Prompted by the exploratory voyages of Captain James Cook, the settlement of New South Wales in Australia as a convict station, and the acquisition by England of New Zealand, the nineteenth century saw the beginning of efforts to reach out to the islands of the Pacific with the gospel.
One of the pioneer missionaries to the South Pacific islands was John Geddie (1815-1872), a Scottish Presbyterian. Born in the Scottish town of Banff, when only a year old his family relocated to Pictou, Nova Scotia, Canada.
Geddie hoped that the Scottish Presbyterian church in Nova Scotia, of which he was a member, would establish a foreign mission of her own, and send forth and support her own foreign missionary. However, the church was not ready.
However, after his own ordination, Geddie organised a missionary society in his own church and encouraged other congregations to do the same. In time, the Synod agreed to start foreign mission work and appointed Geddie as head of the new Foreign Missions Board. A year later and after prayerful consideration, the South Sea islands was chosen as the 'mission field' and Geddie was appointed to be the 'missionary'.
To get from Pictou to the New Hebrides in the South Pacific took Geddie 1 year and 7 months! Not only did he sail over 19,000 miles, he was detained for 8 months when he got to Samoa. There he had to leave behind his eldest child as the child was not permitted to go and live among the cannibals. Geddie had already left behind at home an aged and devoted mother. Eventually, in 1848, Geddie arrived in the New Hebrides.
Apostle of the New Hebrides Before many years passed the entire system of heathenism gave way. Churches were built, schools established, children trained and godly homes built. The island of Aneityum, where Geddie lived and worked, became a centre from which light radiated to the other islands.
Geddie the "Apostle of the New Hebrides" remained there for a total of 24 years, with only one visit back to Nova Scotia in 1865. After his death in Australia at the age of 58, his work continued with two of his own daughters marrying missionaries in the New Hebrides.
A memorial was placed in the church where he worked. It stated that "When he landed in 1848 there were no Christians here, and when he left in 1872 there were no heathen."
