He Is Here Present
Historical Account★★★★John Marrant, a fourteen-year-old in Colonial Charleston, was converted
through the preaching of George Whitefield, but his family disapproved of his new
faith. John, dispirited, left home with only a small Bible and a little hymnbook in his
pocket. He wandered through the wilderness several days, eating little and sleeping in
trees for fear of beasts.
At length, he was seized by a Cherokee hunter. He asked me how I did live. I said
I was supported by the Lord. He asked me how I slept. I answered that the Lord provided. He
inquired what preserved me from being devoured by wild beasts? I replied, the Lord Jesus kept
me from them. He stood astonished, and said, “You say the Lord Jesus Christ does this, and does
that, and does everything for you; He must be a fine man; where is He?” I replied, “He ts here
present.” To this he made no answer.
Back in the hunter’s village, John was promptly condemned to death. The executioner showed me a basket of turpentine wood stuck full of small skewers. He told me I was to be stripped naked and laid down in the basket, and these sharp pegs were to be stuck into me, then set on fire, and when they burnt to my body, I was to be thrown into the flame, which was to finish my execution.
John immediately burst into prayer, and his pitiful words so moved the executioners they took him to the chief. Opening his little Bible to Isaiah 53, John read: “All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one to his own way; And the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all” Turning here and there in the Bible, John preached the gospel, converting among others the chief himself. For the next two years, the teenager remained among the Cherokees, preaching and teaching
and making disciples.’
The point
A teenage convert of George Whitefield, cast out by his family, faces execution among the Cherokees but boldly preaches Christ from Isaiah 53 and leads the chief himself to faith.