The writer regrets that this obituary is so long overdue but owing to circumstances, which need not be related here, the delay was unavoidable. For one reason the writer very much depended for material on friends who knew Mrs. Nicolson more intimately than it was his privilege to do.
Mrs. Nicolson was the daughter of the late Donald Mackenzie, who was an Elder of our North Tolsta congregation from its beginning until he died in 1922, at the good old age of 89 years. She was born at North Tolsta on 15th December, 1884. When she was about 25 years of age she married John Nicolson, one of our Elders there, who is still spared to mourn after her. They lived happily together for many years, a couple truly married in the Lord.
We understand that the Spirit strove with her from her youth. This would account for her regular attendance on the means of grace, including the weekly prayer-meetings. How she came to enjoy the liberty of the gospel for the first time we are unable to say. The Holy Spirit exercises His sovereignty in the means used to enlighten a soul in the knowledge of Christ as a Saviour. We are led to conclude, however, from what a friend told us that for some considerable time after she was justified through faith in Christ, she enjoyed much of His presence. When an intimate friend of hers once complained of the infidelity of the old heart she said she could not understand that, but that tranquillity of resting in the love of the Redeemer did not continue long with her. Few had a deeper knowledge of the enmity of the carnal mind. She became a member in full communion in October, 1914, and verily adorned her profession by a life sincerely dedicated to the service and glory of the Lord, who redeemed her with His own blood. Her love to the cause of Christ, His people and the Sabbath was no ordinary kind. She was never happier than when attending to the Lord’s people, many of whom not only from her own native island but from places further afield, received of her hospitality especially during communion seasons. Many who are now in glory were regular visitors at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Nicolson during such seasons.
Mrs. Nicolson’s love to the Bible made her a constant reader of it with the result that she had few equals in Bible knowledge. Another book dear to her was the Shorter Catechism, the answers of which she knew perfectly. She loved the Truth and was given to be faithful to that testimony, given to her generation in the Free Presbyterian Church. She was a friend indeed, in whom one could place implicit confidence. The writer has received a tribute to her memory from one of her most intimate friends and because he considers it a correct estimate of her he inserts it here in full.
“That she was an outstanding Christian we all know but the fact that she wanted God’s glory above all else left her to say little of herself. She was of a quiet disposition: most of her life seen and not heard. Her knowledge of the Truth was accurate, and if any of the friends had a difficulty in finding a passage of Scripture, they had only to find her and they found the passage.
“I cannot remember what she said of her conversion, but to a friend who did not find it easy to go forward for the first time she said that when she went forward first, she was so willing to go that she felt she had been taken by the hand by the Lord Jesus and led to the Table. That her conversion was genuine could not be questioned. Full of the love of Christ and love to all men, she followed the cause of Christ from her youth. It was no rare thing for her and her husband to walk to Ness and Breasclete in those days.
“She delighted in giving hospitality and was as full of vigour in the service of Christ at the end as at the beginning. Her deep interest in all concerning the cause of Christ made one regard her as Phoebe, a servant of the church and a succourer of many.”
To her friends her death came as a great shock but she was found ready. “So to the haven He them brings, which they desired to see.” The night before her death, because of a question which she and a friend were discussing, she took up John Bunyan’s “View of Heaven” and read aloud. The friend marvelled at the heavenly tone of her reading and could not help remarking on it. Twice she said, “When I am reading this I feel as if I am there.” She was there the following evening.
All who knew Mrs. Nicolson will agree that the above is a true estimate of her. She and her husband came to the Stornoway Communion in February, 1951, although the latter did not feel well at the time. So unwell that he questioned the wisdom of going away from home. She, however, insisted that they should go, and she arrived in a very happy frame of mind. Like David she could say, “I was glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house of the Lord.” On Saturday she visited several of the friends, some of whom had been lifelong ones, while others were of a more recent order. On Sabbath morning, after dressing for church a few moments before leaving for the Communion service, she collapsed in the house of her friend, Mrs. Maciver, Lewis Street, and that same evening she passed away in the Lewis Hospital. Although it was not the will of the Lord that she should sit at His Table that day on earth, it was His will that she would sit at it in heaven. By her removal the Church has been bereaved of a loyal and useful member. Let those who knew her follow her example and they will not regret it. To her husband and her other relatives we extend our sympathy in their great loss, which is her gain. “Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am.”—D. C.