Eaten by worms or cannibals, it doesn't matter.

Recently, J.D. Greer posted this following story about John Paton, the missionary to the New Hebrides a century ago.

The primary problem was that the New Hebrides islands were inhabited by cannibals who had a history of eating any foreigner who came on shore. The other problem was that no one knew their language. What exactly do you do to start a church in a place like that? You can't pass out pamphlets that say "Easter sunrise service this Sunday: come and bring a friend."

Many tried to discourage him from going. In one of my favorite episodes from his life, Paton recounts this:

“I was besieged with the strongest opposition on all sides. One of my divinity school professors told me that I was leaving certainty for uncertainty. I was leaving work in which God had made me greatly useful for work which I might fail to be useful and only throw my life away for the cannibals. One dear old Christian deacon said to me: ‘The cannibals! You will be eaten by cannibals!’”

I replied, “Mr. Dickson, you are advanced in years now, and your own prospect is soon to be laid in the grave, there to be eaten by worms. I confess to you that if I can but live and die serving and honoring the Lord Jesus, it will make no difference to me whether I am eaten by cannibals or by worms. And in the great day, my resurrection body will arise as fair as yours in the likeness of our risen Redeemer.”

“Indeed the opposition was so strong from nearly all, and many of them warm Christian friends, that I was sorely tempted to question whether I was carrying out the divine will or only some headstrong wish of my own. This caused me much anxiety and drove me close to God in prayer. But, again, every doubt would vanish when I clearly saw that all at home had free access to the Bible and the means of grace with gospel light shining all around them while the poor heathen were perishing without even the chance of knowing all God’s love and mercy to me.”

Paton's ministry there was both brutal and exhilarating. The only thing he really loved in his life was his wife, and she died bearing their first child on that island. He had to sleep on their graves for 3-4 nights to keep the cannibals from digging them up and eating them. He was under constant siege day and night, always on the lookout for his life.

Eventually, he saw a breakthrough. One of the chiefs who came to Christ asked him, "When you first got here, who was that army that guarded your hut each night?" Apparently the angels of God surrounded his family each night to preserve this Gospel witness.

When Paton died 35 years later on that island, he recounted that he did not know a single islander who had not professed faith in Jesus Christ.