MARI JONES AND THOMAS CHARLES

WORLD COMMUNION SUNDAY
Reading: Psalm 19:7-10, Joshua 1:6-8, John 7:37-43, Romans 10:9-15
Preached at First Presbyterian Church, Baldwin, NY, on October 2nd 2011

A printable PDF file can be downloaded here

We all have things that we take for granted. We expect trains to arrive when we are waiting for them. We expect there to be food in the shops. We expect electricity to be provided in our homes. We expect water to come out of the tap when we turn it on. When things don’t run properly we are reminded of how important they are. In our better moments we even remember that there are many in our world that would consider what we call basic necessities to be luxuries.

Transport, Food, Medicine, Utilities… we take them for granted. But there’s something else that we take for granted; that we may not be so aware of. And that is this…. Our Bibles. Bibles today are so easy for us to find. We can go online and read scripture. You can go to almost any bookshop and find copies available for less than 10 dollars. If you go to a hotel you often find one in the drawer, provided by organizations like the Gideons.

But that has not always been so. If you go back a few centuries the only Bibles you could find would be chained to the pulpit in a church… and the only people granted access to them would be the clergy or the wealthy. In many countries today access to the bible is still restricted, either because the politics of the region or because the bible has yet to be translated into the language of that country.

So this morning I wanted to tell you a true story about a little girl who lived in the part of the world I came from before moving to the USA, the land of Wales. The girls’ name was Mari Jones and she was born on the 16th December 1784 in a small village called Llanfihangel-y-Pennant, at the foot of a mountain called Cader-Idris.

Now back in those days there were very few schools in country areas but a man named Thomas Charles had begun what were known as ‘Circulating Schools’… teachers who could travel from village to village teaching children to read and write and learn the basics of arithmetic and other subjects.

When Mari was eight years old a school was established about an hours walk away from her home. Every day school was in session she would walk the hour it took to get there, stay as long as she could, and then walk back home again. She quickly began to read and her favorite books to read were the books of the Bible. She wished she had a Bible of her own, but they were a poor family and there was no way they could spend all their money on such a thing.

A neighbor though did have a Bible, and every Saturday afternoon Mari went to read Mrs. Evans' Bible for several hours. Mrs. Evans was not poor like the Jones’s, and lived in a house filled with beautiful things. The comfort and riches around her, however, did not distract Mari. She read through book after book of the Bible.

One day as Mari was doing her chores, washing her family's clothes in the river, she had the idea that she could earn some money by washing for other people and save enough money for a Bible of her own. When Mrs. Evans heard of Mari's plan, she gave Mari some chickens to raise. When the chickens became hens, Mari could earn money by selling the eggs. Mari soon found other ways for earning money too; looking after children, weeding gardens, knitting socks.

It took Mari six years of working and saving until she had enough money to be able to afford a Bible. When she asked at school where she could buy one, the only place that sold them was the hometown of Thomas Charles, the founder of the circulating schools which was in a town called Bala, which was a long way to travel.

After six years of scrimping and saving Mari wasn’t going to let that stop her. In the summer of 1800, when just sixteen years old, Mary set out alone on the twenty-five mile journey over the mountains to Bala. Because she was worried about wearing out her shoes, most of the way she carried them and went barefoot.

There was a friend of her family who lived in Bala, who was able to take her to meet Mr. Charles. Mari was exhausted, but excited, because they had heard that Thomas Charles had just received a new shipment of Welsh Bibles from London.
Mari was introduced to Mr. Charles and she made her request.

But Thomas Charles only had one Bible left, and had told somebody else they could have it. Weary from her travelling poor Mari couldn’t hold back the tears. The look of disappointment on Mari’s face caused Mr. Charles to think again and he decided that Mari’s need was far greater than the person he was holding it for. So Mary had her bible…. and walked the 25 miles back to her home in Llanfihangel-y-Pennant, this time carrying both her shoes and her newly aquired treasure!

There are things we take for granted. The Bible surely is one of them. But our story isn’t over yet. Mari’s journey had more of an impact than she could ever have imagined.

Thomas Charles was an influential minister and his heart was greatly moved by Mary’s passion to have a Bible in her own language for her self. The next year he was in London and shared with some fellow ministers the story of Mary and her quest for a Bible of her own. He gathered together a group of leaders and business folk, from across the denominational spectrum; Episcopalians and Baptists and Methodists and Presbyterians and Congregationalists.

On March 7, 1804, the British and Foreign Bible Society was formed "for the wider distribution of the Scriptures, without note or comment." Their concern became distributing Bibles throughout the whole world, and within a few months the Gospel of John was issued in the Mohawk language. They continued to translate and distribute Scriptures. By 1907, the BFBS had distributed 203,931,768 Bibles, Testaments and portions of Scripture all over the world.

The work of the Bible Society continues today. More than half the world’s 6,912 languages still wait for even one book of the Bible. They are presently involved in more than 550 translation and re-translation projects, bringing the Bible for the first time to those who have never been able to hear or read it in a language they understand.

They are also aware that for millions, having the Bible in a printed format is of little or no help at all for those who don’t read, and those who are visually or aurally handicapped. So they also work to make Bibles available though audio, Braille and sign language. Aware that billions of people in our world live in poverty they seek to make scriptures available at no charge to those who could never afford to buy a bible in their own language. The spark that set the whole movement in motion? A little girl in a small Welsh village who simply wanted a bible of her own!

What became of Mari? She later married a weaver of Bryn-Crug named Thomas Lewis. She died in 1864 and was buried at the graveyard of Bryn-Crug Calvinistic Methodist Chapel. The bible she obtained from Thomas Charles is now kept at the British and Foreign Bible Society's Archives in Cambridge University Library. Written by her own hand on the inside cover it reads;
‘I Bought this in the 16th year of my age. I am Daughter of Jacob Jones and Mary Jones His wife. The Lord may give me grace. Amen.’

Where the cottage once stood in her village there is now a memorial obelisk that has inscribed upon it; -

IN MEMORY OF MARY JONES, WHO IN
THE YEAR 1800, AT THE AGE OF 16 WALKED
FROM HERE TO BALA, TO PROCURE FROM THE
REVD. THOMAS CHARLES, B.A.
A COPY OF THE WELSH BIBLE. THIS INCIDENT
WAS THE OCCASION OF THE FORMATION OF
THE BRITISH AND FOREIGN BIBLE SOCIETY.
ERECTED BY THE SUNDAY SCHOOLS OF MERIONETH

Our Scripture reading this morning contained the words of Romans 10:15 "How beautiful are the feet of those who bring glad tidings of good things!" The beautiful tired feet of Mary Jones launched a worldwide movement to make the Scriptures available to all. We are fortunate in so many ways. We live in a nation blessed with unimaginable riches. Amongst those riches are Bibles, freely and easily available to each one of us.

One of things our Bibles teach us is that Jesus asked that we remember His love by gathering around a table laid with bread and wine. All around the world people will be doing so, in their own lands and hearing the good news of Jesus love in their own languages.

So today I invite you to join with a vast community of the present, the past and the future around this table, around the world, to pray for peace and seek the love of God to strengthen us in the journey we make together.

Rev. Adrian J. Pratt