The Life and Diary of David Brainerd
David Brainerd was an American missionary who was born in the early 1700’s. I was in Kansas City this past week at a conference held by the International House of Prayer (affectionately called IHOP). Someone told me there was coffee down in the basement bookstore and I went down there and there was no coffee, but amongst thousands of other books, I found this book on David Brainerd. I had heard about Brainerd last year and he caught my attention because I was told he was called by God into the native american tribes to preach the gospel (keep in mind this is in the early 1700’s). What I was NOT told, though, last year about this man is that he was incredibly broken and humble always before the Lord. Most of his daily entries show him gasping for air to know God more. But I just cannot get over this man because he was not a superchristian AT ALL. This is part of an entry from when he was 22 years old:
“Sometimes I grew remiss and sluggish, without any great convictions of sin, for a considerable time together; but after such a season, convictions seized me more violently. One night I remember, in particular, when i was walking solitarily abroad, I had opened to me such a view of my sin that I feared the ground would cleave asunder under my feet and become my grave; and would send my soul quick into hell, before I could get home.”
In his life he was either completely stricken with grief by his own sin and the emptiness of this world, or he was ravished by God, responding to Jesus’ sweet wooings toward him. David wanted nothing more than to do God’s will and be with his Lord. David ended up going into the native american tribes for three years and then died at 29 of tb. Brainerd is one who ushers lost sheep into the Kingdom of God and as I read about him i want more and more for my heart to be transformed into the likeness of Christ. Amen.