The Life of Andrew Murray of South Africa Chapter XXIII. Death, Funeral and Tributes
Believe me, a life
lived in earnest does not die; it goes on for ever. —Edward Thring.
Praise to the Holiest in the height,
And in the depth be praise:
In all His words most wonderful;
Most sure in all His ways.
J. H. Newman.
THE story of the last months of Andrew Murray’s earthly course can
he told in few words. During the August of 1916 he contracted the
heavy cold with concomitant bronchitis, from which he never
recovered. On the 16th September a grievous loss befell the family
at Clairvaux, and the nearer circle at Graaff-Reinet, in the death
of the eldest son, Lieut. A. Haldane Murray, in an action fought in
East Africa. For some weeks the evil news was kept from the aged
father, and when at length the tidings were communicated he bore
them with Christian resignation and fortitude. But there can be no
doubt that the passing of this beloved son cast a burden of grief
upon Mr. Murray’s heart, and served to hasten the inevitable end.
Towards the close of October, however, he seemed to regain a little
of his lost strength, and was able to take a short drive by
motor-car. Arrangements were then made for his removal to Kalk Bay,
his favourite seaside resort, where the month of November was spent.
But recovery was a slow process, and it was greatly retarded by the
exceptional heat of that summer. When Mr. Murray returned to
Wellington he was heard lamenting that he was still unable to resume
his writing. The oppressive heat of Wellington was doubly trying
after the fresh breezes of Kalk Bay, and it soon became evident that
his strength was sagging. A brief paragraph in the Kerkbode of nth
January, 1917, gave these details:—
The following communication has reached us concerning that old and
revered servant of God, Dr. A. Murray. He continues weak, though his
heart is still fairly strong, and he is generally up each day. The
great heat affects him unfavourably. His mind is not always
perfectly clear, and in his wanderings he appears to be always
occupied with his fellow-ministers, asking them repeatedly to give
themselves to more prayer. Talking in a lucid interval of the past
year, he said that it was full of answers to prayer, and of grace
vouchsafed for days of need and trial, but on the other hand it
testified to a wealth of unappropriated grace which we had not
obtained because of our lack of prayer. He dwells frequently upon
the necessity of taking more time to contemplate the wonderful love
and grace of God, of which we have so feeble a conception. The
condition of our people weighs heavily upon him, and impelled him to
cry one night, "Pray, pray, pray, that our people may be strong in
righteousness." On another occasion he said, “We are perishing
through selfishness. What we need is men who will really sacrifice
themselves for the cause of education, and wifi so devote themselves
to the poor that the problem of the ‘ poor whites ’ will be solved."
It was plain that the end could not be far off. At one time the
invalid imagined that he was in a steamer voyaging over stormy seas,
for he turned to one of his daughters and said, “ The wind is
blowing a gale and the tempest is raging: I think you must ask the
captain to put into the nearest port.” His voyage had been a long
one, and not free from heavy storms; but he was nearing the harbour,
and quiet water lay ahead. He entered into rest on Thursday evening,
the 18th January, 1917. Of him who during his life was pre-eminently
a man of prayer it may be truly said that he died praying. In his
last moments, so we are informed, he fell to praying, magnifying the
Lord’s goodness and glory and grace, and rejoicing aloud in the God
of his salvation. The current of spiritual life, which had flowed
out in prayer during all his earthly days, set in the same direction
still when his faculties were overclouded at the approach of death.
At the very last, when the members of the family were grouped around
the bedside in silent expectation of the end, they observed his
forehead contracting—as was customary with him when he closed his
eyes to pray—and waited for the words of praise or intercession
which should issue from his trembling lips. But the voice was silent
for ever. The contraction of the forehead was his last perceptible
movement. He was gone—praying!
The following details of the funeral obsequies, which took place on
Saturday, 20th January, is taken from the columns of the daily
press. The last honours were paid to the memory of the saintly Dr.
Andrew Murray amid many manifestations of the sorrow of the people
in whose midst he had lived and laboured for more than forty-five
years. Shops and places of business were closed, and all Wellington
assembled in the great church of the Dutch Reformed community to
testify to their veneration for the man of God whose praise was in
all the Churches of Christendom. The members of the family and their
intimate friends gathered first at Clairvaux, the home of the
deceased, where the Rev. Andrew McGregor, an old and valued
colleague and friend, offered prayer. Shortly after four o’clock the
cortege left for the church, where a silent and sorrowful multitude
sat waiting. The service was conducted by Rev. D. G. Malan, the
local pastor, who led in prayer ; Prof. P. J. G. de Vos, who
delivered the funeral address; Rev. J. R. Albertyn, who described
the work and influence of the deceased as Church leader ; and Rev.
D. S. Botha, who offered the closing prayer. The ceremony at the
graveside was performed by Rev. C. H. Radloff. The burial took place
in the churchyard surrounding the Dutch Reformed church, the grave
being immediately to the right of the main entrance. During the
service the coffin rested upon supports in front of the pulpit; and
as the bearers entered and left the building the organist rendered
the Lachrymosa from the Requiem, and the Dead March from Saul. The
impressive proceedings were attended by some sixty ministers of the
Dutch Reformed Church as well as by prominent citizens from many
surrounding towns, and telegrams of condolence were received from
all parts of the country, and from the highest officials of the
land. The Archbishop of Cape Town sent a special message of
sympathy, expressing, in the name of the Church of the Province of
South Africa, his sorrow at the death of Dr. Murray, and his
profound thankfulness for the life and work of one who had approved
himself as so true and faithful a servant of God.
Andrew Murray's death was the signal for a spontaneous outburst of
gratitude and affection, and tributes both public and private to his
great life-work and exalted Christian character flowed from men of
all classes and in all departments of life. Only a few extracts are
possible from the large number of appreciations which were received
by letter or appeared in the public press. The Hon. John X.
Merriman, P.C., the Nestor of Cape politicians, wrote :—
I am afraid that I am in no sense either competent or worthy to
write an appreciation of that man of God, Andrew Murray. How far was
he removed in thought and feeling from us worldlings, especially
from the political variety. He belonged to another world from onrs.
'For him “the vision splendid” had never died away, or faded into
the light of common day.
If ever there was a dweller in the household of faith, it was Andrew
Murray. Born and nurtured in that grim faith which makes men strong
rather than lovable, nothing could dry up that fountain of love
which was the very soul of Andrew Murray’s being. It was given to
him, a Calvinist, to write books of devotion that met with the
highest commendation at the hands of the most High Church Anglican
Bishops —books which have been a source of consolation and comfort
to many weary souls in travail, in many lands and of many creeds. .
. .
My own personal intercourse with him was small and infrequent. I
admired and respected from afar. But on those occasions when we were
brought into contact, and still more on those when he honoured me
with his correspondence, it was one of my highest rewards to feel
that I had the approval of that good man. He is gone, and his
departure severs a link with the past. Well for us all would it be
if we could bury in his grave that racial bitterness and social
discord against which his whole life was a protest. That would be a
tribute to his memory worthy of the man and of his spotless and
self-denying career.
After the politician we may let the journalist speak. The editor of
the Cape Times said:—
Dr. Murray had a severe illness a few months ago which, especially
at so advanced an age, only a man of quite extraordinary vitality
could have survived. As it was, he pulled through, and came back
from the Valley of the Shadow with all his faculties unimpaired,1
and with the same cheerful serenity and wide sweep of intellectual
and social interest which distinguished him throughout his long and
selfless life. At the end the summons to the venerable old man seems
to have been sudden, but it was a summons for which, however and
whenever it came, no mortal was ever better prepared. Deeply versed
in theology, a pillar of the Dutch Reformed Church for more than
half a century, a most impressive preacher, a powerful apostle of
missions, a sane and liberal educationist, a friend of science—for
“are not the thoughts of science God’s thoughts?" as he once said in
opening the chemical laboratory at the Wellington College—an
unostentatious helper in all good works,—there was something more
than all these things in Andrew Murray which lifted him above all
eminent South Africans of his day and generation, something which is
perhaps most significantly summed up by saying that if ever there
was a saint on South African earth, it was he. For ourselves, in the
little we were privileged to come in contact with him, he seemed
more than any ecclesiastic we ever met to radiate a justification
for Ruskin’s hope of “ a Christian Church which shall depend neither
on ignorance for its continuance nor on controversy for its
progress, but shall reign at once in light and love.”
Men of other creeds and denominations were not backward in the
expression of their reverence for the character and teachings of the
departed father. The Rev. Dr. Kolbe, of St. Mary’s Roman Catholic
Cathedral, in the course of a noble tribute in The Cape, said:—
The name of Andrew Murray is graven with an iron pen and lead on the
rock of South African history, and there it will stand for ever. But
it is also written in softer characters on the hearts of many, and
in that gentler form of survival it will endure far beyond the
ordinary lot of human names. I have known only one unkind word ever
said of him, and that was (strange to say) in the Synod of his own
Church. He had written a piece of advice (never mind what: it was
his, and it was wise), and one member, not liking it, said that Dr.
Murray was growing old. Old ! Of course he was, but with an age more
full of honour than of years, and more full of wisdom than of honour.
I wonder the whole Synod did not rise and cry shame : perhaps it
did, but the fact was not recorded. No: age brings no mental or
spiritual loss to such a man. A man who in public or in private
consistently follows the highest ideals
never weakens at the end : bodily ailments he will have, which do
but draw our hearts to him, but his soul will always burn clear.
"The path of the just is as a shining light, that shineth more and
more unto the perfect day.” . . .
When I came back from Europe, of course, he did not like my change
to Catholicism; but I went to him, and we both spoke frankly. There
was no quarrel. There was no bitterness in Andrew Murray : his
nature was sweet to the core. And as I brought to him all the old
affectionate reverence and gratitude, there could be no strife. They
say it takes two to make a quarrel: here there wasn’t one. Of
course, our paths lay apart. I could not in any way, however humbly,
join my activities to his—such separations are among the sacrifices
of life; but it has always been a gladness to me that no cloud ever
arose between us. He is gone now, and I do not think I am saying
anything derogatory to the present generation if I say he has not
left his equal behind. . . .
Andrew Murray lived his full time and more. He is an ideal instance
of Aristotle’s famous definition of happiness : ’’The fullest
exercise of our highest energies in a congenial medium to the
proportioned end.” He had no more to give us: we had no more to give
him. There was no mid-autumn spoiling of the crop: but the whole
matured harvest fully gathered in without shortcoming and without
loss. And what a harvest!
From a just and generous appreciation by the editor of De Kerkbode
(Rev. G. S. Malan) we select the following attempt to delineate some
traits in Andrew Murray’s manysided character:—
In summing up the chief characteristics of the image of goodness
which he presented we think first of all of the passionate
earnestness which filled his soul. This impressed every one—those
most of all who came into closest contact with him. At all times,
and in everything he did, there glowed the fire of this deep
earnestness. His calling and responsibility—both as a Christian in
private life and as a servant of God in the interests of the
Kingdom—were to him matters of the holiest moment, which he strove
to perform with all the strength of his being. He seemed to live
continually, though unconsciously, under the constraint of the
searching words of the Preacher: "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do,
do it with thy might; for there is no device nor work nor knowledge
nor wisdom in the grave whither thou goest.” His was an earnestness
which half affrighted and half repelled ; but all who knew the
tender soul and humble heart that beat within him, were speedily
arrested and overcome by it.
A second trait which characterized him was his lofty nobility of
character. Who ever discovered anything low or mean or ignoble in
his conduct ? Who ever heard him mingle in the idle talk that gloats
over the faults and defects and sins of another ? Who did not feel
instinctively in his presence that he had to do with one who led an
exalted life, was occupied with exalted matters, cherished exalted
ideals, and exercised an elevating influence? His life exemplified,
in a greater degree than any other we have known, the apostolic
precept: "Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest,
whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever
things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there be
any virtue and if there he any praise, think on these things." In
this connexion we call to mind his courtesy—that kindly and cultured
bearing towards all, even his inferiors, which proclaimed him the
perfect Christian gentleman; his humility—which led him to treat
with innate respect the person and the opinions of another, and
withheld him, in spite of his pre-eminent gifts, from exercising the
temper of a tyrant; his unselfishness—by virtue of which he spent
himself, silently and uncomplainingly, in acts of selfsacrifice for
others ; his love—always ready to see what was best in others,
bearing all things, believing all things, hoping all things,
enduring all things. We remember, too, his sincerity, his fidelity,
his perfect rectitude—which dispelled every doubt that his word
could be implicitly relied on, or that he would fulfil his duty at
all hazards ; and which made it impossible that he could ever
over-reach another or inflict on any man a malicious wound. His
courageous faithfulness to the truth and to his own conscientious
convictions procured him many adversaries, but never, to our
knowledge, did he make a single personal enemy through any lack of
Christian courtesy.
Another trait of character may be mentioned—his absolute devotion to
his calling and his work. He had laid himself upon God’s altar,
body, soul, and spirit, with all his gifts and talents, with all his
time and strength and possessions. He had no worldly by-ends : he
knew no personal ambition. Everything was placed at the service of
his Saviour. He was always and everywhere, first and foremost, a
minister of the Gospel, who had consecrated himself wholly to this
high calling, and regarded the ministry as his greatest honour and
privilege. He could truly take as his own the words of St. Paul to
the Ephesian elders: “None of these things move me, neither count I
my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy,
and the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify
the Gospel of the grace of God."
Another fine appreciation, which was published some months before
Dr. Murray passed away, is from the pen of Dr. J. I. Marais,
Professor at the Stellenbosch Theological Seminary, who was closely
associated with Dr. Murray in many ecclesiastical and social
undertakings, and therefore speaks from an intimate knowledge.
Professor Marais wrote:—
Emerson has said somewhere: "Every man is a cause, a country and an
age. . . . All history resolves itself very easily into the
biography of a few stout and earnest persons.” These words may fitly
be applied to Dr. Andrew Murray ; for few men in South Africa have
had an influence more wide-spreading than he, few have left such an
impress upon their time and their generation. That influence has
been extensive as well as intensive. The Dutch Reformed Church,
which claims him as her own, and to which his best energies have
been devoted for many years, has felt the intensiveness of that
influence, has been, and still is, under the spell of his wonderful
personality. There is hardly an institution—ecclesiastical,
educational, philanthropic, religious—within the purview of the
Dutch Reformed Church, which has not benefited by his advice, or
received a strong impulse from his prayers; few of these
institutions have not been initiated by him. For his sympathies are
wide as his religious life is deep. Even in feeble old age, with a
body bent and frail, he takes the keenest interest in whatever good
is done or attempted by the Church of his fathers, or the Church of
God in any comer of the globe. With Wesley he might say, "The world
is my parish."
Hence in his devotional works—and they are many—he appeals to
thousands and tens, if not hundreds, of thousands. These books were
written with a purpose : in them he discusses the highest problems
of religious life, with a simplicity which the most immature
Christian can appreciate, and the trained theologian would wish to
emulate. They are appeals to the heart; because with Vinet he
believes that “the heart has reasons whereof the intellect knows
nothing.” And yet they are not the utterances of mere high-strung
emotion, but the reasoned discussion of subjects to which many a
theological treatise has been devoted. They embody a theology which
is the result of extensive reading and of long-continued, prayerful
meditation. The name of the author comes with a benediction, his
words are an inspiration, to many a Dutch and English home in South
Africa.
And yet Andrew Murray has never sought fame. Apparently he is a man
without ambition—except perhaps the ambition so characteristic of
St. Paul, the philotimia "to preach the Gospel” and to be
"well-pleasing to God.” He was, and is, essentially a preacher. In
the days of his prime, his appeals have stirred thousands; for his
influence in the pulpit was magnetic. His tremendous earnestness has
swayed men’s minds as the wind sways the cornfield. Bilingual, with
a thorough command of both English and Dutch, he was at home on many
a platform, whether in South Africa or Holland or England or
America. Set speeches he has never delivered ; an oration from his
lips would be an anomaly and an impossibility. He was, and is, as he
professes to be, a minister of the Gospel; and in no other capacity
has he ever appeared before the public.
No one can understand Andrew Murray without reckoning with two
things. He is essentially “a man of prayer,” and at the same time “a
man of affairs.” The eternal world is to him an intense reality, not
a matter of speculation : things spiritual in his case dominate the
temporal. The "new life,” which in his books is discussed in various
ways, is developed by prayer, which to Andrew Murray means unbroken
communion with the Unseen, intercession for others, fellowship in
feeling and suffering with the Church of God in all portions of the
globe. On the subject of prayer he has written repeatedly ; and book
after book was welcomed. For every new book on the subject was fresh
and stimulating, and not a mere repetition of the preceding volume.
"The sense of the eternal,” it has been said, “is the great lack of
the Church to-day.” This Andrew Murray believes. Hence he insists on
the message: "Pray, brethren, pray.” He is essentially a mystic.
Life for him means simply activity “ permeated and purified by the
sense of the Eternal Presence—as the peasants in Alpine villages
live in the presence of mighty mountain ranges, lightening in the
morning and evening glow, or growing solemn and terrible as thunder
broods on their summits.”
But Andrew Murray is not a mere anchorite, a mystic dreamer of
dreams, whose "other-worldliness” lies beyond the influence of
earthly stress and strain. He is essentially a man of action. At
eighty-eight years of age the keenness of his intellect and his
amazing vitality are a marvel to his friends. The joie de vivre is
his in the truest sense of the term. He feels that he has a mission
given him by God, a task to be performed, a message still to
proclaim, a book or two still to be written Some years ago a friend
approached him with the request, “Will you not give us some of your
reminiscences?” The answer was characteristic: "I have far better
things to do than to talk and write about myself.”
Enough has been said. This is not a biographical sketch. Biography
comes in due order, when life’s last chapter has been written, and
the man himself is but a memory, and to many a mere name. Andrew
Murray is still with us; a mystic, a prophet, and withal a
humble-minded follower of the Master he has served for all these
years. His has been a full life. In 1849, a mere lad in appearance,
he went to Bloemfontein as a pioneer. In 1916, frail in body, keen
in spirit, he is still planning, praying, prophesying, inspiring. A
man is immortal as long as God has a task for him to fulfil.
To estimate Andrew Murray’s influence is a task beyond our powers.
His name will not bulk largely in the political history of the
country, which is so richly interlarded with the names not only of
great statesmen and sagacious leaders, but of orators, publicists,
capitalists, officials, and politicians of varying shades of opinion
and varying degrees of capacity. But he has left, nevertheless, an
indelible impress upon the character of the South African people.
During the eighties and nineties of the last century, his tireless
journeys as Gospel-preacher brought him into personal contact with
every minister and almost every congregation of the Dutch Reformed
Church. The other Free Churches of the land, too, were always glad
to welcome him to their pulpits, while clergymen of the evangelical
section of the Anglican Church enjoyed fraternal intercourse with
him on many a common platform. In this way the influence of Andrew
Murray's rich and intense personality permeated the whole South
African community, recalling men and women from vain delights to the
contemplation and pursuit of the highest ideals in their public and
their private life. He was a great, an inestimable gift of God to
the people of this land—the greatest in our whole history : nor can
we conceive that Divine Providence has any greater gift to bestow
upon us in the years to come.
The influence which radiated from Andrew Murray was all-pervasive.
Many Christians would, almost unconsciously, translate the law of
virtue from the abstract into the concrete by asking, “What would
Mr. Murray say ? What would Mr. Murray do?” The intensity of his
convictions led him at times to put his case with an emphasis—an
over-emphasis —which gave rise to misunderstanding, and his
statements were frequently challenged; but no one ever ventured to
challenge his motives or censure his conduct. These lay beyond the
reach of criticism. He thus became a moral standard by which men set
and measured their lives—a standard not enshrined in ethical maxim
or religious precept, but incarnated in a living and breathing
personality. We all felt that Andrew Murray could say, without
hypocrisy and without incongruity: “Be ye followers of me, even as I
also am of Christ.”
Of his influence upon the Christian world at large it ill becomes
the present writer to speak. That influence can be far more justly
estimated by those who are in closer touch with the spiritual life
of the Churches. In this volume a few testimonies only have been
recorded from men and women who found in Andrew Murray’s books a
guidance and a stimulus, an inspiration and a joy, which no other
devotional writings could impart. But these testimonies tell us
hardly anything of the rich blessings disseminated throughout the
world, in many Christian homes, from many Christian pulpits, in
cottages and in castles, among care-burdened souls in great cities
and weary workers in distant mission-fields, by the consecrated pen
of this South African saint. Everywhere, to the remotest bounds of
our globe, a great host of Andrew Murray's spiritual children will
rise up and call him blessed.
And being dead, he speaketh yet. For we cannot imagine a time when
Andrew Murray’s words will have spent their force, and will be
consigned to that oblivion which has overtaken the writings of so
many authors who were famous in their day and generation. The issues
with which he deals are eternal issues : the manner in which he
deals with these issues is characterized by a sane and sanctified
common sense: the spirit which breathes through all is that of a
tender and yearning love. Is it too much to prophesy that Andrew
Murray’s works will take their place upon our bookshelves next to
Augustine and a Kempis and Lancelot Andrewes and William Law, and
will continue to establish the faith and kindle the love and
reinforce the purposes of unborn generations of the children of God?
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