THIS worthy man died at a ripe old age, over 90 years, in July 1925, and though at this late date our account of him is being inserted in the pages of the Magazine, we deem it will be none the less interesting and refreshing. After all, the memory of the righteous who are taken home is more enshrined in the hearts of the living who mourn their loss and who were intimately acquainted with them, than in the minds of those who never saw them in the flesh. God’s living people lament the removal of praying ones. Even though they are incapacitated by sickness and infirmities from attending on the outward means of grace, it affords strength and confidence to pastor, elders, and members of a congregation to know they are still on earth below, and their prayers ascending to the throne for them and others. Therefore, when God’s praying ones are removed, pillars of strength are gone. May the Lord raise up others who will be pillars to take their place.
According to the removed one’s own account, it was the Rev. Mr Fraser, Rosskeen, near Invergordon, who was an instrument for spiritual good to William in his younger days. He was like others, with whom the Lord began to deal graciously, vain and light-hearted enough in his youth. Having heard Mr Fraser preach two or three times, his mind became deeply impressed, and thus the good work had begun. When he was now intensely concerned as to his lost and undone condition, he was making, as many others were, vows and resolutions. His inclination, or rather disposition of mind, was not towards despair of deliverance, but rather in the way of looking for it. He expected God’s mercy would reach him as it reached others as guilty, and as he was so deeply impressed by Mr Fraser’s preaching, he naturally looked forward to his being made the instrument in his saving conversion. Therefore, he looked to relief under him. So on one occasion, before this relief of the Gospel came, he said to himself, “If I will but hear Mr Fraser this once, I think I will be born again;” and because God was not doing what he wanted Him to do, and was not at his time and bidding, he could bear to put the Most High out of existence. The enmity which he felt in his heart at the Holy One for not saving him on his own conditions, and as he thought in his heart, was inveterate.
However, on this morning the occasion referred to—it appears William bound himself with a solemn oath that, if the Most High should not save him on this day, he would for ever renounce the means of grace, and give up all connection with the things of God. A terrible oath it was! The subject of discourse which Mr Fraser had that day was the woman of Canaan—”Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour” (Matt. xv. 28). In the course of his speaking, he said—”She made the cause of another her own, and the Saviour, who was thrusting her away with the one hand, was drawing her gently with the other.” William, as he listened, felt the Lord was drawing him little by little that day until Mr Fraser came to quote the words in Proverbs—”Blessed is the man that heareth me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the posts of my doors”—he got deliverance, or, as he put it himself, “before he was done there, I got relief and deliverance to my poor soul. I went out that morning, making vows and binding God down in my ways, but I had a different song coming home in the evening such as—’What shall I render unto the Lord for what He hath done to my soul?’ Now, I am here to-day, old and infirm and nigh the grave, and all I can say is that, if I shall be saved and in heaven, it will undoubtedly be the greatest wonder that ever was or will be, excepting the wonder of the Lord, the Creator of heaven and earth, being made a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.”
Mr Mackenzie and his family associated themselves heartily with the witness raised by Mr Macfarlane, Dingwall, and Mr Macdonald, Shieldaig, against the doctrinal and confessional changes introduced into the Free Church by the Rainyite party through the passing of the infamous Declaratory Act. He adhered steadfastly without any tinge of regret to this position to the end of his days. He was predeceased by his wife and daughter a number of years, both of whom were like-minded with himself. As his later years were passed disabled in bed, he had the constant nursing and self-denying attendance of Mrs Donald Mackenzie, his wife’s sister-in-law, and a native of Wick. To her, indeed, praise is due for her unremitting care and kindness towards William.
To his surviving sons we extend our deepest sympathy. “Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth.”
M. M.