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Deep Dive into The Life And Diary Of David Brainerd by Jonathan Edwards - Appointed Missionary to the Indians
The diary of David Brainerd, compiled and edited by Jonathan Edwards, offers a profound window into the intense spiritual labors and turbulent inner life of an eighteenth century missionary to the North American Indians. Appointed by the Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge, Brainerd dedicated his brief, intense life to spreading the gospel among the native tribes, yet his journal reveals that his outward missionary work was accompanied by an equally exhausting inward struggle.
His daily entries depict a constant, agonizing fluctuation between sublime spiritual comfort and deep psychological dejection. Brainerd frequently wrestled with a profound sense of his own unworthiness, vileness, and insufficiency for the gospel ministry, often describing himself as a poor worm or a dead dog. These periods of severe melancholy and dejection were routinely triggered by his fear of spiritual pride or his feelings of inadequacy before preaching to his congregations. Under threat of arrest for preaching in New Haven, he often sought solitude in the woods to spread his anxieties before God, demonstrating his complete resignation to divine providence.
Conversely, Brainerd experienced moments of ecstatic communion with God, during which he felt entirely weaned from the world and swallowed up in the divine presence. He spoke of a pleasing pain, an insatiable hunger for holiness and perfect conformity to the divine image that could only be fully and perfectly satisfied in eternity. Consequently, despite his failing health and constant physical pain, death appeared highly desirable to him, representing a sweet release from the body of sin and a portal to the eternal world. Supported by close relationships with fellow ministers like Joseph Bellamy, Brainerd consistently channeled his deep spiritual distress into fervent intercession for his friends, the advancement of Christ's kingdom, and the salvation of the Indians, leaving a lasting legacy of unmatched devotion.
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