IT may be stated, by way of preface to the following brief sketch, that the late worthy Mr. Bethune was most reticent as to his Christian experience. During a conversation last year when he was very ill, the present writer cautiously approached him on the subject of his experience and hope, but he would not be drawn to speak of himself. All he said was, “All I wish the world ever to know about me is this: I am a great sinner, and always was, whose only concern is ‘to be found in Christ’ as my only preparation for eternity. I hope, through the mercy of God, I shall be saved.” The following sketch will therefore be brief and largely general:—
Mr. Donald Bethune was the only son of Mr. Murdoch Bethune, innkeeper, Kenseleyre, Skye. He was a brilliant boy at school, and while still a youth attended the Normal School in Edinburgh, where he passed as a teacher with credit. His first school was at Kylerhea. Afterwards he taught at Glenbrittle and Struan in the parish of Bracadale. He came to Tarbert, Harris, forty-three years ago, where he taught for nineteen years, there being twenty-four years since he retired. As a teacher he laboured with a fair measure of success, and made good scholars, some of whom now occupy responsible positions. He had a deep interest in the spiritual welfare of the children, and was a good disciplinarian, but his methods of discipline were not those of the merciless tyrant, but such as became a humble, gentle, loving Christian, whose love for children was a conspicuous feature of his whole life. He remained interested in his scholars to the last, and was pardonably proud of some of them whose abilities had brought them into prominence in the commercial world. He retained the love and respect of his pupils in a remarkable way, and his death was to many of them a poignant sorrow and heartfelt loss. They were indeed highly privileged in having him as the guide and counsellor of their youth, and one cannot but fondly hope that by his teaching and example, under the divine blessing, he may have been instrumental in bringing some of the boys and girls that passed through his hands to the feet of Him who said, “Suffer little children to come unto me.” When secular songs began to be taught in the schools he firmly refused to teach them, thereby losing part of the grant.
Mr. Bethune was brought up in the Established Church, and it is not known when he left her and joined the Free Church, but it must have been while he was still a young man. He must have been very young when he came under the influence of divine grace, for we understand that in early boyhood he used to go and pray alone, but he did not know why. He did not know how to pray, but still he had to be at it. Some irresistible power within moved him. It is not known when, where, or how he was first awakened to a sense of his lost condition as a sinner, but when the awakening did come it seems to have been terrific. He was long under conviction of sin, and at nights he would be afraid to sleep, in case he would awaken in hell. At last he obtained spiritual relief, and he evidently enjoyed great freedom, which continued for quite a time. Secret prayer was then his greatest delight. The writer remembers him saying that at that time of his life he could not but pray, and that he would be no sooner back from secret prayer than he would require to return to it again, because of the delight his soul was finding in secret intercourse with the Lord. Those days of spiritual warmth were followed in after years by days of desertion, coldness of affection, and hardness of heart. We have heard him exclaim in prayer as often as any we can remember, “My leanness, my leanness!” Yet he was kept from casting away his confidence, and was enabled to keep his hope firm unto the end.
It is supposed that he became a communicant in the time of the Rev. Roderick Macleod, Snizort, and that he was ordained an elder under the Rev. Mr. Fletcher, Bracadale. It was from there that he came to Harris in the days of the Rev. Dr. Macintosh Mackay. He got married when at Bracadale in the year 1870, at the age of thirty-two, to Miss Betsy Maclean, daughter of Mr. Neil Maclean, merchant. The marriage was solemnised at Duirinish by the Rev. Alex. MacColl, and Rev. Mr. Fletcher signed as one of the witnesses. Two children were born of the marriage—a boy and a girl—but both died in infancy and are buried at Scarista, South Harris. Mrs. Bethune also predeceased her husband many years since, and he deeply and tenderly mourned her loss.
Mr. Bethune began to keep religious meetings when he was quite young, but he was sometimes much oppressed with a deep sense of his unfitness, which made him absent himself. At the same time such was his warmth and zeal that he thought at first that he would convert every one of his hearers, but as he continued to speak he gained more knowledge and experience of the strength of “the old man.” The favourite ministers of his early days were Mr. Macleod, Snizort; Mr. Fletcher, Bracadale; and Dr. Mackay, Harris; while “the men,” among others, were Ronald Macdonald and Angus Munro, Snizort. He was opposed to the first Union negotiations and to the later backsliding development which culminated in the Declaratory Act of 1892. When the Free Presbyterian Church was formed he proved himself a judicious and active supporter of the cause, and did much to organise the Free Presbyterian congregation in Harris. During periods of vacancy, before and since the Rev. E. Macqueen’s ministry until the present settlement was made, he nobly and successfully carried on the work of the congregation. The Lord blessed his public exercises to the conversion of some who were very reckless in life, and to the edification of those who were in a gracious state.
As to the secular part of his career, he was for many years Registrar for North Harris, and only gave up his office last year. All his duties he discharged with great conscientiousness and care.
Mr. Bethune remained to the last very steadfast to the Church of which he was an honoured elder. He certainly never regretted the step he took in 1893, nor showed the least desire to retrace his steps. He felt no guilt of conscience over the step referred to, when departing this life. On several occasions he said the Lord had granted him his two special requests, namely, to see the congregation provided with a minister and a church building before he would die. He caught a chill when attending the Synod meeting in Glasgow two years ago, and was never the same after it. He passed through a most trying illness last summer, but was much better this year, though it was daily becoming more obvious that the end was approaching. I never knew anyone who was more patient and reconciled to the Lord’s will. During all his illness he never complained, and in the very midst of his worst attacks he could be bright. He really could hide his troubles as very few could. He was up the day before he died, but did not leave his bedroom. The end came suddenly, a little after midnight, on Friday morning, the 16th April, 1915. His age was seventy-eight years. There was no struggle—he simply passed away—and the last words that his cousin Mary, who proved his faithful friend and servant for twenty-nine years, heard him say, were: “The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin.”
Mr. Bethune’s death has made a great blank in this congregation, and while we prayerfully hope that the Lord, who is the repairer of the breaches, will in His mercy raise up others, still, taking him all in all, we do not expect to see his equal among us again. We have lost, in the person of Mr. Donald Bethune, a judicious, intelligent, exercised man of God, pleasant and affectionate in disposition, and with accomplishments qualifying him for a place in any society. All who knew and valued him will join in deeply mourning his loss. “The memory of the just is blessed.”
D. N. M.