Mary’s Walk, James’ Mules, and a Haystack (notes on history)

Sometime in the next two or three weeks, many of you will be receiving our newsletter. When you do, you’ll see that Camino Global is celebrating some very significant anniversaries this year.

So, in our newsletter you’ll see a timeline touching three centuries – well, more than that, but I don’t want to give everything away. Admittedly, it’s a somewhat self-centred timeline, but it is our newsletter, right? 🙂

Anyway, I thought I would share a few posts to supplement the newsletter.

It’s interesting how so many historic events are intertwined. I actually shared a bit about history at church earlier this month – the history of the Bible. It was back in 1800 that Mary Jones set out on a walk of more than 40km (on the way there – 40 more on the way back!) to buy her very own Bible from Thomas Charles. It was not the walk (which she made mostly barefoot) that was most remarkable, but that it took her six years to save for one Bible. When she arrived, there were no Bibles left.

Mary got her Bible two days later. But Charles was moved by so many who were so desperate to have Bibles of their own. And so he had a part in the founding of the Bible Society.

It was the Bible Society that sent James Thomson, 27 years later, to bring Bibles to a new nation – the nation of Mexico. He landed in Veracruz, and soon a train of 24 mules was winding its way to Mexico City with ten thousand Bibles and New Testaments in Spanish – in those days a rare and beautiful thing.

The light was just starting to shine, but who would carry the light to the millions who still did not know the Gospel?

The newsletter briefly mentions a very significant event in world history, today commonly known as “The Haystack Prayer Meeting”. It was at Williams College in Massachusetts that a group met to pray every Wednesday and Sunday. One week, a group of students were walking home from the prayer meeting – James, Francis, Harvey, Byram and Samuel. It was August, 1806.

Due to a sudden thunderstorm, they stopped to take shelter under a haystack. They decided to continue their prayer meeting. And then they started to talk – we’re praying about needs in the world, but what is our obligation?

What are boys in the 1800s to do? Start a “society”, of course! In this case, the Society of Brethren, formed in 1808. One of the students transferred to another school, starting a society there. A missionary society was formed in 1810, and in 1812 the first missionaries were on their way.

This famous prayer meeting fuelled a large part of the missions movement for the next few decades. Unreached countries were finally being reached. And that brings us to Camino – next time.