William Carey Converting the Heathens

When William Carey was told that God will convert the heathens when God pleases to do so, then as a result Carey published a tract that justified overseas evangelism (Moreau, 124). In the tract Carey defended the need to fulfill the great commission by basically arguing that without international evangelism being strived for by the church the promises of Christ may not be bestowed. Thus if the command of Christ to teach all the nations is restricted to the apostles only, then what should also be restricted to the apostles is baptism and the promise of the divine presence in his work (Carey, 314). Worst of all is that if the command to teach the nations given by Christ was only restricted to the apostles, then all ordinary ministry that evangelized heathens after the apostles would have gone ahead without being sent even though God has promised the most glorious things to the heathen world by sending the gospel (Carey, 314).

Carey knew that he would have to overcome the practical objections to overseas evangelism, so he invented the idea of congregations subscribing to a penny a week for funding (Carey, 318). Carey also used other such practical ideas to overcome obstacles, but his best work was perhaps his motivation given in saying, "We must not be contented ... with praying, without exerting ourselves in the use of means for the obtaining of those things we pray for. Were the children of light but as wise in their generation as the children of this world they would stretch every nerve to gain so glorious a prize, nor ever imagine that it was to be obtained in any other way." (Carey, 318) Overall, Carey's motivation ultimately drastically multiplied oversees efforts to bring the gospel to the heathens.

Carey thus caused tremendous change to occur for his time, and this change has gone so far as to have stimulated a movement that has caused places like Africa to become evangelized. Without the work of Carey many Christian churches would have continued to neglect outreach. Overall, the point is that stimulating new and effective methods for evangelism can be very fruitful when talking into consideration both sides of biblical covenant promises.

Bibliography:

Carey, William. "An Enquiry: Into the Obligation of Christians to Use Means for the Conversion of the Heathens." In Perspectives on the World Christian Movement: A Reader, 4th edition ed. Ralph D. Winter and Steven Hawthorne, 245-53. Pasadena, California: Paternoster Press, 1981.

Moreau, Scott, Gary R. Corwin, and Gary B. McGee. Introducing World Missions: A Biblical Historical, and Practical Survey. Grand Rapids, Michigon: Baker Academic, 2009.