
Five years after she arrived, in the turmoil of the beginning of World War I, her missions board disbanded, leaving her without support. She and her students at times had to scavenge for food from the brush. A British missionary doctor named G. Thompson George offered to marry her. Despite having a rocky marriage, where he often turned to alcohol and even other women, the marriage freed her from many of the burdens of support. They adopted three Liberian children together. Doctor George passed away in 1939.
After her husband’s death, Eliza continued her work in Liberia for another 33 years, investing herself in hundreds of young people who grew into missionaries
and teachers themselves.
When she was in her late 60s, the missions board that had picked up her support forcibly retired her. However, she was certain God wanted her to continue her work and she was able to raise independent support for her work and return to the field.
When Eliza was well into her 90s, new missionaries came to Africa to replace her. They expected to find a brittle, old woman but instead found an energetic, humorous woman still walking from village to village sharing God’s Word, still fasting and praying for her needs and the needs of those in her charge.
Eliza Davis George passed away in March of 1979, having just reached her 100th birthday.
https://www.samford.edu/beeson-divinity/blog/2021/Eliza-Davis-George
https://dacb.org/stories/liberia/george-eliza/
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