THE CHALLENGE OF LIVINGSTONE TODAY

An Example of Excellence
Dr. David Livingstone is an example of excellence. His life, legacy and literature continue to speak to us today. The challenge of David Livingstone is most relevant to our times.

If Dr. David Livingstone was here today, what would he say to us?
We do not need to guess. We have his writings and published statements available. We can know exactly what David Livingstone would say to us today. It is what he said to the people of his generation:

• "The Salvation of men ought to be the chief desire and aim of every Christian!"
• "All men have the right to hear God's Word. No nation ought to hoard the Gospel like a miser!"
• "Can the love of Christ not carry the missionary where the slave trade carries the trader?"
• "If you have men who will come only if they know there is a good road, I don't want them. I want men who will come even if there is no road at all!"
• "We must be uncommon Christians, i.e. imminently holy and devoted servants of the Most High. Let us seek that selfishness be extirpated, pride banished, unbelief driven from the mind. Every idol dethroned and everything hostile to holiness and opposed to the Divine will crucified; that holiness to the Lord may be engraved on the heart and evermore characterise our whole conduct."
• "We have still a debt of gratitude to Jesus… and there is no greater privilege on earth, than after having our own chains broken off, to go forth and proclaim liberty to the captives, the opening of prison to them that are bound."

A Vision of Victory
Dr. David Livingstone was inspired by an optimistic view of the future. Like most of the missionaries of the 19th century, Livingstone held to the Eschatology of victory:

"Discoveries and inventions are culminative… filling the earth with the glory of the Lord. All nations will sing His glory and bow before Him… our work and its fruit are culminative. We work towards a new state of things. Future missionaries will be rewarded by conversions for every sermon. We are their pioneers and helpers… let them not forget the watchmen of the night, who worked when all was gloom and no evidence of success in the way of conversions cheers our path. They will doubtless have more light than we. But we serve our Master earnestly, and proclaim the same Gospel as they will do."​

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