A Good and Faithful Servant

Often when doing missionary work, or when sharing our faith it can be very disheartening when people don’t respond. It becomes even more discouraging when people are negative towards the message we want to share. We are tempted to give up on people and think there is no hope for them to change. Jeremiah faced much opposition to his ministry, however he continued year after year, preaching the message that the Lord had for His people. Even though it seemed that the entire nation was against him, he didn’t give up. He continued preaching with the hope that a few people would respond. When the Lord has a duty for us to do, we must do it – leaving the results in His hand.

One such faithful missionary was a man named John Vassar. He lived in the United States of America in the pioneer days. He was a man of great courage who continued to go and preach the message of the love of Christ, even when faced with opposition. Here are a few experiences from his life.

Upon entering his cabin in the Rocky Mountains after a day in the woods a pioneer saw a strange book on the kitchen table.

“What’s this?” He demanded, as frowns clouded his grim, weather-tanned face.
“It’s – well, it’s – a Bible,” said his wife. “John Vassar gave it to us. He meant no harm,” she added quickly. And she looked pleadingly at her husband.

“He should have known better!” said the man, as he grabbled the Book. Then seething with anger he got a sharp axe and cut the Bible into two parts. “A wife should have half the property,” he said. “Here’s your half.” And he threw one piece of the Bible to her. Then he tossed his part into a dark closet where he kept odds and ends.

During months that followed neither wife nor husband said anything about the torn Bible. Then one rainy day he wanted something to read. He looked into the closet for an old magazine or perhaps a newspaper. But the only reading material he could find was his part of that Bible.

So to pass dreary time he browsed through some of the Book. His interest was highly stimulated when he began reading about a boy who left home, spent all his money, and had to eat with pigs.

Whatever happened to that boy? The man did not know, because he had never read the story of the Prodigal Son. His part of that Bible left him wondering what happened. How he would have liked to have the rest of the Book so his curiosity would be satisfied! Yet he was too proud to let his wife know this. But finally curiosity triumphed over pride, and he asked her for her part of the Bible. She, being a Christian, was of course happy to supply it.

The man read this story and became so much under conviction of his own spiritual needs that he was not satisfied until he accepted Jesus as his Saviour. This spiritual victory would not have been possible if John Vassar had not visited the couple numerous times and finally left a Bible in that home. Vassar was a horse-and-wagon salesman and distributor of Bibles and other devotional literature for the American Tract Society of New York. “I am legs for Bunyan, Baxter, Flavel, and others,” he often said. “They are all in my bag here.”

This Christian witness was very persistent. For instance, he visited one man twenty times without ever being able to get him to talk about salvation. Then one day he stopped again to talk with this man, Robert. John Vassar went out into the field where the man was working with a hoe. The conversation had scarcely begun when Robert flung his hoe aside and made as though to strike the Christian with his fist.

“He came at me fierce as a lion, cursing and swearing. I stood still and he stopped, and we stood looking at each other,” said Vassar. Then feeling sorry for the man, the home missionary said, “You’ll never have any peace until you give your heart to God!”

But that statement only made Robert angrier than ever. In a terrible rage he shouted, “Get out and never let me see your face again or I will kill you!”

Without replying, John walked peacefully away. But he intended to try again. And Robert probably expected him to return.

A few days later, when he came back, he saw the man hurrying around a corner of his house in the general direction of the barn, as though he wanted to hide.

Upon checking at the house with Robert’s Christian wife, John was told, “He warned me not to tell you where he was going. He saw you coming and ran out to get away from you. But, I think he went to the barn.”

“You stay here and pray, and I’ll try to find him,” said John. He went to the barn, but found the door locked. He stood at the door and knocked, but there was no answer. “Robert, please let me in, for Jesus’ sake – please do!” said John. But the door remained locked.

There was another door. John tried it, but it was also locked. There was more knocking at this door, and pleading for entrance. No response. The faithful Christian kept trying until it seemed he must give up for today. Then he heard a sigh and a step on the inside of the barn. There were more steps. The door was opened from the inside. And there stood Robert with open hands and open heart. Jesus had made him willing to open the door. “When I heard you so earnestly pleading outside, I finally felt convinced that I was not fighting you, but fighting Jesus, the Man you kept preaching to me about. Since it seems so very important to you, I realized there must be something of value in this. You are pleading more for my salvation then people plead for gold and silver. The value of this is more than anything in this world to you. I wanted to have this valuable treasure also. I want the peace you have. You never turned away or got upset or angry at me, even though I was so abusive towards you.”

“Let’s kneel and thank God together,” said John. They did. Then they went to Robert’s house. “I tell you the two minutes it took us to go from the barn to the house were the happiest two minutes I had ever seen. And you ought to have seen that woman’s face when she saw us coming together!” Said John. “She knew what it meant. Besides a single glance at him was enough. It seems to me I never saw so happy a woman in my life!” John was extremely happy too.
Another time when he was walking to the church where he would speak an unkempt man called to him from a store porch, “Hey, Captain, I want to talk to you.”

“Do you mean me?” asked John.
“Yeah, I mean you. Who else?” The voice was coarse and mean.
John walked directly to the store porch. And the thug continued speaking, “Let me tell you something. If you don’t leave this town within twenty-four hours I’ll give you a hard thrashing.”

John stood his ground and said kindly, but firmly, “I have planned to leave tomorrow morning. But let me tell you something, I am about my Master’s business, and if He wants me to stay here longer than twenty-four hours be assured I will stay.”

Then John took the man’s hands and prayed with him until he was as peaceful as a little boy.
Several men who observed this event went to church that night for the first time in years. They declared that John had won their respect.

This home missionary frequently talked with young people about Jesus. Often he was successful, but sometimes he was not. For example, in one community he was told about a girl who was very popular and influential with other young people but was not a Christian. “If she would only accept Jesus as Saviour many other teenagers would too,” he was told.

John visited her. But she firmly refused to accept salvation. After this visit it seemed the whole town turned against the missionary. People would not even allow him into their homes. The reason for this attitude was that the girl whom the missionary had visited quickly circulated a false report that he had insulted her. About all John could do was pray that somehow the truth would be revealed.

It was, in a rather unusual way. When John was in another town twenty young people and the girl who had visited came to visit him. With many tears this girl told him how sorry she was for telling a lie about him – that she had repented and had led the twenty other young people to Jesus. It was time to rejoice again!

In various parts of America, John Vassar witnessed to thousands of people in homes, in shops, stores, factories, and on the street, anywhere people would listen. He especially had a fervent desire to get a Bible into the hands of anyone who did not have one. And many people said, “If it hadn’t been for John Vassar I would never have found Christ.”

John would sympathize with those who were apart from God, because for more than twenty years he refused to listen when salvation was mentioned. In fact, he went to his first revival meeting only after his cousin, Matthew Vassar, bribed him to go. He gave him a sum of money to go, ‘just once.’

After John went once, he returned willingly. And before long Jesus had come into his heart and all things became new. A prayer came readily to his lips where once profanity had been so much at home. He gained control of his temper and turned his mind towards helping others find peace and joy. On one occasion he said, “I visit frequently forty families a day, have a meeting somewhere every night, and speak to three church services on Sabbath. I have conversed with more than three thousand people during the past three months of the subject of personal religion, and feel that for this city a wonderful blessing is in store.”

This procedure was repeated, over and over, in other communities through the years until God called John Vassar to rest with, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.”