History of the missions of the American board of commissioners for foreign missions to the oriental churches, Volume II.Anderson, Rufus
Religion
History of the missions of the American board of commissioners for foreign missions to the oriental churches, Volume II.
Anderson, Rufus
American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions; Missions -- Eastern churches
In respect to Mardin, I cannot refrain from quoting the expressive
words of Mr. Williams, whose pen had much of graphic power. "The
community here received the proposal to observe the week of prayer
most joyfully, and preferred two meetings a day to one,--the first
at sunrise, the second an hour and a half before sunset, each an
hour long. Our first meeting was in a pouring rain, thirty present.
This is the first pleasant day, and seventy-six were present in the
morning. One of the preachers opens the meeting by singing, reading,
remarks, and prayer. This occupies from twenty-five to thirty
minutes, and then the meeting is thrown open to others, and six or
eight prayers, short and pertinent, fill the time till the hour is
up. We never before have been able to start a prayer-meeting here,
and now they move off in a line, as if they had done nothing else
all their lives. I think as many as twenty-five persons have led in
prayer."
A church had not yet been formed, but the Protestant community
undertook the entire support of their preacher, and also of one of
their own number as a missionary to the Koords. The latter is thus
described by Mr. Williams: "A great, six feet, brawny fellow, with
unwashed clothes (he is a tanner), long, disheveled hair, large,
open features, and eyes black as coal, that shine like stars; but so
simple in his trust, so tender in his love to Jesus, and earnest in
his efforts to do good! He learned to read with steady, earnest
application, and his questions are so spiritual, so humble, so
childlike, that it is as the sun whenever he enters my door.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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