Hansen Bible Study

On This Day in Church History

A real event from the story of the church on each calendar day, told with its setting and what came of it, and quoted word for word from sources published before 1931.

On this day · November 5

The Patons Land on Tanna

November 5, 1858 · Tanna, New Hebrides (Vanuatu)

The setting

John G. Paton had spent ten years as a city missionary in Glasgow before volunteering for the South Pacific. In 1858 he and his young wife Mary sailed for the New Hebrides, where earlier missionaries had been killed.

The story

The mission schooner had no room for women passengers, so the party paid a trader five pounds to carry them and about thirty casks and boxes from Aneityum. After a few hours' sailing they were landed safely at Port Resolution on Tanna on November 5, 1858.

Paton, his wife and their colleague Mr. Copeland stayed at Port Resolution to finish building a house and win the people's goodwill. Paton wanted to learn every word of the language so he could explain the gospel to the people in their own tongue.

“After a few hours' sailing we were all safely landed on Tanna on the 5th November, 1858.”

Chapter XII

What happened next

The years on Tanna were very hard. Paton's wife and baby son died within months, and in 1862 he had to flee for his life. Paton did not give up. He settled on Aniwa in 1866, where in time the whole island came to faith.

Why it matters: Faithfulness is not measured by quick results; Paton's hardest years came before his most fruitful ones.

Source: The Story of John G. Paton, ed. James Paton (A. L. Burt, New York), Chapter XII, Breaking Ground on Tanna. Public domain.

← Back to today

Church Family Tree

One church, many branches →

Nine eras of church history, a family tree of the major traditions, and how the Pentecostal revival, fed by many Protestant streams, produced the Assemblies of God.

Other days

On This Day in Church History | Hansen Bible Study