Page 11 - Audacity - Edition 1

On 1 April 1743, after a brief period serving a Church on Long Island,

Brainerd began working as a missionary to Native Americans which he

would continue until late 1746 when worsening illness prevented him

from working. In his final years, he also suffered from a form of depression

that was sometimes immobilizing and which, on at least twenty-two occa-

sions, led him to wish for death. He was also affected by difficulties faced

by other missionaries of the period, such as loneliness and lack of food.

In his missionary work, Brainerd started a school for Native American chil-

dren and began a translation of the Psalm. He refused several offers of

leaving the mission field to become a Church minister, writing in his diary:

‘[I] could have no freedom in the thought of any other cir-

cumstances or business in life: All my desire was the conver-

sion of the heathen, and all my hope was in God: God does

not suffer me to please or comfort myself with hopes of see-

ing friends, returning to my dear acquaintance, and enjoying

worldly comforts’.

In May 1747, he was diagnosed with incurable consumption; in those final

months, he suffered greatly. During this time, he was nursed by Jerusha

Edwards, Jonathan Edward’s seventeen-year-old daughter. He died from

tuberculosis on 9 October 1747, at the age of 29. He is buried at Bridge

Street Cemetery in Northampton, next to Jerusha, who died in February

1748 as a result of contracting tuberculosis from nursing Brainerd.

His biography written by Jonathan Edward had great influence on John

Wesley, Henry Martins, William Carey, Jim Elliot and Adoniram Judson.

“Some wish to stay within the sound of Church or chapel

bell. I’d rather run a

rescue shop within a yard of hell.”

C.T. Studd