David Brainerd – Man of Prayer and Mission

David Brainerd (1718 – 1747) was a Presbyterian missionary to the Seneca and Delaware Indians of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania (1744–47). He gained posthumous fame through the publication of his diary by Jonathan Edwards, the Massachusetts religious philosopher.

David Brainerd (1718 – 1747)

Brainerd was ordained as a Presbyterian minister on June 12, 1744, at Newark, N.J. As a missionary, he was employed by the Honourable Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge. He preached through an interpreter, Moses Tinda Tautamy, working among the Delawares, the Six Nations, the Senakes (probably Senecas), and Tutelas. He rode horseback along the Susquehanna and Delaware rivers, camping at night, his only home a cabin at the forks of the Delaware.

A great missionary once said that ‘the spirit of Christ is the spirit of missions, and the nearer we get to Him the more intensely missionary minded we become’. The reason David Brainerd was intensely missionary minded was because he was filled with this very spirit of Christ. He truly love Christ and lived and worked for Him continuously. He was overwhelmed with the missionary spirit and he never lost it.

David Brainerd did his greatest work by praying and weeping in secret. He spent many days in forests all alone, unable to speak the language of the pagan and savage Indians. He spent whole days in prayer, asking that the Holy Spirit might use him so effectively that the Indians would not be able to refuse the Gospel. On hearing that the Indians were about to hold an idolatrous feast and dance, he spent a day and night in prayer. In his diary he wrote about it:

This morning about nine I withdrew to the woods for prayer. I wrestled for an ingathering of souls. I was in such anguish that when I arose from my knees I felt extremely weak and overcome. Sweat ran down my face and body . . . I cared not how or where I lived, or what hardships I went through, so that I could but gain souls for Christ.

He frequently suffered because of the lack of food and cold, or because he was caught in storms with no shelter. He was constantly in danger from wild animals and savages. He recorded one incident with the following words:

About six at night I lost my way in the wilderness, and wandered over rocks and mountains, through swamps and most dreadful places. I was pinched with cold and distressed with an extreme pain in my head and stomach, so that much blood came from me. But God preserved me, and blessed be His name, such fatigues and hardships as these seem to wean me more from the earth and I trust will make heaven the sweeter.

Due to the working of Holy Spirit many Indians would be in tears as they listened to him preach about Christ. One of the Indians who had intended to murder said to his chief, ‘The paleface is a praying man. The Great Spirit is with him . . . and he brings a wondrous sweet message’.

Expressing his love for the lost souls Brainerd wrote:

I care not where I go, or how I live, or what I endure so that I may save souls. When I sleep I dream of them; when I awake they are first in my thoughts – no amount of scholastic attainment, of able and profound exposition, of brilliant and stirring eloquence can atone for the absence of a deep impassioned sympathetic love for human souls.

In 1747, Northampton, Mass. (aged 29) Brainerd contracted tuberculosis and was nursed for 19 weeks at Edwards’ home at Northampton, Mass., where he died at the age of just 29, having been a Christian for only eight years and a missionary for only four years; yet probably no one has had more influence on the modern missionary movement than David Brainerd.

His commitment to prayer and fasting. Brainerd spent whole days in prayer, or prayed six times in the day, also seeking out others with whom to pray. He prayed “for his own sanctification, for the conversion and purity of his Indians, for the advancement of the kingdom of Christ around the world, for guidance for the next steps of ministry.” When he was dying, he urged other young ministers to engage in frequent days of prayer and fasting because of how effective he himself proved it to be.

He saw the Lord respond to his prayer and fasting in very clear ways. Reports speak of the Indians falling down, while he preached, weeping under conviction of sin. In 1745 he wrote: “in the afternoon I preached to the Indians and there was much visible concern amongst them. Afterwards when I spoke to some individually the power of God seem to descend on the assembly like a rushing mighty wind and with an astonishing energy bore down all before it. I stood amazed.” That resulted in changed lives – in changed marriages, in release from debt from alcoholism, in refusing to take revenge on past offences. Lives were changed by the power of God. Jonathan Edwards himself said that “among all the many days Brainerd spent in secret prayer and fasting, there is scarce an instance of one but what was either attended or soon followed with apparent success and a remarkable blessing in special incomes and consolations of God’s Spirit, and very often before the day was ended.” God significantly responded to the prayers of His devoted and dependent servant.

But there is another element in his life that is critical to share. It would be easy to say that his devoted commitment to prayer and fasting was the basis of the Holy Spirit’s response. That is true. But there is another fact which we should not miss – Brainerd’s deep and passionate commitment to the word of God.

Piper picks out several quotations from Brainerd’s diaries which reveal that Brainerd was not just a Bible student, but that he spent significant time studying God’s word, often together with prayer and fasting.He was like a man who had found gold but felt he needed to dig longer and deeper because there would be more and richer treasure. Brainerd and the Bible had much more than a passing acquaintance nor did they only meet in a ‘regular’ quiet time. Some examples:

“December 20, 1745: I spent much of the day in writing; but was enabled to intermix prayer with my studies.”

“December 20, 1742: spent this day in prayer, reading and writing; and enjoyed some assistance, especially in correcting some thoughts on a certain subject.”“Was most of the day employed in writing on a divine subject. Was frequent in prayer.”

“I spent most of the time in writing on a sweet divine subject.”

“Was engaged in writing again almost the whole day.”

“Rose early and wrote by candlelight some considerable time; spent most of the day in writing.”

“Towards night enjoyed some of the clearest thoughts on a divine subject that ever I remember to have had on any subject whatsoever; and spent two or three hours in writing them.”

Although David Brainerd served as a missionary for only about four years and died at the age of 29, his ministry produced remarkable results. Among the Native Americans, a strong Christian community emerged; by the end of his active ministry he had baptized 43 adults whom he regarded as showing credible evidence of conversion, while the total number baptized, including children, reached about 77. His success was closely associated with persistent preaching, personal sacrifice and extraordinary periods of earnest prayer.

Yet Brainerd’s greatest missionary influence may have come after his death. Jonathan Edwards published his diary and biography, and Brainerd’s life of prayer and complete devotion to Christ inspired generations of Christians to missionary service.

Among those strongly influenced by Brainerd were:

William Carey — pioneer missionary to India and a major figure in the modern Protestant missionary movement.
Henry Martyn — reading Brainerd helped persuade him to abandon his intended legal career and become a missionary to India and Persia.
Jim Elliot — missionary martyr in Ecuador, whose own writings reveal how Brainerd’s diary stirred him toward deeper prayer and missionary devotion.
Robert Murray M‘Cheyne — said Brainerd’s example made him “more set upon missionary enterprise than ever.”
David Livingstone — the famous missionary and explorer of Africa was also among those influenced by Brainerd’s example.

Thus, Brainerd’s life demonstrates that the effectiveness of missionary work cannot be measured merely by its length. His few years of prayer, sacrifice and evangelism not only changed lives among Native Americans but helped ignite missionary devotion in generations that followed.

This element of Brainerd’s life encourages us to understand that just a deep experience of the Holy Spirit born of prayer and fasting is not sufficient without a rugged commitment to the Scriptures.

The remarkable man of faith, George Mueller, read through the Bible some two hundred times – and more than half of those were on his knees, praying over Scripture while studying it. The Lord Jesus said: “You are wrong because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God” (Matthew 22:29). The equipped man and woman of God needs to know both “the Scriptures” and “the power of God”.

It is said that Smith Wigglesworth, the English plumber who under God became an astonishingly anointed servant of the Lord, prophesied that “when the word and the Spirit come together there will be unprecedented revival.” The word and the Spirit both had major places in Brainerd’s life. He is a striking illustration of the truth of the Lord’s Jesus’ statement.

Surely the Lord yearns in our day to raise up a new generation of Brainerds. Men and women of God who are not committed either to a close relationship with the Holy Spirit or to a life of studying the Scriptures, but rather totally committed to both.