Donald Crawford

      The religious experience of Donald Crawford is revealing. Contrary to an early idea, outstanding religious leaders come by it naturally; but Donald Crawford was of the type of Paul, who had to learn a hard way. It was an experience related also in the case of leading men in Ontario. When Calvinistic teaching was beginning to crumble, men and women agonized even in godly homes as to how to receive religion's consolation. D. Crawford states that no matter how much good advice his teachers gave him, there was no way pointed out. He could never learn what steps to take to come to the Saviour. It was a knotted mystery. His gloomy prayers for light and power brought him no release, and a reaction followed toward frivolity and sin.

      In the summer of 1840 a Baptist preacher from Nova Scotia preached on the Island with great success. His message there was new--that "men could believe the gospel and might accept Christ without waiting for an added power". "That autumn all our family save two were baptized. My father was delighted, and seeing his children accept Christ, gave him courage and comfort, as to Simeon of old, to depart; he died soon thereafter, at the beginning of 1841. I felt much interest in Mr. Dimock's preaching . . . although I received much light, I still thought it impossible to be saved without something as a pre-requisite, which it seemed Jesus was withholding, and I resolved to pray more earnestly, but all in vain. Before giving up I resolved to read all I could in the history of Christ . . . I was greatly surprised not to find him turning away anyone because he did not feel enough. I came to see that the apostles understood the Great Commission just as it is recorded in Acts: 'He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved'. I believed Jesus with all my heart and believe Him still, although unworthy of such grace. From that day I never felt a lingering doubt of being saved: the Cross, the empty tomb, and the Great Commission: these three shall stand." Crawford goes on to state that he believed the desire to preach the gospel was kindled by the Spirit of God. He joined the Baptist body with the agreement that the New Testament should be the only rule. 

He began to preach at the age of 21 at various points: first, at Belfast, then St. John, N.B., Cornwallis, Rawdon, West Gore, N.S. He continued until certain ministers enforced the articles of faith, when be retired from the body. Crawford received no academic training: he was one of the class of men who, because of natural gifts and industry become 'educated'. He became an able English scholar and by hard work and by preaching as to dying men and women, his messages had real dynamic in them, with which often formal training has no apparent links and cannot guarantee nor yield. Yet, he a student, in a written debate with a trained scholar in Charlottetown, distinguished himself and his cause in the community by his expositions of Bible truth. Crawford records briefly that his opponent "retreated after a time: afterwards became a D.D. and turned his attention to other men." His debating power was able. He claimed that written or printed debates were more effective agents than oral ones and savored less of personal glory.

      Space is lacking to tell of his "journeyings oft" over The Island, over Nova Scotia and parts of New Brunswick and Maine. He spent four years in these parts and organized churches in Digby Co. N.S. A sentence reveals his mode. He tells that a visit to the Island on Dec. 1, 1855, was made during a stormy season, when, with a horse and wagon, the small sailing vessel in which he was embarked came to port with difficulty. He was church founder at Summerside in 1858, and in 1855 had settled down at New Glasgow presumably after his marriage to his life help-mate, Miss Harriet M. Wallace, of Milton, N.S. New Glasgow got much of his care, but he was of the pioneering type that loved to enter and conquer new fields, and these efforts took him widely over the maritime provinces. He lived with his wife in P.E.I. for thirty-five years. In his home, which he enlarged for the purpose, he trained young men for the ministry. 

He was a maker of men and gifted with foresight. While at Summerside he baptized over fifty, amongst them Archibald McLean. This was on a Sunday in June, 1867, when A. McLean, definitely determined to go forth unmistakably before the world (with a brother as a witness) as a follower of the Christ. What a memory for a preacher: 'I baptized A. McLean'. Donald Crawford did some fundamental thinking for a plain man. When H. T. Anderson published serially his translation of the New Testament he used for the word "repentance" the phrase "amendment of life." Crawford contended that "repentance" was better when its meaning was taken as a "heartfelt determination to turn from sin to God." Anderson changed to agree with this. Later, no less a scholar than J. W. McGarvey taught similarly. 

Crawford was an author of tracts, one on "Conversations on the Christian Religion", published first in the Christian Banner, 1857, and later as a pamphlet. This was opposed violently but never successfully. Crawford, man of monumental labors and fidelity, lived to age 91 and passed on August 12, 1911, and, with his wife, lies in the cemetery of New Glasgow, where he spent so many years. In his time he received an inadequate support, and often by the way of "donations". This is freely admitted; we had not yet learned that they who preach the gospel must live of the gospel. Of him, Grace Beattie states, "he was great in physical stature, intellectual capacity, and devotion to Christ". There he lies: one of our "great"--at rest.