Isaiah 42:4 He shall not fail nor be discouraged, till he have set judgment in the earth: and the isles shall wait for his law. It may be said that the inhabitants of remote islands, on account of their isolation from great centres of civilisation, have lost the highest capacities of the race, and have sunk to the lowest depths of savagery. Throughout the fair paradises of Polynesia, when first discovered, idolatry prevailed in its most grovelling form, degrading the nations, and tribal wars kept the people in a state of constant alarm; cannibalism cast a haunting shadow over many a lovely island, and threatened to exterminate the population. Who does not remember the brutal murder of Captain Cook on the scene of one of the grandest of his discoveries; and the martyrdom of Williams and Patterson amid circumstances of the utmost atrocity towards those to whom they had proved the truest friends? There is hardly a single island in the Pacific but has its bloody record of the slaughter of these devoted men who first came to them with the message of Divine peace. And yet nowhere else have the triumphs of the Cross been so remarkable as on the islands that witnessed these barbarous acts. The simplicity and pliability of disposition peculiar to insular races which have made them the easy slaves of cruel practices, have made them, on the other hand, more susceptible to the power of Divine grace. They were not hampered by the shackles of religious organisations which had grown up during ages, and which had extended their roots so far and deep that they could only be torn up at the risk of destroying the whole social fabric that rested upon them. They had no elaborate caste like India, no gigantic ritual like China, because of the almost insuperable barriers in the way. They were far less self-sufficient than those who inherited the ancient religious and social systems of the great continental areas; they were, like children, ready to be attracted by any novelty. And so in spite of their superstition and measureless depravity, like the publicans and sinners of our Lord's time, they were ready to receive the kingdom of. heaven, readier to receive the kingdom of heaven than the heathen of the continental lands when in God's good providence, that kingdom of heaven came to them. The Sandwich Islands, where Williams was martyred, the Fiji Islands, notorious for their cannibalism, the islands of New Zealand, the abode of the most crafty and cruel savages, all were brought more or less under the influence of Christ. The history of the spread of Christianity in Japan and Madagascar, the courage and fortitude of the converts through years of relentless persecution, and the calmness with which they endured tortures from which death was a merciful relief, form one of the most thrilling chapters in the history of Christian missions. (H. Macmillan, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: He shall not fail nor be discouraged, till he have set judgment in the earth: and the isles shall wait for his law. |
    |