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Melinda Rankin: First Protestant Missionary to Mexico · Martyrs And Missionaries

0:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Martyr's Emissionaries is a production of Revive Studios.
0:42
[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to the first Martyr's Emissionaries episode of 2026.
0:45
[SPEAKER_00]: And as I always begin these things now, I have to apologize for taking so long between episodes.
0:51
[SPEAKER_00]: I hope that with each new episode, they get closer and closer together, but I have yet to find that a synchrony between my teaching schedule and my podcast schedule.
1:01
[SPEAKER_00]: I hope I have hope, but uh, you know, in the meantime, just bear with me my apologies.
1:07
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you happen to listen to the top five episodes, we do at the end of every year, it's a crossover episode I do with revived thoughts.
1:15
[SPEAKER_00]: If you haven't listened to it, I do recommend it.
1:17
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a lot of fun.
1:18
[SPEAKER_00]: We obviously talk about our top fives for like, you know, the what had the most impact or growth for us and why we personally enjoyed them.
1:26
[SPEAKER_00]: But also there's some church history trivia, which is always fun.
1:30
[SPEAKER_00]: But at the end of that episode, I said, hey, heads up, we're gonna do a French Revolution episode.
1:36
[SPEAKER_00]: And so if you're clicked on this and you said, where's the French Revolution episode, it's in progress.
1:44
[SPEAKER_00]: to make, you know, new episode.
1:47
[SPEAKER_00]: I decided to divert a little bit and go over to Mexico.
1:51
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know if you're like me but I really didn't know an awful lot about missions in Mexico because, you know, Mexico is very heavily Catholic and so I didn't really think a lot about, you know, any Protestant missions that would be there.
2:01
[SPEAKER_00]: But I happen to think about it one day and said, hey, let's go dig around, see what I can find.
2:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And I happen to find this woman named Melinda
2:12
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's very insightful, like this is a period of history that I had really not a lot of knowledge on and I think you'll find it fascinating.
2:22
[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, the French do come into this episode, so if you are really hungering for the French Revolution, maybe this will kind of tie you over or to what your appetite a little bit.
2:42
[SPEAKER_00]: And in 1911, there was a massive revolution that lasted for 12 years and many non-Catholics were killed by the 1950s because of that 98% of Mexico was Catholic and today it's actually 78% with about 11% identifying as some form of evangelical.
3:01
[SPEAKER_00]: But Melinda went in when there was barely a pin prick a Protestant light in the whole country.
3:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is about 18, 48.
3:09
[SPEAKER_00]: I couldn't find the best place to put this quote.
3:12
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a quote that I really loved.
3:13
[SPEAKER_00]: And I really couldn't figure out where to squeeze it in.
3:15
[SPEAKER_00]: So I thought, let's put it at the very beginning, because I really think that it underpins the heart of her ministry quite well.
3:22
[SPEAKER_00]: She said, it has been a fixed principle with me not to attack the religion, but to present the truth, and let that do its work.
3:29
[SPEAKER_00]: To this sentiment which I have found imminently judicious, I am indebted to a man of St. memory.
3:34
[SPEAKER_00]: The late Deacon Charles Stottard of Boston, Massachusetts, upon whom I called in my early labors for Mexico.
3:40
[SPEAKER_00]: After making me a liberal donation for the object I had in hand, he said, in your labours among Romanists, make sure to make no decided demonstrations against their religion.
3:51
[SPEAKER_00]: Only present the truth to them.
3:52
[SPEAKER_00]: If you wish to enlighten the room, you carry a light and set it down in it, and the darkness will disperse of itself.
3:58
[SPEAKER_00]: So with that in mind, let's go ahead and dive in.
4:01
[SPEAKER_00]: I love the way that her book starts because she said that she was called to Mexico despite being a woman.
4:07
[SPEAKER_00]: She didn't want to write this book.
4:09
[SPEAKER_00]: She didn't feel like she had done enough to warrant it, but she hoped that God would bless it.
4:13
[SPEAKER_00]: None the less.
4:14
[SPEAKER_00]: And she said, I baited a due to my new England home in friends and took up my way toward the West, going as far as Kentucky, which at that period 1810 was considered quite a remote region.
4:25
[SPEAKER_00]: It seems like there was a large swath of Roman Catholics that were basically being sent over to these more remote regions attempting to convert them to Catholicism and so Melinda and several others were sent out to counteract that influence.
4:41
[SPEAKER_00]: And I can tell you as someone from Kentucky that I never met anybody with a Catholic background until I was much, much older and I moved away from the state.
4:49
[SPEAKER_00]: And so in a way, I guess it kind of worked because there really aren't a lot of Catholics as far
4:54
[SPEAKER_00]: In Kentucky, but once her work was finished there, she moved down to Mississippi to basically do the same thing, and she loved Mississippi, and she got a little bit too comfortable.
5:06
[SPEAKER_00]: But she started hearing some different information coming out about Texas coming out about Mexico, and she had her heart burdened for Mexico, which at this point had no religious liberty, had no religious freedom, and was quite tumultuous.
5:20
[SPEAKER_00]: There was the whole annexation of Texas, which occurred by
5:23
[SPEAKER_00]: America and we'll get into that a little bit later, but Mexico had no religious liberty which meant it was very much against a law to bring a Bible in to teach anything of the Protestant faith, and Melinda felt it on her heart that somebody needed to go out and minister to them, and Melinda wrote, where there are no hearts to commiserate the helpless condition of those perishing millions of souls under the iron heel of papal power, with its all soul destroying influences,
5:48
[SPEAKER_00]: I could not avoid the impression that an important duty devolved upon Evangelical Christendom to try and do something for the moral elevation of this people who had been so long sitting in the region and shadow of death.
6:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Indeed, I felt that the honor of American Christianity most empirically demanded that some efforts should immediately be made.
6:06
[SPEAKER_00]: So strongly impressed was I buy this, that I wrote several articles for publication, hoping to enlist an interest among the Church's missionary boards.
6:14
[SPEAKER_00]: But my appeals met with no response, and I resolved God helping me to go myself to Mexico, and do what I could for the Enlightenment of her long neglected people.
6:24
[SPEAKER_00]: Although I could not preach the gospel to them, yet I felt that I could in ways adapted to my appropriate sphere, do something for bringing its blessings among them.
6:33
[SPEAKER_00]: I mentioned earlier how Texas had been annexed or basically made a part of the U.S. and about 1845, but Texas itself is very dangerous.
6:44
[SPEAKER_00]: But it is the closest you can get to Mexico, obviously.
6:47
[SPEAKER_00]: And so this is where she needed to go.
6:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Texas is kind of overrun by criminals and bandits.
6:53
[SPEAKER_00]: And so going as a single woman is an incredibly bold and daring
6:57
[SPEAKER_00]: Could meet with some pretty serious mishaps and so she knows this but still she carries on She goes with no job, no prospects.
7:05
[SPEAKER_00]: She's on a ship headed for Texas and she runs into a Gentleman and his niece this Gentleman turns out to be the head of a school which is looking for
7:16
[SPEAKER_00]: teachers, specifically for female teachers.
7:19
[SPEAKER_00]: And so this is kind of her end into Texas.
7:21
[SPEAKER_00]: She's not really near the border of Mexico.
7:23
[SPEAKER_00]: She's more like in the middle, but she loves her job.
7:27
[SPEAKER_00]: And then when she's not been there very long, she gets this horrible long illness, which seems to be yellow fever.
7:33
[SPEAKER_00]: Later, though, for almost a year, thought she was going to die, but obviously she did not.
7:38
[SPEAKER_00]: And a couple of years later, she writes a pamphlet called Texas 1850, which is telling people what's going on in Texas and how they can help and get on board and it just kind of falls on deaf ears.
7:49
[SPEAKER_00]: But she ends up working for the next couple of years on building up these schools and then she feels as though she really needs to get closer to Mexico.
7:58
[SPEAKER_00]: and this was kind of pushed upon her, pushed on her mind set because two years before a Presbyterian missionary had come to the church she attended and said that the Mexicans he met were interested in learning about the Bible and so she was like set a flame a little bit and wanted to go kind of capitalize on this so she moves to Brownsville which is right there at the border so you have the Rio Grande and
8:20
[SPEAKER_00]: And then you have Brownsville, and then across, I believe it's modern mortos, I think, is kind of in that area.
8:26
[SPEAKER_00]: So you're very much, you can basically almost look over into Mexico.
8:30
[SPEAKER_00]: As she's heading there, she hears about a group of Indians who are attacking.
8:36
[SPEAKER_00]: settlers and she thinks she should I turn back.
8:39
[SPEAKER_00]: This seems really dangerous and then she wrote But could I turn back because of the difficulties ahead?
8:45
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought of the trials of Pilgrim from Pilgrim's progress Who met lions in the way and also of the advice given him to keep in the middle of the road and the lions could not harm him Doody did God was my watchward and on his powerful arm.
8:58
[SPEAKER_00]: I trust a protection.
8:59
[SPEAKER_00]: I resolve to go forward
9:01
[SPEAKER_00]: She took a stage coach headed for Bounceville and the driver asked her where she wanted to be dropped off.
9:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And she said, well, just send me to the best hotel in town.
9:09
[SPEAKER_00]: Turns out there isn't a best hotel in town.
9:12
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no hotel in town.
9:14
[SPEAKER_00]: But there is a German lady who occasionally accepts borders.
9:17
[SPEAKER_00]: He toops her off there.
9:19
[SPEAKER_00]: She spends one night and the next morning she heads over to spend a couple days with an American family, but they can't give her permanent board either.
9:26
[SPEAKER_00]: And then she asks around and is eventually forced to rent out two rooms, one for her personal living and the other for the school she was to start.
9:33
[SPEAKER_00]: The night before her school was to open, she had no bed and no way of cooking for herself.
9:38
[SPEAKER_00]: and about an hour before she went to bed, a Mexican lady stopped by to give her a caught, an American lady brought her a pillow, and a German lady said that she would cook all of her meals and bring them to her, which was, I'm sure, a great relief for her.
9:52
[SPEAKER_00]: And the next day, she opens up her school to five students, more were promised,
9:56
[SPEAKER_00]: And she felt that the school would be the most used to people in that moment because she can't go over to Mexico, she can't openly preach the gospel there.
10:04
[SPEAKER_00]: And so if she started a school in Mexico, she would have been shut down and put in prison.
10:08
[SPEAKER_00]: But because many Mexicans that actually chose to stay in Texas, even though it was in U.S. control, she had an easy access to many people who were living there.
10:17
[SPEAKER_00]: And some of her students could read Spanish and some of them learned spoken English.
10:21
[SPEAKER_00]: And her parents really didn't have any qualms about sending them to read from the Bible, because their biggest thing was that they wanted them to learn English and become more Americanized.
10:31
[SPEAKER_00]: She said, although the work might look small to the eye of human reason.
10:34
[SPEAKER_00]: Yet faith bade me hope that it might prove a beginning, and I was satisfied to work on even in this small way.
10:41
[SPEAKER_00]: The parables of our savior afforded me much encouragement, especially those in which he compares the kingdom of heaven to a grain of mustard seed, which, when sewn, is the least of all seeds.
10:51
[SPEAKER_00]: Yet, from its spring-a-tree sufficiently large enough for the fouls of heaven to lodge in its branches.
10:56
[SPEAKER_00]: Especially, she's feeling very secure, but physically, she feels very exposed, because
11:04
[SPEAKER_00]: and they're liable to raid at any moment and then you've got these bandits who she had been repeatedly warned would murder her just for her dress and there were just many anxious weeks that she felt like she couldn't sleep she had to keep you know watch and she eventually says if i get broken into it my house is broken into then i'm gonna head out i'm out of here
11:25
[SPEAKER_00]: But nothing happens, and eventually, even though she's still anxious, she decided that she needed a trust to God with her life and trusted, he would actually keep her safe.
11:35
[SPEAKER_00]: And so, her school prospered, and there was a decisive change in many of the children.
11:40
[SPEAKER_00]: They had had it previously had a problem with stealing, they were no longer stealing, and the children began telling their parents about what they were learning from the Bible.
11:47
[SPEAKER_00]: and so these parents saw these changes for themselves and wanted to talk to Melinda.
11:52
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think this is fascinating because it's a way that God still works today.
11:55
[SPEAKER_00]: I've heard a few stories very recently about parents whose kids go to a Christian school or have some influence of Christians and so they want to understand what their kids are learning.
12:05
[SPEAKER_00]: and so through this, they begin to learn about the gospel for themselves and come to faith or yeah, it's an amazing thing that God uses even still.
12:16
[SPEAKER_00]: So in Melinda's case, one of the mothers of her girls came to Melinda's house and brought a saint.
12:23
[SPEAKER_00]: And she said, she'd pray to the saint for a year, and it had not done a thing for her, and she wanted to trade it for a Bible.
12:28
[SPEAKER_00]: Melinda said, great, I'll give you two, actually.
12:30
[SPEAKER_00]: And this lady said great, I have a friend who's over in Modamoros who once won, and this woman and her daughter would actually go on to be her most efficient helpers in getting Bibles into Mexico.
12:41
[SPEAKER_00]: And she was actually able in this way to get Bibles or portions of Bibles to many of the parents.
12:46
[SPEAKER_00]: But as she writes, they were millions upon the other side of the Rio Grande, who, by the most stringent laws of the government, were shut up and impenetrable darkness.
12:54
[SPEAKER_00]: When I cast my eye over into that pre-spound country,
12:57
[SPEAKER_00]: My heart yearn for its emancipation from the dreadful tyranny of people laws, but upon my distressing thoughts, a light suddenly arose by ascertaining that Bibles were being carried over into that dark land by the Mexicans on the American side of the river.
13:11
[SPEAKER_00]: Although I knew the transfer of Bibles into Mexico to be a direct violation of the laws of the country, and I felt no conscientious scruples in lending them my aid,
13:20
[SPEAKER_00]: Fry felt God's word was to be above all human law, and no earthly power had the right to withhold it from any of God's accountable creatures.
13:28
[SPEAKER_00]: Dozens of Bibles were carried over the river and distributed among the people who gladly received them.
13:33
[SPEAKER_00]: I became convinced that good might be done, even by this slight skirmishing upon the outskirts of the enemies camp.
13:39
[SPEAKER_00]: The missiles that are being sent there were of a character to do powerful execution, and I doubt it not that it would ultimately be seen by them, a central damage had been received in this kingdom of darkness, where Satan had so long rained with undisputed sway.
13:52
[SPEAKER_00]: In the midst of this, there was a bunch of Catholic priests and nuns who came from France to build a church and to teach the people, and she began to despair and thought, how can I keep up?
14:02
[SPEAKER_00]: with this, how can I compare to an official missionary party, and she felt that she needed some kind of competitive building, and it wasn't because the gospel was insufficient, or because she felt that she needed this building to help people to worship, but that people are fickle, and so if they see this beautiful Catholic church across the way, and she doesn't have anything that can even possibly remotely be compared to this, that people would be drawn away because they're superficial.
14:27
[SPEAKER_00]: And so she needed to go to the states and ask for money to build this building.
14:31
[SPEAKER_00]: She said after all, a France could send $4 million after all, they're woes, then why not Protestant Christians in America?
14:37
[SPEAKER_00]: And they do have a lot of woes because you have the French Revolution, you have Napoleon, you've got revolutions of both government and they back to royalty and all this stuff, and still they managed to make it a priority.
14:49
[SPEAKER_00]: So she said Christians surely should be able to do this.
14:52
[SPEAKER_00]: I just seen a few hundred for the Rio Grande.
14:55
[SPEAKER_00]: So, she takes this tiny boat going across the Gulf.
14:58
[SPEAKER_00]: During what I can only assume must be her a keen season, and the storms are so bad that the ship is feared lost as sea.
15:06
[SPEAKER_00]: It takes them two weeks over when they were projected to arrive to come into harbor and they're feared.
15:11
[SPEAKER_00]: All-dad, there's actually reports coming out of a newspaper called The Daily Pick a U in which is a fantastic name for a newspaper.
15:19
[SPEAKER_00]: And so you can imagine the relief when they pull into Harbor and everybody's fine.
15:24
[SPEAKER_00]: But this is one of many arduous and dangerous trips.
15:27
[SPEAKER_00]: She will take back and forth.
15:28
[SPEAKER_00]: So while she's there, she meets with Protestant pastors, and they are not interested at all in building a church on the frontier, work of all-assism held so much sway.
15:36
[SPEAKER_00]: They said it was absurd and a fantasy to entertain such a heuristic hope.
15:41
[SPEAKER_00]: And others were concerned whether she had the fortitude to withstand the difficulties of battling with the foreign paper as they called it.
15:46
[SPEAKER_00]: I rather ironic question because she's actually there doing the work and they are not.
15:51
[SPEAKER_00]: And at one of these meetings, there's a Christian gentleman who most kindly had managed her that the undertaking wasn't entirely incompatible with the character of a lady, and advised her not to expose herself in collecting funds in the manner in which she was pursuing.
16:05
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, you will receive rebuffs and insults which will kill all the finer instincts of the soul.
16:11
[SPEAKER_00]: She leaves this meeting and she is subdued and she values she will never again ask for money.
16:16
[SPEAKER_00]: But there was this house nearby that it expressed interest in talking to her.
16:21
[SPEAKER_00]: There's actually a group of men there who are chatting and so she joins their meeting and she apologizes.
16:26
[SPEAKER_00]: She said, I'm so sorry.
16:27
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm a woman.
16:27
[SPEAKER_00]: I really shouldn't be doing this and there's a man that kind of pulls her aside and says, by no means is it contrary to the most refined delicacy of the female sex to be engaged and works with philanthropy for the elevation of a people in need.
16:40
[SPEAKER_00]: She didn't receive an awful lot of money, but she received spiritual encouragement and letters of recommendation to influential men who would be able to help more.
16:50
[SPEAKER_00]: She goes to the Presbyterian Board of Education in Louisville, Kentucky, gets the same old arguments in one of these men, Dr. Chester, was determined that her endeavors would be an abject failure.
16:59
[SPEAKER_00]: And she grew frustrated.
17:01
[SPEAKER_00]: She stood up and she said, gentlemen, I leave the responsibility of the proper education of the youth of that portion of country upon your hands.
17:09
[SPEAKER_00]: I have done what I can and henceforth my skirts are cleared of the criminal negligence of leaving the beloved youth of the Rio Grande Valley to the baleful influence of foreign
17:18
[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Chester immediately rose to his feet with much emphasis said, I am not going to take the Rio Grande upon my shoulders.
17:25
[SPEAKER_00]: You are the one to bear that burden.
17:26
[SPEAKER_00]: We have fully tested your proper understanding of the difficult enterprise and your ability in carrying it forward.
17:32
[SPEAKER_00]: We are now ready to inquire of your once.
17:34
[SPEAKER_00]: I reply, I must have money.
17:36
[SPEAKER_00]: How much he said?
17:37
[SPEAKER_00]: I felt quite subdued and modestly replied, $2 or $300.
17:42
[SPEAKER_00]: He replied,
17:45
[SPEAKER_00]: If the board of education do not see a proffer to see it give you 200, I will pay it out of my own pocket and the remaining 300, I will put you in the way of obtaining from the Presbyterian churches of the city.
17:56
[SPEAKER_00]: From there she goes on to Boston and collected another 500.
17:58
[SPEAKER_00]: She said, oh, how my heart exalted in the prospect of the Bible having its place and exerting its due influence upon the hearts and minds of the rising generation in that land.
18:08
[SPEAKER_00]: But one of the things she was really fighting against was people's racism towards Mexicans and towards Mexico in general.
18:16
[SPEAKER_00]: She said the sentiment was expressed by many that the Mexicans were a people just fit to be exterminated from the earth.
18:21
[SPEAKER_00]: Even ministers of the gospel said to me, we had better than bullets and gunpowder to Mexico than Bibles.
18:27
[SPEAKER_00]: of such I generally ask the question, what class of persons that are savior come from heaven to save the righteous or the wicked?
18:34
[SPEAKER_00]: Just such a class of sinners as the Mexicans sometimes I would receive donations in this way and they would say we do not care for the Mexicans but seeing you so devoted to their cause will give you something for your sake.
18:46
[SPEAKER_00]: This was what she found most often in the cities, but when she went to the countryside, people were actually much more generous and so she often found herself walking about 8 to 10 miles between these plantations.
18:57
[SPEAKER_00]: But she was so warmly welcome that she really didn't notice the fatigue, it didn't really drain on her at all.
19:02
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, 1854, she happens to find herself in nachasmuses sippy, she's raising funds.
19:07
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a very generous woman she wasn't at home, but her husband was.
19:10
[SPEAKER_00]: And she wrote, he very pleasantly replied, that perhaps he would do as well.
19:14
[SPEAKER_00]: And if I pleased, I might deliver my message to him.
19:16
[SPEAKER_00]: Thus encouraged, I gave a very elaborate delineation of the great need of evangelical laborers in that papal land.
19:22
[SPEAKER_00]: Especially as it was becoming overrun by foreign Roman Catholicism, I was unusually eloquent upon the subject as my listener manifested such a deep interest.
19:32
[SPEAKER_00]: When I concluded he arose went to his desk, took out $20 and handed me saying, I presume you do not know that I am Roman Catholic.
19:39
[SPEAKER_00]: And there were a few feathers dropped out of my cap at that moment, and the most profound mortification took possession of me.
19:45
[SPEAKER_00]: But a smiling face reassured me, and I very neatly said that I did not know he was Catholic.
19:52
[SPEAKER_00]: and all my ancestors Roman Catholic, but I have no preferences for that religion.
19:57
[SPEAKER_00]: My wife is Episcopalian, and I attend her church.
20:00
[SPEAKER_00]: He continued, I am convinced you will do good to those people and have very cheerfully contributed my aid.
20:05
[SPEAKER_00]: We parted the best of friends and I told them that in future, I would take a better look out, less I find more dangerous soundings than what I had found with him.
20:13
[SPEAKER_00]: One of these ladies with whom she found more dangerous soundings, came out of left field because there was a very wealthy woman.
20:19
[SPEAKER_00]: She was known to be very generous, very sweet people, loved her.
20:22
[SPEAKER_00]: She's also a matcha's when Melinda goes to meet her.
20:26
[SPEAKER_00]: She's not an all-generous.
20:27
[SPEAKER_00]: She is a very hateful woman.
20:30
[SPEAKER_00]: She accused Melinda of being an imposter.
20:32
[SPEAKER_00]: one that gives her her letters of recommendation and in this lady said, I don't care about your letters, I think you may be you forged them.
20:39
[SPEAKER_00]: So Melinda is no longer concerned with trying to raise money for the mission.
20:42
[SPEAKER_00]: She's like, I just don't want you to think I'm an imposter.
20:44
[SPEAKER_00]: And this woman told her servant to kick her out and so she would never see her again.
20:49
[SPEAKER_00]: And Melinda leaves the house.
20:51
[SPEAKER_00]: She's humiliated and tears a streaming down her face, but she composed herself for the next house.
20:56
[SPEAKER_00]: And the lady in this next house was really kind and gave her a generous donation.
20:59
[SPEAKER_00]: And at the end of the visit, she said, have you visited my sister?
21:03
[SPEAKER_00]: She's a very benevolent woman, but Melinda didn't have the heart to tell her that this woman had been a monster to her.
21:09
[SPEAKER_00]: And in this case, we get kind of what happened afterwards, story with this lady.
21:15
[SPEAKER_00]: So as Melinda is traveling through the area, she reads a newspaper and turns out there is a railroad accident.
21:21
[SPEAKER_00]: And this woman's body was so broken that she had to live in a shack from which she could not be moved.
21:28
[SPEAKER_00]: Melinda wrote, My heart was moved at the recital of her distress.
21:32
[SPEAKER_00]: I could only put up the prayer that God would comfort her and forgive her, so for so misjudging me.
21:36
[SPEAKER_00]: But I soon passed on from there and never heard of her again.
21:40
[SPEAKER_00]: About 14 months later, she is back in Texas, and she experiences a lot more racism towards Mexicans, and a lot of it comes from her fellow Protestants.
21:51
[SPEAKER_00]: They were just very down on her ministry, and she eventually was just kind of like, I'd rather talk to Catholic priests than meet with Protestants, which is just really sad, right?
22:01
[SPEAKER_00]: But in this time, the seminary is built and all of our former students have returned, as well as several that came from the convents, so while she was gone, it seems like they kind of went over to the convict.
22:11
[SPEAKER_00]: But she gets them all back.
22:13
[SPEAKER_00]: Because, and sadly, not because they were like, oh, we really need to hear more of the gospel.
22:17
[SPEAKER_00]: It was English.
22:19
[SPEAKER_00]: They really wanted the English and the French, obviously, could not provide that.
22:22
[SPEAKER_00]: But she's like, hey, I've got all these students.
22:24
[SPEAKER_00]: let's make it work.
22:26
[SPEAKER_00]: But as the school continued to grow, she needed more help with the work.
22:30
[SPEAKER_00]: She couldn't both distribute bibles and keep teaching anymore.
22:33
[SPEAKER_00]: But no one could be found that could speak Spanish and so nobody was sent.
22:37
[SPEAKER_00]: This is people from her work.
22:38
[SPEAKER_00]: She has a affiliation with the Board of the American and Foreign Christian Union.
22:43
[SPEAKER_00]: And then she said, hey, I can go out and I can distribute these bibles and I can read the people and I can go into homes,
22:54
[SPEAKER_00]: And so they agreed.
22:56
[SPEAKER_00]: And so she spent her time traveling from home to home, giving out Bibles to everybody who could read and only a few turned her away.
23:03
[SPEAKER_00]: But her friends, these wonderful friends she had, convinced her, tried to convince her that they were giving them to the priests to be burned.
23:11
[SPEAKER_00]: I can only think at this point, does she have Job's friends because that really would make a lot of sense.
23:16
[SPEAKER_00]: But she went to the house of one of these students who had been absent
23:23
[SPEAKER_00]: And she said, well, my daughter died of yellow fever, and she loved her Bible so much that we actually buried her with her Bible, and then she has kind of the same story of a father with his son.
23:34
[SPEAKER_00]: He loved his Bible so much that his Bible was buried with him.
23:38
[SPEAKER_00]: And then she was getting even more requests from Mexico for Bibles, requests that were actually sent with the money to pay for them.
23:46
[SPEAKER_00]: And she got to thinking, like, is it some sort of trick?
23:48
[SPEAKER_00]: But no, it wasn't.
23:50
[SPEAKER_00]: They just wanted Bibles because the priest said that they couldn't have them, and they wanted to see what was in it.
23:55
[SPEAKER_00]: And then alongside this, there was a German Protestant portrait painter, which is kind of a tongue twister to say, but he was also a Bible distributor.
24:04
[SPEAKER_00]: So he would use his portrait painting.
24:07
[SPEAKER_00]: to go into Mexico and then be able to kind of distribute Bibles on the side and one day he is killed and nobody really knows if it was because of the Bibles or because he was robbed.
24:18
[SPEAKER_00]: Melinda said nothing more was ever heard of him by his friends.
24:21
[SPEAKER_00]: He was eminently a man of God and we felt assured that like the martyrs Steven he had fallen asleep in Jesus, although a violent death was permitted to be his.
24:30
[SPEAKER_00]: But he's one of these people who help some bringing in kind of settled like the ground, kind of prepare the ground for when they are eventually able to go into Mexico.
24:37
[SPEAKER_00]: But before all this happens, she had written a pamphlet entitled, and I think she had sent it to the states, but it was entitled, I hate Romanism.
24:45
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, this paper had been gotten a hold of by the convict in Brownsville and they spread it around and they showed it to the parents of Melinda's pupils.
24:53
[SPEAKER_00]: And said, she hated Catholics.
24:55
[SPEAKER_00]: Why do you send her student?
24:55
[SPEAKER_00]: You're student to her school.
24:57
[SPEAKER_00]: And this parents were like, she loves our students.
24:59
[SPEAKER_00]: She visits them when they're sick.
25:01
[SPEAKER_00]: And she cares for them when they're at school.
25:03
[SPEAKER_00]: She wrote to a work about what was going on.
25:05
[SPEAKER_00]: And then somebody there got really fired up and decided to publish the letter that she had sent.
25:15
[SPEAKER_00]: Not at all helpful, because once again, the convict gets their hands on it, the whole thing just blows up.
25:20
[SPEAKER_00]: The convict uses her of lying, published as the letter locally, and then spreads it around.
25:25
[SPEAKER_00]: Even friends who had told her they were worried about her building refused to speak up in her defense.
25:30
[SPEAKER_00]: And these Catholic priests went from house to house, talking to each of her students, and more than half of them, uh, some even among her close friends pulled their children out of the school.
25:40
[SPEAKER_00]: And she's in a very dark place.
25:41
[SPEAKER_00]: So I cast myself upon the Lord.
25:43
[SPEAKER_00]: I tried to shelter myself under the shadow of the Almighty.
25:47
[SPEAKER_00]: And she heard a one a that there was a Catholic woman in American who said that the judgment of God must come upon a misrank and an I replied immediately.
25:56
[SPEAKER_00]: I will also submit the matter to the judgment of God.
25:58
[SPEAKER_00]: And if I am guilty of wrong as you represent, let divine judgment fall upon my head.
26:04
[SPEAKER_00]: But if you're a part of your guilty, let the deserve judgment be passed upon it.
26:07
[SPEAKER_00]: One of the biggest instigators of this was the father's superior.
26:12
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't realize that there was a father's superior, I only knew about mother's superior because of the sound of music, but apparently there are also fathers.
26:18
[SPEAKER_00]: And he is the biggest rival and stir up of controversy, but he has to leave on a trip to New Orleans.
26:25
[SPEAKER_00]: But in this absence, he leaves instructions to keep up the pressure.
26:28
[SPEAKER_00]: And once again, it is hurricane season in the Gulf.
26:32
[SPEAKER_00]: all but one man was killed and that one man was not father superior.
26:37
[SPEAKER_00]: The community was so busy mourning the loss of the father superior that they forgot about her entirely and then without within about two months all of her students were back.
27:08
[SPEAKER_00]: And now the year is 1857.
27:10
[SPEAKER_00]: This is a big year for Mexico, and it's kind of a big year or a rough year for Melinda, because it's the fight for religious freedom for Mexico.
27:19
[SPEAKER_00]: Mexico decided they had had enough of the current ruling party.
27:23
[SPEAKER_00]: They wanted to be more free, and so that was an ongoing battle.
27:27
[SPEAKER_00]: that took a couple years to resolve.
27:29
[SPEAKER_00]: And then in that time, she lost her assistant teacher of three years to yellow fever.
27:33
[SPEAKER_00]: The year after that, she comes down with yellow fever herself, she's near death.
27:38
[SPEAKER_00]: And she's this really sweet story about the grandmother of one of her students who had come to care for her.
27:43
[SPEAKER_00]: And this lady was a nurse.
27:44
[SPEAKER_00]: She wrote, after some days of underbitting care, she came to me one morning, saying she had received a call to go in nurse three strangers, who had been stricken with the prevailing fever.
27:53
[SPEAKER_00]: With the offer of $15 a day, as the case was a most urgent one, I said, you will go, will you not, and urge her to do so, as a new their need of money.
28:04
[SPEAKER_00]: She replied, most infatically, I shout out leave you until I know you are past all danger.
28:08
[SPEAKER_00]: to go and take care of others, although they will pay me so much, but she added, I have too much gratitude in my heart for what you have done for me in mind, to take any pay for what I have done for you.
28:19
[SPEAKER_00]: I will not leave you, and nor did she, she'll until she was perfectly satisfied, but I needed her services no longer.
28:26
[SPEAKER_00]: When she has sufficiently recovered and thinks she's going to be able to get back to life as normal, there is an ally.
28:32
[SPEAKER_00]: Other infamous outlaw his name is Cortinas, and he had it out for Americans he felt had wronged him.
28:38
[SPEAKER_00]: One day he told a normal guy, something flipped the switch, Melinda isn't sure what it is, but he has this list.
28:45
[SPEAKER_00]: And as he comes into Brownsville, he begins calling these men out, or women, I'm not sure, but calls them out by name, and then has them killed many of them in front of their families.
28:54
[SPEAKER_00]: He is about 60 odd men with him who take over the city and kept any word from going out about what they were doing, but there is one brave courier who made it out and then sent word to the governor who immediately sent his men in Chase Quartina's off and any comes back reinforced and Melinda felt she had to flee, she had to get away and stay with a Mexican lady who had offered her shelter before.
29:15
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, this lady she was staying with had actually given many of her friends these bibles and these Bible books and so she was excited to see kind of how much impact they had had and so she was very happy to find that actually there was an amassed appreciation for the word and this woman said that if they had known the Bible before, we would have believed it.
29:36
[SPEAKER_00]: and then she also found a whole school of some 30 boys supply with a new testament which they read daily, and the teacher was an elderly Mexican man who had a Bible which he had procured many years before from a British vessel lying in a Mexican port.
29:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Moindest said she visited his school and he expressed great gratitude to me for furnishing him so as to enable him to put a copy of the Blessed Book into the hands of all of his pupils.
29:59
[SPEAKER_00]: He told me it learned from the Bible to cast away his idols in the trust and Christ for salvation.
30:05
[SPEAKER_00]: My friend told me that this man and speedy give me was a custom to call me sister, and I was pleased to reciprocate the Appalachian by recognizing him as a brother and client in Christ.
30:15
[SPEAKER_00]: Finally, by the end of 1859, Christmas Day, good news finally comes to Mexico.
30:21
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a man named Horas and the Liberal Party had entered the capital.
30:26
[SPEAKER_00]: They had been elected.
30:27
[SPEAKER_00]: There was religious freedom now allowed in all of Mexico.
30:32
[SPEAKER_00]: Melinda wrote, was this not a bright era in Mexican history.
30:35
[SPEAKER_00]: The gates of brass were broken in pieces.
30:37
[SPEAKER_00]: The bars of iron were cut a sunder.
30:39
[SPEAKER_00]: and eight millions of souls through off the shackles of popry and emerged into the liberty where with God makes his people free.
30:46
[SPEAKER_00]: The popular demonstrations, the ringing of bells, and the firing of canon by the people generally events their great joy for the precious boon of religious liberty.
30:54
[SPEAKER_00]: As the noise from Madame Modais broke upon my ear, I thought I'd never heard more delightful sounds.
30:59
[SPEAKER_00]: I my heart bounded in joyful anticipation that God's word could now have free course run and be glorified.
31:06
[SPEAKER_00]: Minimarily came over from Modern Morris for Bibles and Tracks saying we can now distribute Protestant books without any hindrance.
31:12
[SPEAKER_00]: We will pay you for all you can let us have, and so I supplied them to the extent of my ability and wrote on to the Bible and Tracks Society for Greater Supply.
31:21
[SPEAKER_00]: When these Protestant preachers and Bible distributors came into Mexico, many of them found the Bible and knowledge of Protestantism had already actually preceded them.
31:30
[SPEAKER_00]: The groundbreaking art even laid, and many of the Mexicans they encountered, either profess faith or wanted to learn more.
31:37
[SPEAKER_00]: But in the midst of this, the Civil War gets underway, the American Civil War, the ports are blocked, and there's trouble for a while getting these Bibles and materials into the country.
31:50
[SPEAKER_00]: But then we have...
31:52
[SPEAKER_00]: French.
31:53
[SPEAKER_00]: This is where they come in.
31:54
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know this, maybe you did, but from 1862 to 1867, France tries to take over Mexico while America is distracted with the Civil War.
32:04
[SPEAKER_00]: In 1862, they take over Mexico City and install a puppet government led by Maximilian of the Austrian Habsburgs who was then declared the Emperor of Mexico.
32:14
[SPEAKER_00]: A very, very strange story.
32:20
[SPEAKER_00]: And actually, it turns out Maximilian doesn't really want to do this, but his wife Carlotta, very devoutly Catholic, says, hey, this is an opportunity.
32:28
[SPEAKER_00]: We need to do this and leave these people back into the faith.
32:32
[SPEAKER_00]: And so by doing this, you are a great man of God, and this is how God will use you.
32:36
[SPEAKER_00]: You can't disagree with that, right?
32:38
[SPEAKER_00]: So he goes and does this thing becomes emperor of Mexico.
32:42
[SPEAKER_00]: But it turns out the people don't really want to be ruled and they don't want to be shoved around with no religious liberty.
32:51
[SPEAKER_00]: And so eventually he makes kind of a compromise with them to give them religious liberty, which makes the pope, especially, really, really upset.
33:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, once the Civil War ends, an American kind of turns her eye back to what is happening in Mexico, the polling of the third decides,
33:06
[SPEAKER_00]: We're gonna leave you here and he just takes his troops move his out.
33:11
[SPEAKER_00]: Please Maximilian, completely alone and his wife Carlotta, I guess she's back in Europe at this point.
33:17
[SPEAKER_00]: So she tries to plebe in the pulling in the third to send his troops back.
33:21
[SPEAKER_00]: He's like, nah.
33:22
[SPEAKER_00]: And then she goes over to the pope and the pope still mad at him because, you know, the whole religious liberty thing.
33:27
[SPEAKER_00]: And by the time she leaves a Vatican, she's actually declared Jews insane.
33:33
[SPEAKER_00]: She lost her mind.
33:34
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't know what happens to her after that.
33:36
[SPEAKER_00]: But
33:37
[SPEAKER_00]: Later on, I think Maximilian tries to get his control back by then taking out the religious liberty.
33:43
[SPEAKER_00]: The people aren't having it eventually.
33:45
[SPEAKER_00]: He is executed.
33:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Now Melinda tells us a story kind of in snippets, social tell like you want to ask about the story and bounce back to what else was going on in this timeline.
33:55
[SPEAKER_00]: So for her personally in 1862, she was commanded to give up her school to the Southern Presbyterians.
34:03
[SPEAKER_00]: These Southern Presbyterians are with Joe Wilson's people and if you know anything about them, they're not great people.
34:08
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, they're very much pro-slavery among other things.
34:11
[SPEAKER_00]: And so she is forced out and takes her stuff and moves to Modern Morris, just in Mexico proper now.
34:18
[SPEAKER_00]: But life kind of becomes too tenuous there due to the Confederacy ties.
34:21
[SPEAKER_00]: So they're allowing the Confederacy to use these ports.
34:25
[SPEAKER_00]: Melinda is obviously from...
34:27
[SPEAKER_00]: the north she's not a confederate and so she's seen as a Yankee unionist and she is not welcome in Maramura so she has to leave.
34:36
[SPEAKER_00]: Now she ends up going into this town called Baghdad which is not in the Middle East but I guess there's a little town in Mexico called Baghdad and this town was under confederate control.
34:48
[SPEAKER_00]: And because of this, they wouldn't allow her to rent in a room because she's a Yankee.
34:54
[SPEAKER_00]: But there is a kindly man, a Canadian, who takes pity on her, and then she's actually trying to get over to New Orleans with her aunts.
35:01
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think a couple of nieces or nephews.
35:03
[SPEAKER_00]: And this man puts them up on his tiny boat.
35:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And the town goes even further and says, we're not even going to feed you.
35:09
[SPEAKER_00]: So this man had to kind of sneak out and get them food and all of that.
35:13
[SPEAKER_00]: And then after a few days of this, there's better accommodations they find with a Northerner who was making money off the Confederates even when a jeopardize his lucrative hustles.
35:21
[SPEAKER_00]: So he lets them stay in the hold of the boat.
35:24
[SPEAKER_00]: And eventually, they're either like this for, I don't remember how many days it was like almost two weeks or something like that.
35:31
[SPEAKER_00]: But eventually they are able to make this trip to New Orleans with about 100 other refugees.
35:35
[SPEAKER_00]: from Texas.
35:37
[SPEAKER_00]: And while she was there, she was not idle as these people never are.
35:39
[SPEAKER_00]: They're always doing something, right?
35:41
[SPEAKER_00]: So she decides to see how the union soldiers are being cared for in the hospitals and finds out it's rather a trotaceous.
35:48
[SPEAKER_00]: And so she decides to go and help these union soldiers.
35:51
[SPEAKER_00]: She, you know, ministers of them.
35:53
[SPEAKER_00]: herself and then also raises money for their care, and then by like the next year, she is helping to establish the first Friedman schools for black Americans.
36:03
[SPEAKER_00]: She met a man there who had been a pastor for about 40 of his 60 years on earth, but he didn't know one letter of the alphabet.
36:09
[SPEAKER_00]: and he told her how he came to the Lord.
36:11
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, when I fought myself sinking down into eternal woe due to my sins, they're appeared one before my eyes who showed me his pierced hands and side and said, all this I suffered that you might be safe from the punishment of your sins.
36:25
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, I fell down at the feet of this loving savior, and he raised me up saying, by sins are forgiven me.
36:31
[SPEAKER_00]: I went to tell others, of this loving Jesus, and I cannot tell you,
36:35
[SPEAKER_00]: of the great numbers who have been brought to feel themselves sinners and made to rejoice in the same forgiving love.
36:42
[SPEAKER_00]: I still tell the wonderful story, and though it was 40 years ago, I first learned up my Savior's love, it is still new.
36:48
[SPEAKER_00]: That's a beautiful story, I really love that one.
36:51
[SPEAKER_00]: By 1864, she returns to Brownsville in the seminary building and about every other building in town has been heavily damaged if not just outright destroyed, and so she has to fix and repair all the cracked bricks and then replace all the windows and all of this.
37:06
[SPEAKER_00]: But while she's there, there's kind of a revival that has taken place or had to take I'm not sure, but at some point there have been a revival in this town.
37:15
[SPEAKER_00]: and she talks this young Irishman who is grateful for the war because it was there that he'd met Christ.
37:20
[SPEAKER_00]: But soon the Confederates would retake the towns so they all had to evacuate once again.
37:24
[SPEAKER_00]: And so she's back in New Orleans.
37:26
[SPEAKER_00]: She's treating at the Friedman's schools and then finally the war ends and she returns.
37:31
[SPEAKER_00]: But now they need a more permanent mission presence in northern Mexico in a place called Monterey.
37:38
[SPEAKER_00]: This is a Catholic stronghold and others wondered if they ought not to set up.
37:42
[SPEAKER_00]: Some were different, where they wouldn't necessarily be in direct competition.
37:45
[SPEAKER_00]: But Melinda said that they might as well attack the strongholds and grapple with the Prince of Darkness on his throne by establishing the truth in the very heart of his domain, but they needed buildings.
37:56
[SPEAKER_00]: And so as she would try to rent out these buildings, the church would eventually find out she was teaching the Bible and there would
38:02
[SPEAKER_00]: basically make it impossible for her to stay, would find some way of kicking her out.
38:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And then eventually she finds one building that she could stay in, but she needs to expand it and they needed a few different buildings.
38:14
[SPEAKER_00]: And so she needs money, so she goes off the states again.
38:18
[SPEAKER_00]: But as is no surprise to you now, this is an easy voyage.
38:21
[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, it's probably one of her most difficult voyages, because Cortina says back, he's that bandit guy who took over Bounceful a couple of years back.
38:30
[SPEAKER_00]: He is making it really, really difficult to get things in and out of Mexico.
38:35
[SPEAKER_00]: He's harassing and harranging.
38:36
[SPEAKER_00]: Always different convoys.
38:38
[SPEAKER_00]: But there was one convoys that made it through.
38:40
[SPEAKER_00]: This was the French convoys.
38:41
[SPEAKER_00]: They were very heavily armed.
38:42
[SPEAKER_00]: They had just successfully returned from America.
38:45
[SPEAKER_00]: And so people felt that they would be safe if they traveled back.
38:48
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I did something honestly kind of foolish, they thought, okay, and they've already made this trip, it's fine.
38:53
[SPEAKER_00]: So they began to load them down with supplies, will supplies and money, which painted even bigger target on their back.
39:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Now Melinda wouldn't have taken this convoy in this, I don't think anyway, I think she was just, I would imagine alarm bells are going off, right?
39:08
[SPEAKER_00]: But also, she was deeply convicted of the French should not be in Mexico and so she didn't
39:16
[SPEAKER_00]: So she finds a passage with an American stage coach who says, hey, I'll help you out.
39:21
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't worry.
39:22
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, they had to be very careful in how they were going to America because they didn't want to be too close to the convoy.
39:27
[SPEAKER_00]: We'll eventually, they decide, let's just go off on a different path.
39:31
[SPEAKER_00]: So they kind of veer off and they land right in the middle of Cortina's camp.
39:36
[SPEAKER_00]: And he is not there.
39:37
[SPEAKER_00]: So they kind of hold them kind of hostage for a little while until Cortina's gets back and he can tell them what to do with them.
39:43
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, Melinda's looking around.
39:45
[SPEAKER_00]: They got a lot of sick people in the camp and she said maybe I can create some goodwill if I help these guys So she takes out some medicines and starts giving it out to the guys then she helps them With some food.
39:57
[SPEAKER_00]: She kind of makes meals for them.
39:58
[SPEAKER_00]: So when Cortina's comes back.
40:00
[SPEAKER_00]: He is hungry.
40:01
[SPEAKER_00]: He gets some food
40:02
[SPEAKER_00]: He looks around kind of sees what she's been doing, but he's preoccupied because they're small potatoes Nobody really cares about them because you've got this French convoy just laden like imagine it just glowing You know just like this.
40:15
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, you know, and so they he doesn't care about them You let some go now the French convoy is not lucky this time.
40:22
[SPEAKER_00]: They end up getting completely just
40:24
[SPEAKER_00]: broken apart everything stolen.
40:27
[SPEAKER_00]: I guess the Cortina's specifically had a problem with Confederate, so he would let Union soldiers go, but not Confederate soldiers and they died.
40:36
[SPEAKER_00]: And then he turns around, has the convoy turn around and sent back to Mexico, empty, bereft of supplies and bereft of certain men.
40:43
[SPEAKER_00]: And yeah, Melinda's very glad she didn't end up taking that convoy.
40:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Now she's back in New York, it's 1865, and she needs to raise $10 to $15,000 for these buildings.
40:55
[SPEAKER_00]: Her board thinks that's too much, and so says, hey, it's great, no, but go ahead and raise it independently.
41:02
[SPEAKER_00]: She tells them this is a fair price, but goes ahead and raises it.
41:05
[SPEAKER_00]: She gets the money for her building.
41:07
[SPEAKER_00]: It's gets them remodeled.
41:08
[SPEAKER_00]: There are many converts that come.
41:10
[SPEAKER_00]: because they're able to kind of house more people, host more people, teach more people, et cetera.
41:15
[SPEAKER_00]: And some of these men become quite well versed in the scripture and evangelizing, and so she wants to take four of her best men and then send them out full time to evangelize.
41:24
[SPEAKER_00]: But she needed money to help keep their families fed.
41:27
[SPEAKER_00]: They weren't getting paid for the gospel, but they were farmers and so their families needed money while they were gone.
41:33
[SPEAKER_00]: and they decided about $30 a month per man would be fair.
41:36
[SPEAKER_00]: And so she has to go back to New York to get money from the board, permission from the board.
41:42
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, the board says they don't have any money for that.
41:44
[SPEAKER_00]: It's all been promised to other fields, but it's a good idea.
41:48
[SPEAKER_00]: She should totally independently raise these funds.
41:52
[SPEAKER_00]: I, you gotta ask, what is the point of this work?
41:55
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, they're not helpful like at all, like ever, but she carries on.
41:59
[SPEAKER_00]: She decides not to go to church's proper.
42:01
[SPEAKER_00]: As many of them had already given to the missions of work and so they were kind of like off the table.
42:07
[SPEAKER_00]: So she goes to the lady's groups.
42:09
[SPEAKER_00]: And these ladies,
42:10
[SPEAKER_00]: wanted to give Anna Bond and say, love to us she was doing.
42:14
[SPEAKER_00]: They felt the heart of her mission.
42:15
[SPEAKER_00]: And so she had so much money raised from these ladies that she was actually able to outfit several different teams of two and send them out for a month at a time.
42:25
[SPEAKER_00]: After a year, they had traveled from house to house, from ranch to ranch, a hundred miles and every direction around Monterey.
42:32
[SPEAKER_00]: And Melinda said that there were many brought into the kingdom by these faithful men.
42:36
[SPEAKER_00]: the mission continued to grow and they actually branched into a region some 400 miles away expecting that nothing would be there will turns out that there have been harvest that have been prepared by an American man who had labored there for a number of years and so soon they had a church of 170 members which was built actually by Mexicans themselves not by foreign workers which is even more incredible.
42:59
[SPEAKER_00]: Then on top of that, this is, remember, this is in the heart kind of a Catholic stronghold, but there are just so many reports that are coming out of Monterey.
43:07
[SPEAKER_00]: One of these reports will end up wrote, all ages and conditions alike are influenced by the transforming power of the gospel.
43:14
[SPEAKER_00]: A man who had been a terror to the country around by his savage conduct had been so changed that he has the spirit of a lamb.
43:21
[SPEAKER_00]: His wife would often been obliged to hide herself to escape
43:26
[SPEAKER_00]: who had become a convert to the truth to whom she related the brutal treatment she frequently received from her husband.
43:32
[SPEAKER_00]: This girl told her of the religion which the Bible taught, in which husbands were commanded to love their wives and not be bitter against them.
43:39
[SPEAKER_00]: The unfortunate woman was forcibly struck by the blessedness of such a religion and begged the girl to get the book which contained it.
43:46
[SPEAKER_00]: that she might be able to help her husband to read it.
43:49
[SPEAKER_00]: And the girl didn't have a Bible herself but kind of put her in contact with some people who did.
43:54
[SPEAKER_00]: There was a lady who was a Christian who was then urged to come and read the Bible to her husband.
44:00
[SPEAKER_00]: And Melinda said that the man listened with attention to this first knowledge that ever received from God's Word.
44:05
[SPEAKER_00]: He became deeply interested and after a banning once and after another, he became an entirely changed man in hearts and conduct.
44:12
[SPEAKER_00]: And as soon as his mind began to be enlightened, he toured on his images with which his house abandoned and he threw them away, his own language to one of our evangelists soon after his great change was, we have been taught to worship devil instead of God.
44:26
[SPEAKER_00]: The Church of Rome is as different from the Church of Christ as hell is from heaven.
44:30
[SPEAKER_00]: How beautiful is the religion of Christ.
44:33
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, his wife also rejoices in the truth, and it has been three months since his conversion, and he seems to be growing more and more sensible of the great sinfulness of his past life, and the great obligation he is under to God for snatching him as a brand from the burning.
44:46
[SPEAKER_00]: And if furthermore, there were two men who threatened to shoot the evangelists that they came there with their bibles, and these men are now sitting at the feet of Jesus in their right minds.
44:55
[SPEAKER_00]: That Mexico was right for the gospel, and that God is wonderfully raising up these native
45:01
[SPEAKER_00]: is equally evidence.
45:03
[SPEAKER_00]: By around 1869 there are six churches and eight schools in this region and have an evangelist about a hundred miles away where no known Christians or missionaries had existed found these 12 believers in these men had come across a tract and a Bible and the tract showed the errors of Catholicism and they tested it against the Bible.
45:21
[SPEAKER_00]: and not being under the oversight of a priest decided to break away from the Catholic faith.
45:27
[SPEAKER_00]: A little church was soon set up there, and this church proved to be as Melinda put it, one of their staunches churches.
45:33
[SPEAKER_00]: And then she relates this story about that, that had this virgin Mary statue at the kind of the beginning of town, kind of as you walked in, and one day, right before a giant saint's day, this statue had been knocked over and was destroyed.
45:50
[SPEAKER_00]: They were supposed to protect the Protestants because the Protestants had basically come under persecution.
45:55
[SPEAKER_00]: There were death threats.
45:56
[SPEAKER_00]: There was vandalism.
45:57
[SPEAKER_00]: It got so bad that Melinda was thinking she would have to flee the country.
46:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Friends were watching her house.
46:03
[SPEAKER_00]: There was possible gunpowder shoved into the drains under the buildings.
46:07
[SPEAKER_00]: The local police were completely worthless.
46:08
[SPEAKER_00]: They actually would keep closing their eyes, physically closing their eyes.
46:12
[SPEAKER_00]: So they wouldn't see what was going on, which is kind of crazy to think about.
46:15
[SPEAKER_00]: So she goes to the mayor and he promises protection, but it's kind of worthless, right?
46:21
[SPEAKER_00]: So then she goes to and writes a district official, there's a slow response because there is a revolution which talk about in just a second.
46:29
[SPEAKER_00]: But when he finally writes back several weeks later, he promises support.
46:33
[SPEAKER_00]: Well then she decides to write to the governor and just basically write everybody, let them know what's going on.
46:39
[SPEAKER_00]: the governor finally deals with it.
46:41
[SPEAKER_00]: What it seems like happened is that the priests destroyed this statue themselves.
46:46
[SPEAKER_00]: So a few weeks before maybe a few months before they had been visited by some of their higher ups.
46:51
[SPEAKER_00]: And these higher ups were mad at the priests because they had allowed a Protestantism to gain too strong of a foothold
46:58
[SPEAKER_00]: in the region.
46:58
[SPEAKER_00]: They said, hey, if you don't get it under control, put a stop to it, we will fire you when we come back around.
47:04
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I guess their idea of dealing with it was trying to harass them into leaving.
47:09
[SPEAKER_00]: Doesn't work?
47:10
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't know what happens these guys later, but it doesn't work.
47:13
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, a couple of years later, it's 1871, Mexico is in the throes of a massive revolution, and this is, we've had enough of these stories, right?
47:23
[SPEAKER_00]: You kind of know that where growth is, where the gospel is spreading, there's generally some kind of especially political upheaval to other things that happens to kind of try to slow that down.
47:33
[SPEAKER_00]: So many people were convinced of the current president Horas that he was not a great guy, and so he'd been in power for like 14 years or something like that.
47:42
[SPEAKER_00]: And they needed a new president to oppose him and so revolution.
47:46
[SPEAKER_00]: And there were soldiers that came into her town.
47:49
[SPEAKER_00]: These are revolutionaries.
47:50
[SPEAKER_00]: They are bad guys.
47:51
[SPEAKER_00]: They were killing people in the streets.
47:54
[SPEAKER_00]: They took her friend pressed him into service or something or killed him.
47:58
[SPEAKER_00]: I think just pressed into service.
47:59
[SPEAKER_00]: But it's kind of unclear.
48:00
[SPEAKER_00]: We kind of break into her house.
48:02
[SPEAKER_00]: And she has these two young boys with her that she is kind of hit away in case harm came to them.
48:07
[SPEAKER_00]: She's trying to figure out how to calm them down because they were.
48:09
[SPEAKER_00]: really upset.
48:11
[SPEAKER_00]: She doesn't really have bars on her on her doors and so they could definitely break in if they really really worked at it.
48:18
[SPEAKER_00]: So she said, let me go ahead and try to maybe feed them maybe they'll feel better if I get from food and so she kind of gives them food through the bars of her window while they're thirsty.
48:27
[SPEAKER_00]: so she goes and gets them some water.
48:29
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, she tries to pass a glass through the bars and the glass kind of breaks and shatters and she's thinking, what do I do?
48:35
[SPEAKER_00]: How do I give them water without opening up the door?
48:38
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I open the door like who knows what's going to happen?
48:41
[SPEAKER_00]: But one of the men says, hey, just kind of pour the water through the bars and they just kind of baby birded for a while to turn, basically having water poured into their mouths and they felt better, they moved on, she was okay.
48:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, the next day, she said, we've got to kind of get over to safer accommodations, so she takes at least one of the boys the other one, I think she kind of left with the house to kind of watch over it.
49:02
[SPEAKER_00]: for a little while and she's going to move across the street while the street is littered with dead bodies which should try to escape.
49:10
[SPEAKER_00]: So as she's running across the road, they just just revolutionised her kind of coming and they seem to fire at her a few times and she just narrowly escapes into her friend's house.
49:19
[SPEAKER_00]: Finally, Order is restored both the town and to Mexico.
49:23
[SPEAKER_00]: Mexico got a better president.
49:25
[SPEAKER_00]: They felt represented them more fully.
49:28
[SPEAKER_00]: And so everything was okay.
49:31
[SPEAKER_00]: And life can continue to don for a little while as normal.
49:34
[SPEAKER_00]: But then Melinda's health just kind of continued to fail.
49:38
[SPEAKER_00]: And I have really taught much about it.
49:39
[SPEAKER_00]: But she really doesn't either actually.
49:42
[SPEAKER_00]: But it turns out that it seems like the very first illness that she got when she arrived in Texas had basically taken its toll on her.
49:49
[SPEAKER_00]: And then it kind of began to compound it with stress with other illnesses.
49:53
[SPEAKER_00]: And so she had wanted previously to labor and die on the field.
49:57
[SPEAKER_00]: She said, it had been the long cherished desire of my heart that I might make my last resting place with the Mexican people.
50:03
[SPEAKER_00]: And with them rise in the morning of the resurrection as a testimony that she had desired their salvation.
50:09
[SPEAKER_00]: But she had kind of changed her mind on this, and not because she didn't want to be buried.
50:14
[SPEAKER_00]: in Mexico, but because she thought the health of the mission was more important than our personal needs, and so she thought it would be better if the mission just passed into healthier hands, and also it had grown so much that they actually needed more ordained ministers to actually carry on the work beyond what she could do, and she wrestled with this desire to stay, what God wanted, what was best with the mission, but she did decide it is best if I just give it up.
50:39
[SPEAKER_00]: She said, I felt thankful that God had given me health and strength to labor for Mexico when no others would condescend to notice such a hopeless field.
50:47
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought of the times I had turned and wept because no one appeared to care for these souls, but now evangelical Christians with one heart and one mind.
50:55
[SPEAKER_00]: Say by their actions, we will take Mexico for Christ.
50:58
[SPEAKER_00]: What a happy contrast.
51:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Missionaries of all Protestant denominations are hastening to spread the gospel among these long neglected people.
51:06
[SPEAKER_00]: She travels back to New York to go to her missions or to enter resign and they try to talk her into staying.
51:12
[SPEAKER_00]: They're like, hey, we don't have anybody else we can send.
51:14
[SPEAKER_00]: Do what you can, but like, please stay.
51:17
[SPEAKER_00]: And so now she has to pray again and kind of wait for things to develop.
51:22
[SPEAKER_00]: And so she goes on raising funds for the mission and then waiting.
51:26
[SPEAKER_00]: and then she gets called and again turns out her work actually wants to transfer her mission to the American board because her board was basically being forced to relinquish all of their foreign fields as other denominations were withdrawing their support not really sure what happened there but if Melinda's anything to go by it's not terribly surprising that other people got kind of fed up with them as well.
51:49
[SPEAKER_00]: but they ask her to meet with the American board and she lays out the mission before them told them of its history.
51:55
[SPEAKER_00]: It's needs operating costs, etc.
51:57
[SPEAKER_00]: But then she said, although I had full confidence in the American board, yet when I actually came to surrender my dearly cherished treasure, the fruit of more than a score of years of weeping and bearing precious seed.
52:09
[SPEAKER_00]: My heart again shrink and I exclaimed, how can I give it up?
52:12
[SPEAKER_00]: And I left the rooms of the bore without being able to say, I relinquished the mission into your hands, and I retired to my dwelling passing the night and meditating upon the duty, which I felt lay before me.
52:23
[SPEAKER_00]: And about the fourth watch of the night, appeared one who in other scenes of trial had come, walking upon the sea of trouble, and calling it my anxious heart.
52:31
[SPEAKER_00]: By faith I realized that the sympathy of my divine master and the comforting assurance of the mission was his and that he would take care of all its precious interests.
52:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Indeed, I was made conscious that it was even dear to him than to myself and the next morning I returned to the rooms and with the full consent of my heart gave the mission and all its interests into the hands of the American board.
52:53
[SPEAKER_00]: About two or three years have passed since when this event happened in the Winshi Rotor Book.
52:59
[SPEAKER_00]: And they had already in that time assumed full responsibility, relieved her of the need to raise funds and had sent four missionaries with more kind of on the way.
53:08
[SPEAKER_00]: And then Melinda's semi-retired to Illinois, but then continued traveling around the country writing her autobiography, meeting with women's societies and missionary gatherings, a no doubt contained to raise support and awareness for the needs of Mexico.
53:22
[SPEAKER_00]: And she passed away in 1888 at the age of 77, and I'll end her story where she does.
53:29
[SPEAKER_00]: If there is one nation of people more than any other with whom I shall delight to join and sing the song of redeeming love, in the day when that great multitude which no man can number stands before the throne of God, I am sure it will be with the Mexican nation.
53:44
[SPEAKER_00]: If you enjoyed this episode, please head over to Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever you've listened and let us know.
53:50
[SPEAKER_00]: And as always, thank you for listening to Martyr's Emissionaries, I'm Elise.