p. 12 | LORA CLEMENT by LORA CLEMENT

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Dec 17, 1914

LORA CLEMENT

By LORA CLEMENT

Missionary Biography—No. 4

LORA CLEMENT

Allen Gardiner

As never before, the eyes of the Christian world are turning to South America, the Neglected Continent of yesterday, the land of abundant promise for today, the continent of opportunity. But the open doors of the present are hinged upon the blood-bought victories of the past, and the servants of the King who enter to gather the fruitage follow in the footsteps of courageous men who, counting all things as loss that the cross of Christ might be uplifted, have cast themselves into the furrow of South America’s great need. Foremost among these stands Allen Gardiner.

He was born in England in 1794, and manifested even in childhood the spirit which controlled his later life. When questioned as to why he slept on the floor in place of his bed, he answered that when he grew to be a man he intended to travel around the world, and therefore he wished to accustom himself to hardship. Joining the British navy, he distinguished himself in service and became a lieutenant. The reading of a touching record of his mother’s death, written by his father, led him to give his heart to God, and at the first opportunity he purchased a Bible and began its study. Meanwhile he traveled, and seeing the results of missionary work, especially in Tahiti, became a missionary enthusiast. Later his ship visited South America, and he was inspired with an undying desire to work among the neglected Indians of that continent. Beside the coffin of his wife he solemnly dedicated himself to God’s service.

With Allen Gardiner, to resolve was to do. Anxious to serve his Master anywhere, he was glad to improve an opportunity to go to Africa. There, amid a thousand perils, he aided in the establishment of the town of Durban, and gained such an influence over the ferocious Zulu chief, Dingaan, that he was chosen governor of the region now known as Natal. Difficulties between the whites and the Zulus broke up his missionary

labors at last, and he was forced to flee from the country.

Undaunted by this experience, Gardiner determined to devote the remainder of his life to pioneer mission work in South America. He landed at Rio de Janeiro in July, 1838, and immediately began a series of indefatigable journeyings and investigations. In all missionary annals no one can more justly claim as his own the apostolic motto, “In journeyings often.” Until his death, in 1851, Captain Gardiner spent his time in extensive missionary travel, visiting repeatedly all parts of the Continent and England, pleading for means with which to establish the mission to which he had given his all. His journeys through the wilds of South America, his encounters with bigoted Catholics and crafty, ungrateful Indians, his labors in the distribution of Bibles, his narrow escapes, his ceaseless energy, leave no doubt regarding his devotion to the work of his choice. “Faint, yet pursuing,” he wrote, “my prayer is that the Lord, my God, may be glorified in me, whether it be by life or death; and that he will, should I fall, raise up and send forth other laborers into this harvest, that his name may be magnified and his kingdom enlarged.”

Finally, in company with a surgeon, a catechist, three Cornish fishermen, and a ship carpenter who declared, when volunteering for service, that to be under Captain Gardiner “was like a heaven upon earth, he was such a man of prayer,” the dauntless missionary undertook his last journey in an effort to gain a foothold for Christ among the savages on the bleak coast of Tierra del Fuego. The expedition was inadequately equipped. Gardiner had found it impossible to arouse the interest of the Christian world to the liberality that was required. No one knew better than he did what was absolutely needed for such an enterprise; but rather than abandon the effort, he reluctantly resolved to eliminate necessities, in the self-denying hope that the additional danger and hardship endured would compensate for their absence.

Gardiner and his companions secured passage on a ship bound for San Francisco, taking with them two small launches and provisions for six months. On Dec. 18, 1850, the vessel left them at Banner Cove, sailing away with many cheerful messages from the little party to friends at home. Their journals tell the painful story of the next nine months. Misfortunes and disasters followed in quick succession. During a heavy storm an anchor and both small boats for landing were lost. In repairing a leak in one of the launches the terrible discovery was made that their powder and shot had been left on the ship; hence they were without means of obtaining game, upon which they had counted to help out their supplies, and also without defense from attacks of the natives—a constant peril. When they tried to fish, the ice tore their nets to pieces. One of their launches was wrecked, and finally the plundering, hostile natives compelled them to seek shelter in a retired bay known as Spaniard Harbor. They were waiting anxiously for supplies which were to have followed them, but one relief boat was wrecked, and the captain of another disobeyed orders and did not call at Banner Cove.

The frightful Fuegian winter began in April, and from the terrific storms of wind and snow the deep caverns in the rocks surrounding their retreat were their only refuge. At length their stores were completely exhausted, but they managed to subsist on limpets, mussels, and wild celery. Scurvy broke out among them, and added its horrors to that of hunger. One by one every member of the brave little party starved to death, Allen Gardiner probably being the last survivor of the band. Some days later help came, “but there were none to help.” Gardiner’s body lay beside a rock upon which was painted a hand pointing to the words found in Ps. 62: 5-7: “My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from him. He only is my rock and my salvation: he is my defense; I shall not be moved. In God is my salvation and my glory: the rock of my strength, and my refuge, is in God.” Who but a hero could, under the circumstances, write such a confession of faith in his dying hour?

Gardiner’s journal, preserved as by a miracle, and his triumphant death accomplished what his life could not bring about. The Christian world roused to her duty, and mission stations were established not only in Tierra del Fuego, but in other parts of the hitherto neglected continent.

And the end is not yet. Our southern neighbor is still a mission field. Her people cry from the darkness and superstition of Romanism for a knowledge of the true and living God. The task is great, the laborers comparatively few. It is easy for us to sing as soldiers of the cross, “Like a mighty army moves the church of God;” but does it move? So often we prefer to hug the trenches. Workers no less faithful than Allen Gardiner are calling for recruits at the battle front today. How often they call in vain, and in disappointment pray:—

“More than half beaten, but fearless, Facing the storm and the night; Breathless and reeling, but tearless, Here in the lull of the fight, I bow not but before thee, God of the fighting clan, Lifting my fists I implore thee, Give me the heart of a man! “What though I live with the winners, Or perish with those who fall; Only the cowards are sinners, Fighting the fight is all. Strong is my foe—he advances! Snapped is my blade, O Lord! See the proud banners and lances! O, spare me this stub of a sword!”

Some time ago Robert E. Speer, while touring in South America, made a trip up the Magdalena River in an old-fashioned stern-wheel boat. It had to stop frequently to take on fresh fuel during the night, and at one point the passengers were awakened as the boat tied up to the shore, and the men ran out the gangway and began to bring on wood. Suddenly there was a sound of a plunging body in the water, a rush of footsteps on the lower deck, and excited voices whispering; then a half-strangled, pitiful cry, “O hombre, hombre!”—literally, O man, man! but truly, also, O brother! O friend!—and then a gurgling sound and a swirl of the brown waters rushing by, and all was still as the boat went sobbing on its way. In the morning it was found that a Colombian soldier who had been sleeping on the unfenced lower deck had rolled off into the water. No one had seen him go; they had heard his cry, but were too late to help him, and the man was gone.

“O friend! O brother!” is the cry that is coming from the priest-ridden millions of South America today—an earnest appeal for the things that in Christ we have to give. “O friend!” that voice calls to you. Will it find in you the heart of a friend to reply?