Scriptures: Mark 4:30-32, Matthew 9:36-38, Mark 4:3-8 & John 12:24-26.
Structure:
- Introduction
- Leaving NZ
- Reaching out
- Difficulties
- Conclusion
Credits: The information about Rosalie Macgeorge in this message was gleaned from the following web page…
Introduction:
Good morning everyone.
Can anyone tell me when New Zealand held its first general election. [Wait]
That’s right, it was 1853.
Can anyone tell me when the New Zealand Baptist Missionary Society (or NZBMS) was founded. [Wait]
That’s right, it was 1885.
Just one year after that, in 1886, the NZBMS sent their first missionary overseas. Her name was Rosalie Macgeorge.
Today is Women’s Sunday, and the beginning of missions’ month. With this in view our message focuses on the story of Rosalie Macgeorge, New Zealand’s first Baptist missionary. But even if it wasn’t women’s day or missions’ month I would still want to tell Rosalie’s story because it is quite incredible really.
The newly founded New Zealand Baptist Missionary Society of the 1880’s had heard of a special need in Bengal. The seclusion of women in zenanas.
A zenana is an Indian term to describe the inner apartments of a house where the women of the family live. Some say a zenana is the Indian sub-continent’s equivalent of a harem. Essentially women in the zenanas were isolated or secluded and therefore not able to hear the Gospel of Christ.
The NZBMS took this need so seriously they were seeking only women missionaries to reach the Indian women in the zenanas.
In August 1886 two women from Hanover Street Baptist Church in Dunedin volunteered to go: A Miss Fulton and a Miss Rosalie Macgeorge. The idea was that the two should work together. This follows Jesus’ practice of sending apostles out in twos. Unfortunately, Miss Fulton pulled out.
I am not sure what motivated Rosalie. I don’t know if she had some mystical experience in which God spoke to her and told her to go. Or whether she simply felt an unction in her spirit. In any case, Rosalie stayed the course.
Leaving New Zealand
But before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s go back a step. Rosalie was born in Australia, in 1859, the third of nine children. She had seven sisters and one brother. It is thought she probably came to NZ when she was about five.
In her mid-twenties, Rosalie is described as “A young woman of fine appearance, strong character, and deep devotion to her Lord.” She had been baptised 12 years before, had become a church member, served in many departments of church life, and was an able speaker.
Rosalie’s family were respected and active members of the Hanover Street Baptist church. Rosalie herself was held in high esteem also. She was a trained teacher, and had a special love for children — a love and understanding that was demonstrated later in the many letters she wrote to them from India.
Rosalie’s departure was a rush. Her farewell was on the 28th September, 1886, barely a month after she had signed up. Rosalie would travel with English Baptist missionaries, Mr and Mrs Kerry, to Calcutta. Rosalie asked for the prayers of God’s people. She was 27 years old when she left NZ.
The minister, Rev Alfred North, noted that the occasion was unique as Rosalie was the first missionary from the Baptist denomination in New Zealand to go overseas, and the first woman sent by any NZ group for mission work.
Alfred North said something else that proved to be very true: ‘The work which lies before you is exceptionally hard and exhausting.’ He mentioned disappointments, pity, compassion, hope deferred, ignorance, time-consuming language study, separation from loved ones and climate.
In saying these things Rosalie’s pastor was essentially paraphrasing the words of Jesus, that going into the world as his representative would not be easy. That his followers would face many hardships.
The Rev North charged her,
…Go! In the assurance that His presence yields. Go! In simple faith in the power of the Gospel of His love. Go! Your heart over-brimming with love to all on whom His love is set, and for whom His blood was shed. So shall the blessing of the Lord Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, rest upon you for ever.’
The faith of Rosalie Macgeorge was truly remarkable. We need to remember that in 1886 there were no aeroplanes and no internet. One couldn’t skype or text or email or jump on a plane if things got tough. People travelled by boat over the ocean and they sent hand written letters which could take months to arrive.
This wasn’t like a short term mission trip. Once a missionary left they were gone for many years. Rosalie’s family and friends back home did not know if they would see her again (in this life at least).
The other thing to remember is that the 1880’s were not a time in history when women enjoyed equality. Rosalie Macgeorge left NZ six years before women anywhere in the world were given the vote.
Rosalie was an incredibly brave woman with a deep devotion to her Lord. She was walking by faith and not by sight. Like Peter, Rosalie stepped out of the boat to walk on water with Jesus. Unlike Peter though, she did not begin to sink.
Rosalie reached Calcutta in December that same year (1886), so it took her about 2 or 3 months to get to India. Once in Calcutta she travelled to Faridpur to join women on the South Australian mission society while she studied Bengali.
The next month she wrote to the children at her church how a woman who was helping her learn was crying bitterly because her baby had died. Rosalie was deeply distressed that she had no words to tell of Jesus and his love. She was impatient to start work but recognised she must do about two years of study.
There was bookish, classical Bengali but that was a little different from the common spoken language. One time she got her words mixed up and called her teacher a cow. He was not amused. But Rosalie was never content with the books. She insisted on gaining colloquial words, tones and twists of language, even asking local children to correct her. She wanted free conversation style, something many missionaries had missed out on.
Reaching out
By early 1888, after just over a year in India, Rosalie could write, ‘I feel I could do a little in the zenanas if necessary, but it would be blundering work, and would cripple me in the language for the future.’ Rosalie wanted to lay a good foundation before reaching out. She knew the way to build that foundation was by listening and learning, so she kept studying.
Rosalie prepared a short talk to give to the women in the zenanas, carefully correcting her pronunciation. Her joy was great when seven weeks later, she found she was understood by the women in a house. Yay! She was getting somewhere. She visited five houses a week and talked to the women for an hour.
Later in the year Rosalie started a young men’s Bible Class for Hindu boys who were learning English. Rosalie told them, ‘Of course, my motive is to teach you about the Bible, but at the same time you will have the advantages of hearing English spoken and of having your mistakes corrected.’ I like the way Rosalie was up front about her agenda.
The class grew from three to eight, to eleven… Soon the boys were more interested in the Bible than in English. By May two of this class wanted to know more of Jesus and by the end of the year 100 students had been through her class at some point.
In Mark’s gospel Jesus compares the Kingdom of God to a mustard seed, saying: “What shall we say the kingdom of God is like,or what parable shall we use to describe it? 31 It is like a mustard seed, which is the smallest of all seeds on earth. 32 Yet when planted, it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants, with such big branches that the birds can perch in its shade.”
In Christian work we do not despise small beginnings. God can work with small. Rosalie’s English class started with just three boys but it grew. Not only that but the seed of the gospel grew in people’s hearts and minds.
As Mother Teresa said: ‘We cannot all do great things. But we can do small things with great love.’
An Indian Pastor was preaching at a mela (festival) and Rosalie, together with an Australian woman, Miss Newcombe, helped by giving out tracts and singing hymns. Rosalie played on her concertina.
Miss Newcombe told the story of Rosalie saving a little girl’s life. The girl was bitten on the leg by a snake, and her father saw Rosalie walking past and called her to help. ‘Rosalie ran and applied a ligature above the bite, and then sucked out the snake poison. Her quick resourcefulness undoubtedly saved the life of the child, who, within a few days was almost completely well again. [As a consequence] the parents sent two sons to the Sunday School.’
I like this little vignette. It demonstrates how God uses people. Rosalie’s response was very practical. The miracle was in God’s timing, that Rosalie was walking by at just the right moment to help. We notice too, the response of faith by the boy’s father. Rosalie’s action inspired the parents to trust so they sent their sons to Sunday school.
The New Zealand Baptist mission wanted a site of their own from which to work. Dacca (Dhaka) was suggested, but Rosalie wanted somewhere smaller, so they chose the sizeable river port of Narayangunj. The Australians and Rosalie asked the committee in NZ to send them more workers as soon as possible.
This reminds us of Jesus’ words in Matthew 9…
36 When Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. 37 Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. 38 Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.”
Rosalie’s sister Lillian offered to come, and soon another woman, Hopestill Pillow, offered as well.
Rosalie started by walking the streets of Narayangunj with a muslin saree over her dress to indicate she wished to identify with the people. Initially she spoke to a few women who were willing to learn to read.
It was tough going, though. Hindus did not mind her Bible teaching but on occasion Muslims asked her, ‘Do you intend to teach that Jesus is the Son of God?’ When she said ‘Yes,’ they said point blank, ‘We don’t want you.’
The men grew noisy and vehement. But Rosalie quietly and bravely held her ground. She said a Bengali hymn or gave out tracts, offered to come into the homes and talk to the women if they invited her. During this tense moment, she asked to be allowed through the crowd and walked away quietly, followed by the children.
Soon she had permission to enter 30 homes weekly where there were about three women in each. Some women listened happily. Some didn’t. Some babies cried too loud for lessons to happen. Some women chattered non-stop. Some asked questions. ‘Why don’t you get married?’ ‘What soap do you use?’ ‘Will you have a smoke?’ ‘What did you eat for breakfast?’ ‘How do you twist your hair up?’ ‘Let us see the colour of your feet.’ ‘How much money does the government pay you?’ [The government didn’t pay her anything of course.]
Sometimes we can romanticise the work of ministry and mission. While good things do happen it does not always feel meaningful. Missionaries are not immune from frustration. It was hard work for Rosalie, especially with the language difficulties, but some women were also interested in the Bible stories. Children loved Rosalie and she loved them and taught them songs that helped them remember her lessons.
We are reminded of Jesus’ parable of the four soils in Mark 4, where Jesus says,
3 “Listen! A farmer went out to sow his seed. 4 As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. 5 Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. 6 But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. 7 Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants, so that they did not bear grain. 8 Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, some multiplying thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times.”
The seed is the gospel of Christ and the soil is the human heart.
Difficulties
Sadly, Miss Newcombe became unwell and in 1889 doctors told her to return to Australia and not to return to Bengal. This was a big blow to Rosalie, who longed for and needed a fellow-worker.
Rosalie’s health had been good but in April 1889 she became unwell and was sent to the cool of the hills, in Darjeeling, for some respite. In June she returned to Narayangunj feeling much better, but was promptly dragged down in health and by July was unwell again.
On top of all this Rosalie was beginning to feel affected by the loneliness. She had been expecting her sister, Lillian, to set out for India but Lillian was given a negative health report and told to stay in New Zealand. Hope deferred.
Remaining in India was becoming more difficult. No land had been bought for the NZ mission base and no decision made. But Narayangunj itself added to Rosalie’s difficulties. Her biographer notes that ‘The sights and sounds appalled her, the smells, the poor hygiene, the lot of women, the plight of the widows, the sad little child-wives, the rudeness and discourtesy of the men, the poverty, the disease, and the godlessness of the English residents, the idolatry… She was never free of it and she had no one to share it with.’
This is the experience of exile.
Still, there were some good things. There was a woman who, in great discouragement, turned to Jesus for help and continued to pray. Another, at the end of Rosalie’s long day visiting homes, who said she believed in Jesus Christ and her husband had concluded the Bible was a true book. Rosalie now had some new converts to nurture.
During 1889 Rosalie worried the NZBMS committee back in New Zealand by refusing to accept a personal salary. They tried to dissuade her, fearing she may no longer obey them if not in their pay.
But Rosalie had prayed about it and was determined. She believed God would bless a simple life of trust. She felt receiving a salary compromised people’s view of her, making them think she was a government agent. And she wanted to free up mission funds to support others.
So instead she lived with a Hindu family and earned her keep by teaching some of them English and other subjects. This would also enable her to understand the culture more.
The apostle Paul took a similar approach. Paul was a tent maker by trade and, at times, he supported himself financially by doing that. Better to give than to receive, I suppose. But Paul didn’t always refuse financial help. There were times when he did have the grace to receive.
The Baptist Assembly in New Zealand made a resolution that they were highly satisfied with Rosalie’s usefulness, her devotion and success but regrets that she does not accept her salary and hopes there may be no cause for divergence between them.
Rosalie wrote and delivered a ‘paper’ at a missionary conference of Baptists in Bengal to the effect that if a missionary was convinced of trying a new method from the others, she should be allowed to move to a branch station and do so.
At this time the NZBMS enlisted the help of Baptist missionaries of Australia and the UK to try to settle on a place for a New Zealand mission site. They chose against Narayangunj (which was prone to flooding), and got Rosalie to move to Comilla, to the south-east.
They then considered Pabna at the request of the Australians, but eventually, with Rosalie’s encouragement, they chose Brahmanbaria. Rosalie was caught up in this stressful indecision.
Rosalie moved to the town of Muradnagar and told schoolboys she would like to meet their mothers. This worked. A Hindu man invited her to stay in a bamboo hut on their family grounds.
It turned out he had given up worshiping idols, forbidding his wife and children to do so as well, and wanted to learn about Christ and God from Miss Macgeorge. Rosalie enjoyed her 10 days there, so many people wanted her to teach them.
About this time Rosalie again became ill. She stayed in her hut and one evening a small boy peered in and saw her pray to her God. When she asked her house owner for some goat’s milk she carefully checked that the woman’s child would not receive less milk because of her. Small things done with great love.
Two new companions and an experienced middle-aged couple arrived from New Zealand to work with Rosalie. Wonderful! Miss Hopestill Pillow worked with her for a while and then went to Faridpur to concentrate on language study. The next was Miss Bacon, also going to Faridpur. This was a relief to Rosalie, who had spent so much time alone.
In January 1891 Rosalie wrote home that she was well and strong again and ready for another year’s work. However, at a routine doctor’s visit, she was told to return to New Zealand immediately. The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.
A dispirited and unhappy Rosalie left East Bengal to go home via Calcutta and Sri Lanka (which was then called Ceylon). Old friends, the Carters, met her in Ceylon, finding her ill with a fever, and immediately arranged a stay inland.
Even though Rosalie was attended by a skilled doctor she passed away six days later on 12 April 1891. She was 31 years old. (Women had still not been given the vote.)
Missionaries and Tamil Christians sang as they carried her to her resting place in the garden town of Kandy. In four and half years of missionary service Rosalie had, with devotion and zeal, forged a pathway for others while winning a number of converts.
Conclusion
But Rosalie’s story doesn’t end there. Many years later a man asked at a nearby mission station to be baptised. The pastor enquired as to how he was converted. He said he was the small boy that Rosalie had been concerned about. At Rosalie’s request, his mother had pledged not to decrease his milk. He had been deeply impressed by this, and by Rosalie’s piety, unselfishness and gentleness. So years later he had searched for and found Rosalie’s Saviour.
In John 12, Jesus says…
24 Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies,it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. 25 Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep itfor eternal life. 26 Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant will be also.My Father will honor the one who serves me.
Not everyone is called to overseas mission, as Rosalie Macgeorge was. Some are called to serve God in the home, others in the work place and others in the local church. Where has God called you to serve Him?
Sources
Summarised from ‘Rosalie Macgeorge—Missionary Pioneer’, by R.J. Mardle, a Paper of New Zealand Baptist Historical Society, published November 1960.
NZ Missions Interlink https://missions.org.nz/about/
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/199041739/rosalie-macgeorge
Questions for discussion or reflection:
What stands out for you in reading this Scripture and/or in listening to the sermon? Why do you think this stood out to you?
- How do you feel hearing/reading Rosalie Macgeorge’s story?
- Indian women in the zenanas were secluded and not able to hear the gospel of Christ. Who do you know who has not heard the gospel?
- Not everyone is called to overseas mission. Some are called to serve God in the home, others in the work place and others in the local church. Where has God called you to serve Him?
- Discuss (or reflect on) Jesus’ parable of the mustard seed in Mark 4:30-32. What small thing can you do with great love?
- Discuss (or reflect on) Jesus’ parable of the four soils in Mark 4:3-8. How does this fit with your experience of being a Christian and sharing the gospel?
- What would you like to be remembered for?
Tawa Baptist 