We’re nearing the official launch on September 10 of my new youth biography, David Livingstone: Africa’s Greatest Explorer. The book is already available for pre-ordering from the publisher Christian Focus Publications, Christianbooks.com, Amazon, and other booksellers.
Here are a dozen succinct reasons (enumerated below as R1-R12) for young people to read this biography on their own or with their parents. The book is written for youth ages 9-14, but older teens and adults are sure to enjoy and benefit from it as well.
R1. To become acquainted with one of the most outstanding missionaries ever to serve the Lord Jesus. David Livingstone is probably the premiere Christian missionary to Africa. He helped to bring about greater good for more Africans than likely any other person of his generation.
R2. To gain a good overview of the highlights of David’s remarkable life in an abbreviated account that is engaging, well-paced and easily understood. A timeline of David’s life and a map of his African travels provide further help in following the story of his life and ministry.
R3. To be encouraged by David’s example in overcoming tremendous challenges in his boyhood. He was raised in a loving but poor family. Starting at age ten, he needed to work twelve hours a day, six days a week to help support his family. In order to get his education, he attended evening classes, then did his school homework late into the night.
R4. To find out how David was led to become a Christian after several years of spiritual struggle and resistance. To discover how he decided to be a medical missionary. To learn how God redirected his steps to serve as a missionary in Africa when initially he planned to go to China. David’s experiences relate to questions not a few kids have about becoming a Christian and serving the Lord with their lives.
R5. To enjoy reading about David’s many adventures throughout his thirty-two years of service in Africa. On numerous occasions he encountered hostile tribesmen and threatening wild animals such as lions, rhinos, and hippos. He often faced difficult and dangerous travel conditions on land, by rivers, and at sea. Great courage was needed to face those dangers.
R6. To observe how David overcame many other difficulties and discouragements as well. He often experienced: serious illnesses; long periods of separation from his wife and children; lack of food and other necessary provisions; unreliable servants who stole from him and refused to help him; receiving little or no interest from the Africans with whom he tried to share the Bible’s teachings. He needed to exercise exceptional patience, perseverance, and trust in God to get through these additional hardships. His example has much to teach us about facing our own trials in life.
R7. To venture with David in his many important geographical explorations and discoveries. He journeyed through parts of southern Africa where no white man had ever been. He became the first European to discover a number of significant lakes, rivers, and other outstanding geographical features in southcentral Africa. His explorations and discoveries gave Europe and America a completely revised understanding of the people groups, geography, plants, animals, climate, natural resources, and other aspects of that part of the African continent.
R8. To see how David opposed the tragic slave trade in southern Africa and sought to bring it to an end by introducing Christianity, lawful commerce and other civilizing influences to the African tribes. More than any other person, David drew the attention of all Britain to the monstrous evils of the slave trade and stirred up the determination of the British public and Government to put a stop to it. The story of exactly when and how that was finally accomplished is quite amazing.
R9. To discover that David’s top priority throughout his decades of service in Africa was to help bring God’s Word and the Christian Gospel to tribes which had never even heard of the Bible and the message of salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. While David served in various important capacities for the good of Africa, he always viewed himself first and foremost as a Christian missionary.
R10. To profit from the book’s “Thinking Further Topics,” which help point out some of the spiritual principles and other practical life lessons to be gained from each chapter. These can be contemplated by individual readers or discussed by families reading the book together.
R11. To become acquainted with (or to be reminded of) the tremendous spiritual and educational benefits to be gained by reading youth biographies on exceptional Christians of the past. Christian Focus Publications has published scores of such beneficial youth biographies in its Trail Blazers series.
R12. Last but certainly not least, to be reminded that God should receive all the credit and glory for His gracious work in and through the lives and ministries of all Christians. Why? Because it is God who: draws people to faith in Jesus as their Savior; gives them the desire, abilities and opportunities to live for and serve Him; blesses them with whatever fruit and successes they have in their own spiritual lives and Christian service. All that is true, whether a person is a celebrated Christian hero like David Livingstone or an ordinary, unsung servant of Jesus.
Copyright 2024 by Vance E. Christie
