“God Will Have to Speak Very, Very Loudly…”
The period between 1929 and 1939 is known colloquially as “the dirty thirties.” These were tumultuous years of economic depression that left millions of Canadians unemployed, hungry, and homeless. The Union of Regular Baptist Churches, forerunner of our Fellowship, was hit hard as well. Giving in support of home mission pastors and overseas missionaries virtually dried up.
The 20s and 30s were also years of contradiction, a time when married women seemed to lose their own identities and were almost always referred to by their husband’s first and last names, while at the same time these years were the heyday of the era of female evangelists.
In 1935, one Union pastor in Southern Ontario, sent his report into the Union’s head office in Toronto, rejoicing in a hugely successful evangelistic campaign. Many had been saved and the work was encouraged. The preacher for the campaign was a Miss Hudson, one of the many female evangelists of the period. There is no record of any letter, or minute from the Executive Board, that condemned the event—or the speaker. The men of the Executive Board were as conservative in theology as any conservative could possibly be. Their silence on the subject (and silence when it came to disagreements was NOT characteristic to these men) speaks volumes.
In any case the poverty of the 30s had drastic effects on home and overseas ministries, including the Union’s first missionary endeavours in Liberia, Africa. Though the work was challenging the published reports of how God was blessing were glowing.
Miss Minnie Lane, a member of Stanley Avenue Baptist Church in Hamilton, Ontario, had gone to Liberia to serve with more senior missionaries and in the company of Mr. and Mrs. Gordon Mellish. Mellish had previously served as a home mission pastor with the Union. Liberia was not an easy field of service. Missionaries frequently became ill, unused to the conditions and climate that they lived with daily. The Board felt a responsibility to care for those who were forced to return home because of chronic and sometimes permanent disability. That meant money, as did the salaries and materials needed to do the work.
In 1937, the Union decided to abandon the mission to Liberia and ordered all its missionaries there to return home.
Miss Lane and her colleagues received a letter from the Board, part of which reads: “After most careful consideration of the subject, the Board reached the decision to recommend to the Convention the discontinuance of our work in Liberia. It also…reached a decision respecting the termination of the services of the Missionaries.”
There simply wasn’t enough money to sustain the work or look after the missionaries disabled by the conditions there. As well, there were difficulties between the missionaries that were creating challenges for the Board. And herein perhaps lies another of the contradictions of the era. The men of the Board had good, strong, logical reasons for their decision. And there is no doubt about their commitment to prayer, to the ministry, and to obedience to the Lord.
But it seems their faith might not have been quite as strong as that of their missionaries.
This decision would have serious repercussions among the Union churches, some of whom were incensed enough to withdraw their fellowship. But for the missionaries in Liberia the decision was more disappointing than devastating and certainly tested and proved their faith.
The many letters back and forth to the Board are still preserved in the Fellowship’s archives.
Minnie Lane wrote:
“I have also … received your personal letter telling of closing of the work. What can I say about it? Nothing except that we pray that God has so dealt with His children that He has laid a greater burden for Africa on their hearts than ever so that they no longer consider quitting…We are not in the least discouraged…You folks at home are not here and never have been and so you will never know the great need of the work. I do not know how to tell you how I feel but to speak plainly, God will have to speak very, very loudly before I can go home and leave these people without help. Yes, I know it costs money but the God who owns the Universe is no poorer than He was and I’m willing to let Him look after me.” —May 19, 1937
“I cannot understand whatever has happened to the home folks, for to me it is just falling backward not advancing ahead. If the home folks could be out here they certainly could never even think of closing this work for its God’s work not ours…Oh, Mr. Thomson, if it’s only money, then why not let us trust God for our money. If the people at home haven’t money to give then God will not see us in need…What can we do but beg to stay on, money or no money, and be in God’s will, than to go home and sit down and be out of God’s will…God forgive us all for our lack of faith.” —June 15, 1937
By June, 1937, the Mellishes and Minnie Lane had made the decision to stay in Liberia without the support of the Union and its churches. And this they did.
Gordon Mellish wrote to the Board:
“Not for one moment would either Mrs. Mellish or myself even suggest that we are indispensable to the work in Liberia but at the same time we desire to re-affirm to the Board and the constituency who have supported us for the past six and one half years, that more and more we know that the Lord has called us to serve Him in Liberia, and not any Board. The joy of the Lord has been our strength continually. For this reason, if we left Liberia now, left these people without any witness of the truth, and without the expectation that the people of the interior as well should hear the Gospel, it would be on our conscience for life. So long as the Lord wants us in Liberia we could not serve the Lord happily in any other place…we are willing to trust the Lord completely for the supply of all our needs and that of the work and He will not fail.”
Nor has He failed almost a century later.