In July 15, 1992 there passed into the presence of the Lord a great woman whose life and death would not have been noticed by the world nor it’s press. Yet her’s was such a life of devotion for God that it should be an inspiration to us all.
Marie Thomson was born of Scottish parents sixty-four years ago in Detroit, MI, where she was also born again and came into fellowship with believers. A perusal of her diaries and letters, only read by her sister and one other after her death, reveals a life of quiet devotion rarely equalled. It has a message for us all.
In her teens she dedicated her life entirely to the Lord and from then felt a burden for the lost, especially in neglected fields. She plunged into what was nearest at hand, but her special passion was for children and, though she never married, she became a friend and mother to thousands of these, leading many to the Saviour.
She trained as a nurse, using her profession as an opening for talking to people about Christ and also to earn enough to take time off for lengthy periods of very real missionary service. She was not publicized in missionary magazines, nor did she receive funds from any of the regular and recognized sources. She was the modern personification of 2 Corinthians 6:9-11: “As unknown, [to man] and yet well known [to God] . . . as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things.”
Her first forays into work away from home were in 1948-49, and 1952 when, carrying a simple letter of introduction to the believers there, she went for much of the summer to Quebec, mostly for children’s meetings and visitation. She was there again in 1956-57, in the same kind of work but adding girls clubs for older ones in the Sherbrooke and Stanstead areas. Later, she helped for several years in youth conferences at Frontier Lodge. Her interest in Quebec had been stirred through groups of sisters in a number of assemblies who mailed thousands of pieces of gospel literature to that province, and through replies, she heard of what was being attempted for God there.
In her earlier periods in Quebec, she heard of great needs in Newfoundland and, with her usual practical approach, decided to see if she could help. She asked her hospital for a leave of absence. They said they couldn’t do that, but when she came back she would be re-employed. When she did come back, however, there was no opening for her–an early lesson on the folly of trusting in man. She found the need great, the laborers few, and the welcome in Newfoundland very warm. She lived in quarters above the assembly meeting room and plunged into girls’ clubs, Sunday School, women’s work, and visitation.
She stayed for two months, but did the same work for longer periods in 1956-57. Between 1955 and 1968, she visited Newfoundland thirteen times in all, sometimes for the whole summer and on several trips for a whole year. It was a hard life and far from “gracious living” for a young woman, but she loved it, loved the people, and was loved warmly in return. They were simple people and helped her with food and in every way they could. The diet was heavy in fish of which they brought her gifts, along with all sorts of local dishes which others might have found a little strange. In winter, it was often very cold with 40-50 mph winds blowing off the sea. In her secret diary, she says at one point, “A little girl who got saved a few days ago shyly put $2 in my hand for which I thanked God as I only had five cents left in my purse.” There were other similar gifts along the way.
During these years, she frequently visited Prince Edward Island on her journeys, cheering everyone in her path. While there on one occasion, a Christian nurse happened to mention the needs of the Magdalene Islands, governed by the province of Quebec. About 100 miles west of Newfoundland and a little north of PEI, there was virtually no evangelical work there. She knew nothing about the islands, but right away longed to tell the children about Christ. So she prayed that the Lord would supply some link as she did not know how to start. Then she heard that a sisters’ tract band in Montreal had sent literature, and had received eight requests for more from the Magdalenes. This was a start, but that was not quite enough of a linkage, though she was eager to go as soon as she had a lead.
The guidance came in an unusual way. Glancing through a copy of a now defunct home newspaper, the Family Herald, her eye caught a request for a pen-pal by a 21-year-old boy in Grindstone, The Magdalenes. She wrote to him, saying she was much too old to be his pen pal but she needed information about the islands. His mother replied, saying that her son was only 17 and the request had been sent in as a prank by a group of girls in his class to embarrass him, as he was very shy. The mother, however, gave her information and suggested she should visit them. That was enough for Marie and she jumped at the opportunity. On that first trip, she spied out the land while she labored in her usual fields. Then in 1957, and 1960-62, she spent lengthy periods there, between visits to Newfoundland. She had children’s meetings, distributed literature, visited homes, and witnessed to all who would listen. She also visited the eight women who had written to the Montreal Sisters’ Tract Band, though they were on another island. To her God’s hand was in every bit of it.
In 1961, she heard through friends in Orillia, ON, of a Huron Indian Reserve where there was no evangelistic outreach. Her immediate thought was, as she wrote in her diary, “for those children with no hope of ever hearing the gospel.” There were problems and obstructions, mostly from local religious leaders, but Marie worked her way through all that and went to teach the children the Scriptures while she lived quietly among them.
By the end of the 1970s, she settled at home (by now in California) to care for her aging mother. In 1975, most of the murderous “Charles Manson Gang” were moved to a penitentiary near her home. One of these men was saved through a prison worker, and when Marie heard of this, she started to visit him on a regular basis to be a help to him. Having proved by his completely changed life the reality of his conversion, he has a certain amount of liberty and later, though still in prison, married a fine Christian girl. Marie became a spiritual mother in the Lord to them.
All these were only branches of this unusual life. From early days she kept a “Missionary Scrap Book” with photos and facts about the workers. Linked to this was a complete “Missionary File-card System” which she regularly updated; she wrote to workers all over the world. After visiting relatives in Scotland in 1965, she went over and visited many missionaries in Portugal, France, and Belgium. All her life a stream of cheerful and encouraging letters poured out to hundreds of people for whom she prayed. Many shall “rise and call her blessed” in that day.
Ours is a day of selfish unconcern in many lives. There is also an increasing acceptance of some sort of “regular and adequate support” as automatically part of “commendation to full-time service” and, of course, a resultant spate of publicity. One stands humbled and ashamed before the life of this woman who wanted nothing and asked for nothing but to serve the Lord humbly and quietly trust Him for all her needs.
A sentence in her diary many years earlier gives a tiny window into her heart. She visited an old man on her street who was dying alone. Her comment: “When I went in he cried; when I heard two days later that he had died, I cried because I wasn’t sure where he was for eternity.”