“They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters; these see the works of the Lord, and His wonders in the deep. For He commandeth, and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof. They mount up to the heaven, they go down again to the depths: their soul is melted because of trouble. They reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at their wit’s end. Then they cry unto the Lord in their trouble, and he bringeth them out of their distresses. He maketh the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still. Then they are glad because they be quiet; so He bringeth them unto their desired haven. Oh that men would praise the Lord for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children of men!”
GOD AT WORK! Adapting to the need
(#12 on stick #45)
Mr. Herb Harris had the vision for the boat, but he didn’t know much about operating or maintaining a boat. He needed help to use the “M.G.M.” so he contacted Doug Howard who knew how to cook and preach. Then he contacted Bert Joyce who knew navigation as an airplane pilot, and he too was a good preacher. George Campbell had worked on a boat in the Bahamas, so he knew “the ropes” and he was a good open-air preacher with a very clear voice. However, he was not on the boat when the journey started in St. John’s. Albert Barbour went with them from St. John’s to Newtown, Bonavista Bay North. That part of the journey was about two weeks. George joined the boat later when they got to Lewisporte and from there on, he was the fourth man of the four men in the crew on the “Missionary Gospel Messenger” during the summer of 1956.
Albert Barbour knew how local harbours were used in the out-ports from his days on schooners and boats before he was saved. There is a certain protocol to follow when you tie your boat up to another man’s wharf. When tied up to a government wharf, there are also rules to follow and those men who live in the outports, follow those things they learned when they were young. For some preachers to be traveling the coast on their own, it was wise to learn from someone who knew the local customs to not only be with them for a while, but to identify four mainlanders as being accepted by some Newfoundlanders and Labradorians. Donald Moffatt also was on the boat for the first day when they travelled from St. John’s to Carbonear. By the time they reached the wharf in Carbonear, he knew he was not cut out for traveling on the water.
After a stop or two in Conception Bay, they went on to some places on the east end of Trinity Bay, stopping at several places until they got to Bonavista Bay North. They stayed a number of days in Newtown where Albert Barbour was born and raised. He was able to preach the Gospel in the open-air from the deck of the boat to people who knew him but hadn’t seen him for fifteen years. During that time the Lord had saved him, so his testimony was of great interest to the people of his home village, including his in-laws. He left the “M.G.M.” there and went by mail boat to Glovertown, where he caught the
“Newfie Bullet,” (slow moving train) back to St. John’s. His interest in the outreach of the Gospel never waned, all the days of his Christian life.
When they left Newtown, the crew of three travelled to Fogo Island and stopped at Seldom-Come-By for a night or two where they had open-air meetings, and waited for favorable weather to get to Lewisporte. Herb Harris was the skipper. Bert Joyce was the man who kept things going on the boat as his role was, pilot/navigator/first mate/engineer. Doug Howard was the cook and he could make good meals on the three- burner stove and small oven. There was no refrigerator so each meal was made from scratch or a can. George Campbell came from Corner Brook and joined the boat at Lewisporte. For the next month or more they travelled through Notre Dame Bay, White Bay, Green Bay and the east side of the northern peninsula having meetings and distributing tracts and Bibles as they went.
A lot of people came to the open-air meetings “down at the wharf,” because it was something new that most people had never seen. The big reel-to-reel tape recorder had a lot of hymns relating to the sea, oceans and ships, and that was very attractive to people in the outports who love music and especially good clear singing. One of those communities where they were for a few days was Twillingate in Notre Dame Bay. After preaching from the deck of the boat to the many people that gathered on the wharf, a man approached the boat and asked if he could come aboard. After he had looked around at the boat, he began to tell them about himself, and told the men a story that has a powerful message.
“I have a hotel here,” he began, “And a number of years ago, my father, who was an ocean-going captain came to live with us in his old age. He had gone to sea when he was young, and was a good captain. He was a wicked man though. He would swear at his men and anything that didn’t go the way he wanted. In later years he wasn’t so bad and when he came with us, he was an old and lonely man.
He had his own suite of rooms in the hotel so he could be by himself or with his friends when he wanted. If he wanted to be with other people, or us, he just had to walk down the hall. One day I was walking down the hall past his room and noticed the door open a bit and he was talking. I stopped for a look in and to my surprise saw my father down on his knees praying. That was very unusual but even more so was, he was praying out loud.
He prayed, ‘O God, my ship is going on the rocks and I can’t get her around.’ Then he stopped for a minute. Again, he prayed, ‘O God, my ship is going on the rocks and I can’t get her around.’
After that he got up and lay down on the bed and turned his face away toward the wall.” When he finished telling the story, one of the men on the “M.G.M.” asked, “Did he get his ship around before he died?” The story teller answered briefly, “I wish I knew.” He was asked, “How about yourself? Where will you go?” Again, he answered, “I wish I knew.”
When life is about over, bold people who have lived a wicked life without God, are aware of death and life beyond death. They may have professed to believe a person dies like a fish for many years, but they become worried toward the end of life, fearing they might be wrong. Those who know the Lord, need to be ready to give an appropriate comment or two which may open the way to a conversation about how a person can be saved. We need to remember that while there is life, there is hope.
It was really impressed on the preachers on the boat, how important the work they were doing was. None of them ever forgot that story, but unfortunately no one ever found out if the hotel man ever came to Christ. It did give a sense of urgency to what they were doing, and it seemed to especially confirm to them, the value of having the “M.G.M.” to travel on and live in, as well as giving them a focal point from which to preach the Gospel. It is really important that a person prepare ahead of time for heaven. When one gets older it is not easy to change one’s thoughts and beliefs. Habits have settled in and become a part of life. If they are bad ones, they bind a person like chains and God alone can change them.
(#11 on stick #45)
When they got to St. Anthony, they met Dr. Gordon Thomas, who was at that time, the head of the Grenfell Mission. He was a believer who was open with his faith and preached the Gospel himself when he had opportunity. Back in the 1950s there were still some churches that were open to the clear Gospel. Dr. Sir Wilfred Grenfell came to northern Newfoundland and Labrador and opened cottage hospitals from the White Bay north on the east side of the northern peninsula and from Port Saunders north on the west side of the peninsula. On the Labrador coast there were quite a number of cottage hospitals all down the coast to the north.
Most of the personnel in the Grenfell Hospitals at that time were Christians who were nursing and working to give medical help to the people, as a work they were doing for the Lord. Dr. Thomas made a good connection with Bert Joyce that lasted until the doctor retired from the Grenfell Association. Later, when the Joyce family moved to Red Bay, he would occasionally take patients to the St. Anthony hospital in his airplane when the mission plane was not available. The hospital also had a boat on which medical personnel would travel and hold special clinics in the isolated communities. One of those boats was the “Albert T. Gould” which later was phased out and bought by George Campbell. He renamed it, the “Northern Light IV.”
From St. Anthony, the brothers on the boat decided to cross the Straits of Belle Isle to the Labrador coast rather then follow on around the tip of the northern peninsula. Dr. Thomas suggested to them that would be a good place to go as it had often been by-passed because of the eleven miles of water between Newfoundland and Labrador. Years before there had been a strong Methodist presence on the Labrador coast and in past generations there were genuine believers in Christ who had been saved when faithful Gospel preaching was in the local churches. There were still some of the older people on that coast who were truly saved and lived for the Lord.
One of them was Mr. Alan Moores in Red Bay. He had helped to build a new church in that community but when the new minister preached in the new church and said that the sin of Adam and Eve wasn’t too bad, he never went back. When the men on the “M.G.M.” preached in the open air at Red Bay, he could hear it from his house, and then came down to listen. He was influential in the community and was able to get them the Orange Lodge to preach in. The place was full the first night, and George Campbell was the first one to speak because he was the youngest. He told his testimony. They were in Red Bay for a while before going on to L’Anse au Loup. Mr. Moores encouraged them to continue to preach the Gospel in Red Bay. He was convinced the Lord had people there to be saved.
As they travelled south along the straits, Bert Joyce was watching through binoculars and noticed there was no church building in L’Anse au Loup. Church services were held in schools in many places at that time. So, they headed in and were able to tie the boat to a wharf and preached from the boat that afternoon. A good number of people came to that first meeting who are still living in that community and some are in the assembly that meets in the Gospel Hall now. Some of the Barney families were at that meeting. Francis Barney was a young boy then. A number of the Linstead families including Cornelia Linstead, and some of the people of the Earle families were at that meeting over sixty years ago and the Lord saved many in that community since that time.
The next place they went on the Labrador coast was Forteau, where they met Miss Mary Taylor who was the nurse at the Grenfell Cottage Hospital in that community. She was a believer who was very happy to hear the Gospel preached. She had been saved in England and had been serving the Lord in that hospital since 1952. Because of her support, interest and influence, people were inclined to listen when the Gospel was preached from the boat. But the weather turned bad, so Mary was able to arrange for a Gospel meeting in the community hall.
Stan and Elsie Trimm who lived at English Point, invited them to have meetings in their house, but because they had been gone for a few months by that time, the two married men wanted to get back to their families who they had been left on their own for several months. The two bachelors, Herb Harris and George Campbell, wanted to stay longer and have nightly meetings, but it was decided to leave and go to Port au Choix that night and on to Corner Brook the next day. There was no question in any of their minds that the Lord had brought that boat to them, and that it was right that they went to the Labrador coast. The seasons had changed and the weather was getting bad, so it was clear to them it was time to go on to Corner Brook.
While they were backing away from the wharf at English Point, one of the blades hit a rock and was bent to the extent there was a lot of vibration. Because of a damaged propeller they were only able to travel using one engine. The boat had two fairly small Perkins engines each with 43 horsepower. On the “M.G.M.” there were two shafts and two propellers, one on each quarter. So, leaving the Labrador coast they didn’t travel very fast on one engine, and before they reached Port au Choix, a storm came and they had to pull away from the shore. They suffered through the night on a very rough sea and could barely make any headway. The next afternoon they were able to get into Cow Head and tied up there for the night. When the weather cleared and the sea calmed down, they finally got to Corner Brook where the boat was put up on the Bowater’s wharf for the winter.
Navigation on the “M.G.M.” was limited to a compass, charts of the coastal areas of the province, and a book called “Newfoundland and Labrador Pilot” that gave information as to the lighthouse signals, the foghorns, and the guidance buoys into each harbour. Then of course, a watch or clock was needed and a ship’s log to determine speed. In one way, it was quite remarkable that Bert Joyce was able to take that first trip without needing any local help into any of the ports. Perhaps part of that was because the “M.G.M.” only drew about three feet of water, and the other most important fact was the Lord was with His servants and guided them all the way.
When they finally reached Corner Brook, they were all very tired but happy men. Before they separated, Doug Howard read the portion of Psalm 107 that is at the beginning of this chapter. Then they all prayed for guidance as to how to continue the work with the boat another year, and what to do about the places they had already visited. Determining God’s will, is one thing, and following up on a lot of open doors is another. When there are many open doors, how do you come to an understanding as to which one the Lord wants you to go through first? Prayer and fasting are not just words, but they are actions that people of faith can take when we are not sure of the path ahead.
It is a wise man or woman who will make time, to “come apart” to seek guidance and understanding from the Lord. Prayer involves being thankful for what God has done and for the burden He lays upon our soul. Fasting is a means whereby we shut out all other issues that have a tendency to sidetrack our minds, so that we can focus our attention on the urgent matters at hand. To deliberately avoid distractions is not easy, so on occasions, one may need to go to a private place with only a Bible, and stay there until there comes clarity regarding the issues before us.
(picture #10 on stick #45)