IT is with sorrow we record the removal by death, during the past year, of three God-fearing women from our Helmsdale congregation. These were Mrs. Johan MacKay, Portgower, Mrs. MacPhail, and Mrs. Wm. MacKay. The writer was in Canada when they were taken away. Mr. Adamson, Helmsdale, notified him, saying—”Some of our congregation have gone to heaven, isn’t that good news for you?” Yes, good news in that they reached the haven their soul desired to see, but sorrowful news as we thought of the loss to the cause of Christ here.
MRS. JOHAN MACKAY, PORTGOWER.
This gracious person was the last surviving member of a family eminent for piety. Her worthy sister, the late Mrs. Johnstone, was well known to many in the north. (An obituary of her appeared in the F.P. Magazine for November, 1920.) Mrs. MacKay was bereaved of her husband in 1914 and of a son in the Great War. Her only other son, David, died at the age of 14 years. He gave clear evidence of having been taught by the Holy Spirit—in that he was a boy to whom the Lord Jesus Christ was precious. It would appear that Mrs. MacKay was brought to a saving knowledge of the truth when she was a young woman. Her life and conversation revealed it. She loved Zion and Zion’s children. It was to her, and to many others, as life from the dead, when in 1893 a banner for truth was displayed in Scotland by the definite stand made by the late worthy Messrs. Macdonald and Macfarlane. The steadily increasing prevalence of such sins as Sabbath desecration, and the inordinate love of pleasure with its accompanying evils to be seen on every hand, were a source of much grief to her. She was faithful in rebuking sin. The tempter often tried her. She referred to one occasion, many years ago, when her soul was in deep distress. On the Sabbath, as she entered the old meeting-house at the Shore, the precentor was “giving out the line” from Psalm 34—
“O taste and see that God is good
Who trusts in Him is blessed.”
The relief and comfort experienced through these words were sweet to her soul.
Her spirituality of mind and her hospitality made it a privilege and a pleasure for one to visit her little home. Sometimes she expressed a feeling of loneliness, while thinking of those who had gone before, adding:—”Oh that the Lord would cleanse me, and take me to Himself, for I know He will not cast me off.” As the end drew near one of the congregation visited her, and having read Chapter 14 of the Gospel according to John, he quoted Isaiah XL, 2, as having been specially laid on his mind for her. She was comforted by it.
After six months’ illness, patiently borne, she passed away into the great eternity on Sabbath, the 3rd August, 1930, at the advanced age of 81 years. “Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord.”
Her only daughter, Mrs. MacAngus, and the latter’s husband, tenderly and lovingly nursed her to the end. Much sympathy is felt for them. May they be enabled by grace to follow in her footsteps and arise to witness for Christ in the village of Portgower. This village had many of the “Salt of the Earth,” but it has now come, comparatively, to desolation.
MRS. MACPHAIL, HELMSDALE.
On the same Sabbath, 3rd August, 1930, as Mrs. MacKay, Portgower, was removed from earth, death claimed Mrs. MacPhail, widow of Hugh MacPhail, Arnisdale, Glenelg. She was about 90 years of age, having been born before the Disruption of 1843, at Knockan, Assynt, Lochinver, of godly parents. Having lost her mother early in life, she was brought up by her grandmother, Mrs. McLeod, the well known, saintly Margaret Bhan, of Assynt, who frequently travelled from Knockan to Redcastle to hear Rev. John Kennedy. Mrs. MacPhail was the last surviving member of the family of Alexander MacLeod, an eminent Gaelic teacher and layman-preacher at Arnisdale. It was under the preaching of her father that she was spiritually awakened. To one to whom she confided something of her experience at that time, she remarked:—”For nights I lay under a weight of guilt, and, if you were to place a pail under my head, I think the perspiration would fill it.” In this distress, she went to Lochalsh. A Lochearron woman meeting her said:—”To-morrow you will be set free.” This proved to be the case, under the preaching of that eminent servant of Christ, the Rev. Alexander MacColl. “The Gospel prevailed,” she would say, “and I lost control of myself.” Her soul thirsting for the water of life, she walked many a mile to communions from that day onwards. A deep attachment to Rev. Mr. MacColl, and latterly to the late Rev. D. Macfarlane, Dingwall, was evident. They were instruments for good to her soul. For twenty years she resided in Dingwall. While there she met with an accident in going down stairs for the morning milk to the milk cart. To her daughter, who expressed alarm, she said:—”Oh, don’t weep! I deserved that blow as I did not bend my knees in prayer before going.” An early riser on Sabbath morning, she would awaken others singing—
“O that men to the Lord would give
Praise for His goodness then,
And for His works of wonder done
Unto the sons of men.”
Next to the Bible, her companions were Boston’s “Four Fold State” and the Shorter Catechism. In giving advice to others, she would add—”Be kind to the Cause of Christ.” Her own actions were in keeping with this advice. On one occasion she had no money to give to the Sustentation Fund. She went out and caught a fowl, which she sold, giving the proceeds to the fund.
The last five years of her pilgrimage were spent with her son-in-law, Mr. MacPherson, in Helmsdale. For several years she was under the infirmities of old age, and thus she was, comparatively, unknown to the present generation in Dingwall and Helmsdale. In both places she was affectionately nursed by two daughters. With the sorrowful daughter in Dingwall and with Mr. and Mrs. MacPherson, Helmsdale, we express sympathy. May the departed’s prayers on their behalf be answered.
MRS. WM. MACKAY, HELMSDALE.
The subject of this notice was born in Hilton, Fearn, in 1857. At the age of 21 she married Wm. MacKay, now elder in our Helmsdale congregation. For over 50 years they were happily united—equally yoked, being of one mind for many years in the great concerns of the soul. Where the Spirit of the Lord begins a good work in a soul it is carried on unto perfection. Mrs. MacKay was not one of those “perfectionists” who maintain that having believed they are therefore no longer troubled with sin. Neither was the Apostle Paul, who, long after he believed, cried, “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death!” The plague of her own heart was much felt. “It is at death the souls of believers are made perfectly holy and do immediately pass into glory, while their bodies, being still united to Christ, do rest in their graves till the resurrection.”
Mrs. MacKay had the grace of discernment above many. A religion of mere sentiment did not satisfy her. She desired the sincere milk of the Word, and, consequently, she grew in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. We have good reasons for believing that few were more in secret prayer than she was. Her wise, gentle and kind ways endeared her to old and young. Family anxieties were many. Her son, Donald, has been for over a year in hospital in Western Canada. The writer visited him last summer and brought home a favourable report of improved health—an improvement which has continued since. Her son’s illness, and the death of his wife, leaving four children, weighed heavily on her. Her greatest concern for her family was the welfare of their never-dying souls. In her they have lost a praying mother. Her husband has lost a devoted, spiritually-minded helpmeet, and the congregation of Helmsdale a loyal, warm-hearted member, and they mourn their loss. The end came unexpectedly. She had been visiting friends and seemed in her usual. That evening she became sick, and, the following morning, she passed away at the age of 73, to be, we believe, “with Christ which is far better.”
The deepest sympathy is felt for her sorrowing son and daughter in Canada and for members of the family in this country. May they have an interest, through Christ, in the promise which says—
“And to their children’s children still
His righteousness extends.”
We desire that the bereaved husband, in his much felt loneliness, will be enabled to lean more and more upon the Blessed Saviour who said:—”I shall never leave thee nor forsake thee.”—W. G.
The late Mrs. Catherine Bain, “Englewood,” Stornoway.
CATHERINE Morrison or Bain was born in Newton, Stornoway, sometime in the year 1838. Her mother was considered a mother in Israel, in that the most discerning of the Lord’s people of that day had great delight in her company. In particular, she was an intimate friend and associate of Sandy Morrison, an eminent witness, whose name is still savoury among us, and he delighted much in her fellowship. Mrs. Bain lived the first forty years of her life without giving much evidence that she cared for ought above the things that perish. Without doubt, her mother’s godly example and instructions left their own impression on her mind, but the cares of this life, especially of husband and family, caused higher matters to be put off to a more convenient season.
In the Lord’s good time and way, it pleased Him to convince her by such truths as—”They have hewed unto themselves broken cisterns that can hold no water,” that these wells afforded no lasting satisfaction, and that the end of these things is death. She used to speak as though the Lord Jesus, as He is revealed in the Scriptures, stood before her and directed her away from the cisterns of death to the Fountain opened for sin and for uncleanness. In due time she became concerned about making a public profession of her faith in Christ. She had what many of the Lord’s people do not have, in addition to the Saviour’s command:—”Do this in remembrance of me.” That passage:—”O my dove that art in the clefts of the rock, in the secret places of the stairs, let me see thy countenance,” constrained her and encouraged her in the path of duty. Mrs. Bain’s aim in life was to adorn her profession by seeking to be dependent on divine grace, so that it might be without spot or blemish. We hardly ever called to see her without hearing something about the goodness of God in bestowing health of body and, especially soundness of mind, and also that the Lord would keep us without spot or blemish. She was remarkable for her kindness to the poor, even in her early days of domestic struggles, and when, by the dutifulness and competency of her son, Mr. John Bain, banker, Chicago, she had enough and to spare, her delight was to spread out her bounty to relieve all necessitous cases and the cause of Christ.
Mrs. Bain, though surrounded by her family and friends, used often to feel how much alone she was in her generation, missing the companions of her early days, the godly women such as Anna Bhan, Grannie Ullapool and Bantrach Dhannie (the widow of the late Dannie Maciver, Missionary). Her last year in this vale of tears was a year of longing to depart and to be with Christ. We were never alone with her during these last months without hearing something of the Lord’s wonderful goodness during her life’s journey, her own weariness of the present, and of her willingness to go when the Lord’s time would come. Mrs. Bain, though kind to all, was a straightforward rebuker of wrong-doing, and a faithful witness to the testimony of the Free Presbyterian Church and to all else that was right. She had many months of extreme weakness to endure, but never failed to state that she was without pain. She passed away from hence to be with Christ on the 12th of August last year at the age of 92 years, and what was mortal sleeps in Sandwich Cemetery along with the dust of others of the Lord’s people till “the trumpet shall sound and the dead in Christ shall rise first.”
We extend our sympathy to her daughter, Mrs. Macdonald and her family, to Mr. John Bain, whose generosity to the Stornoway congregation is well known, and to the other sons and relatives. We would pray for them what David sought for Solomon:—”And thou, Solomon my son, know thou the God of thy father, and serve Him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind; for the Lord searcheth all hearts and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts; if thou seek Him, He will be found of thee; but if thou forsake Him, He will cast thee off forever” (I. Chron., xxxviii., 9).—M.G.