James Chalmers was born in Scotland in 1841. He loved adventure, messing about in boats and on several occasions rescued friends from drowning. He loved danger and a good punch-up was always welcome on a Saturday night.

He attended Sunday school for a number of years and on one occasion he heard an inspiring story about missionaries who had preached the gospel to bloodthirsty cannibals on the island of Fiji. Chalmers was profoundly moved and he made an inner vow to follow in their footsteps.

In 1859, Chalmers had a powerful experience of the Holy Spirit. He became acutely aware of his sin and rebellion against God. He cried out to God and he was converted to the Christian faith. He devoured the Bible and was smitten with a passage from Revelation 22 which reads as follows:

                        The Spirit and the bride say, "Come!" And let

                        him who hears say, "Come!" Whoever is thirsty,

                        let him come; and whoever wishes, let him

                        take the free gift of the water of life.

                                                                Revelation 22:17

The Scottish lad was determined to bring many people to this living water (John 4:14) and so he embarked on missionary training.

Chalmers was a great practical joker and on one occasion he dressed up as a huge bear and terrorised the other students while they were enjoying an evening meal. Shy and withdrawn he was not. During this period of his life he met the woman who became his wife.

In 1867 he and his wife Jane travelled by ship to the Cook Islands and stayed there for ten years. It was here that Chalmers was given his nickname ‘Tamate' by the indigenous people. This experience was an excellent introduction to missionary work but Chalmers longed for greater challenges. He craved adventure, swashbuckling daring-do and he was not to be disappointed. In 1877 he and Jane were given permission to go to Papua New Guinea, located across from the northern tip of Australia. This is the second biggest island in the world after Australia. It is six times the size of England. There are amazing landscapes, tropical forests, mountains and plenty of crocodiles. The local natives, however, were not renowned for their charm, good humour and courteous conduct.

What did the locals look like? They enjoyed brandishing huge clubs, wore necklaces of human bones, displayed gaudy-coloured feathers and sported unsightly tattoos which signalled murder as a favourite pastime. Tribal disputes were invariably settled by bloodshed and victory was celebrated by an orgy of cannibalistic feasting. Some of the more depraved tribes would capture their enemies alive and would then proceed to hack off pieces of flesh while the prisoners were kept in giant larders. Sometimes the unfortunate victims would be kept alive for six or seven days!

Household decoration consisted of repulsive idols, human skulls, bones and bloodstained weapons. Many dwellings were built in the tops of trees and entire villages were often perched on stilts over the ocean water. There was a constant and unrelenting fear of enemy attack, butchery and frenzied guzzling of human flesh.

And into this pagan darkness Chalmers proclaimed the good news of the kingdom of God. He taught the natives about King Jesus and his wonderful teaching about loving your neighbours and loving your enemies. Patiently he explained to them the good news of Christ's death and resurrection. With passion and conviction he outlined the biblical drama and invited his listeners to respond. His favourite sermon always began and ended with those magnificent words from the final chapter of the book of Revelation - "Come!" Whoever is thirsty let him come....let him take the free gift of the water of life."

And they came in droves! Can you picture it? Tribes that used to spend their Sundays butchering and pillaging were now gathered together celebrating communion and hugging each other with cordial, warm embraces. Men, women and children could now enjoy a decent night's kip without the awful dread of being attacked by vicious warriors on the prowl for a late night snack. Houses could now be constructed on the ground! And idols were thrown out and pulverised. It is not difficult to imagine the peace and goodness of God invading and infusing these converted communities. Truly the kingdom of God had arrived!

Tamate was fearless as he explored the island and preached the gospel of the kingdom. He fully mastered the delicate art of ducking and diving as he proclaimed that Christ was King. He literally plucked clubs and swords out of enemy hands to save his life and the lives of his companions. In one region he so influenced the natives that peace prevailed and cannibalism ceased within five years of his coming.

In 1879, Chalmers lost his beloved wife Jane when she died. The stress and strain of life in New Guinea had proved to be too much for her. Tamate was grief-stricken but he threw himself into his missionary work.

It is hugely important to recognise that Chalmers understood his work as far broader than is often evoked by the word ‘missionary'. He was very concerned about the Royal Navy treating the natives with fairness and respect. Often he would broker deals between British officials and the former cannibals. Tamate was very concerned with the political sphere of life. He refused to privatise and spiritualise the gospel of Jesus.

In the last few years of his life Chalmers was determined to preach the gospel to the most ferocious tribes. In 1901 while he was visiting a new region, he was surrounded by practising cannibals, clubbed, beheaded and finally eaten. His body was cooked with sago and served as the main course of a celebratory feast. A most dramatic ending to a most dramatic life.

Very often we hear bad news from an African country like Uganda. We hear stories about famine, hunger, misery, warfare and man-eating lions. We see disturbing pictures on television and in newspapers but is there any good news which comes from this vast continent? The following story is full of hope and clear evidence that God is at work in a broken, groaning world.

Our story begins in a difficult and challenging time for the nation of Uganda. Picture it if you can. The year is about 1975. Innocent people are vanishing on a daily basis. Idi Amin  is the brutal and insane dictator of this benighted land. Opponents of Amin are fed to hungry crocodiles. Murder is in the air.

Little David had never known his dad. He was brought up with his brothers and sisters by his mother on a smallholding about 40 miles from Kampala in Uganda. When he was about nine years old (he isn't quite sure of his age) his mother and siblings all died of a virulent form of malaria in the space of one week.  The villagers helped him to bury his family on nearby land but none of them could adopt him as they already had too many mouths to feed.

David was alone, vulnerable and miserable. What should he do? The inspiring words of his Sunday school teacher "Trust Jesus" filled his mind. He set off for Kampala on foot   and several days later he reached this sprawling, ragged city. He knew nobody. Quickly he was adopted by other ragamuffins and shown the best places to sleep and hide from the authorities. He discovered the best spot to find food - the skip outside the kitchens at the opulent Sheraton Hotel.

A few years later the street children heard that Idi Amin's soldiers were kidnapping the

orphans and were forcing them to work on Idi's sugar plantations. David was reluctant to work for the rotund and sadistic dictator.  How could he escape a life of slavery and brutality? Christian-run businesses in Uganda are very overtly Christian and David noticed a commercial enterprise with a sign that declared: THE JESUS GARAGE.

Nervously David knocked on the door and a huge man came out and seemed startled to see the little lad at his doorstep. David remembers standing on tiptoes to try and look big and cheekily asked the imposing man for a job.  Taking pity on him, the man said he could be the sweeper and gave him an old car to sleep in - his first home for years. 

Over the next few years David became an accomplished mechanic who specialised in steering alignments. He became a committed Christian through the love and witness of the garage owner who had adopted him. The first thing he did when he had a proper pay packet was to rent a shack and adopt six homeless orphans. He met and married Sarah, a delightful and intelligent lady and they have had 8 children over the years. They adopted a further 9, making 15 adopted in all, and suddenly became aware that the kids needed schooling. They had no idea how they could feed them all but they have never starved.  People heard about David's large family and food or money arrived just when it was needed.  After theological training and ordination, David became the Diocesan Evangelist for the Central Buganda Diocese of Uganda.

At first Sarah and David started a nursery school for their children and then they invited  other local children. Then they established a primary school, of which they now have two. Then a secondary school was needed and so they set up Centenary High School.

They are now caring for and educating over 2000 children, a large percentage of whom are orphans.  Each year they expect about 30 children to be orphaned and they do not turn them out when the school fees stop coming but make more bunk beds and somehow manage to look after them. Just like George Muller, the famous orphan lover of 19^th century England, David and Sarah experience amazing provision from God. Money, food and clothing simply appear - often at the last possible moment.

In recent years David and Sarah have built a maize mill with funds from a Bristol

church which provides income and work for his orphans and staff. He has also bought a satellite dish and shows live football games to the local people, charging a small entrance fee to help towards the costs of the school.  He is also constructing the "Double Cure Medical Centre" near Mpigi which is where Centenary High School is based. David and Sarah are concerned about every aspect of the lives of their colourful and vibrant community. Loving families, education, maize mills, hospitals and the beautiful game. What a contrast to the brutal and devastating legacy of Idi Amin.

David prefers to be called by his nickname ‘Romans' and he is a man of integrity and entrepreneurial excellence. He is a Director of the Open Air Campaigners movement in Uganda and in recent months has been asked to organize the evangelization of the entire Buganda-speaking area which consists of six dioceses. His life is a thrilling and exciting adventure. An inspiration to Christians everywhere!

Mark Roques is a tutor for the West Yorkshire School of Christian Studies. For more inspiring stories check out his website -

http://www.markroques.com/

Catherine Booth was born in Derbyshire in 1829. When she was a young girl the family moved to the East End of London. She was a committed Christian and by the age of twelve she had read the Bible eight times! Not bad for a cockney sparrow. She was particularly concerned for the weak and the powerless and on one occasion she became incensed with a policeman who had arrested and abused a drunken member of the ‘lower orders'.

In 1852 Catherine met William Booth, the future founder of the Salvation Army. William believed passionately that Christians should be busy "loosing the chains of injustice, freeing the captive and oppressed, sharing food and home, clothing the naked, and carrying out family responsibilities."

Catherine shared William's commitment to social justice but disagreed with his views on women. On one occasion she chided William when he declared that women were the "weaker sex". Catherine was having none of it.

Despite their disagreements about the role of women in the church, the couple married on 16th June 1855. It was not until 1860 that Catherine first started to preach. One day in church, a strange compulsion seized her and she felt she must rise and speak. Later she recalled how an inner voice taunted her: "You will look like a fool and have nothing to say". Catherine decided that this was the Devil's voice. The 'father of lies' Mr B.L. Zebub was up to his usual tricks; a Molotov cocktail of lies, accusations and ridicule!

Catherine's sermon was a cracker and William soon changed his mind about women preachers. Catherine was now developing a reputation as an outstanding speaker but many Christians were outraged by her preaching. Many contended that a woman's place was in the home fully absorbed in the domestic activities of cooking, cleaning and giving suck to immature progeny.

In 1864 the couple set up the Christian Mission which later became known as the Salvation Army. Catherine Booth took a leading role in these revival services and could often be seen preaching in the dockland parishes of the East End. Many cockney lads and laddettes responded positively to her winsome and winning way with words.

The Church of England were at first extremely hostile to the Salvation Army. Lord Shaftesbury, a leading Christian politician and factory reformer, described William Booth as the "Anti-Christ". Harsh words indeed! One of the main complaints against William Booth was his "elevation of women to man's status". In the Salvation Army a woman officer enjoyed equal rights with a man. Although William Booth had initially rejected the idea of women preachers, he had now completely changed his mind and wrote that "the best men in my Army are the women."

Catherine established what became known as Food-for-the-Million Shops where the poor could buy hot soup and a three-course dinner for sixpence. On special occasions such as Christmas Day, Catherine Booth would cook over 300 dinners to be distributed to some of the poorest people living in London.  

By 1882 a survey of London discovered that on one weeknight, there were almost 17,000 people worshipping with the Salvation Army, compared to 11,000 in ordinary churches. Even, Dr. William Thornton, the Archbishop of York, had to accept that the Salvation Army was reaching people that the Church of England had failed to have any impact on.

It was while working with the poor and needy that Catherine found out about what was known as "sweated labour". What on earth is that I hear you cry? Picture it for a moment. Women and children working painfully long hours for miserable wages in horrible conditions. The Bible calls a spade a spade; this is a clear manifestation of the kingdom of darkness (Colossians 1:13).

In the tenements of London, Catherine discovered exhausted, red-eyed women sewing and stitching for eleven hours a day. These cockney ‘birds' were only being paid 9d. a day, whereas men doing the same work in a factory were receiving over 3s. 6d. Catherine and William attempted to shame employers into paying better wages. They also struggled to improve the working conditions of these female slaves.

Catherine Booth was particularly concerned about the women who were employed by match factories. A match can be described as a tool for producing fire under controlled circumstances on demand. Matches are readily available, being sold in tobacconists, newsagents and other shops. A match is typically a wooden stick or stiff paper stick coated at one end (the match end) with a material often containing the element phosphorus, that will ignite from the heat of friction if rubbed against a suitable surface. Matches are often purchased by consumers who enjoy lighting bonfires, cigarettes and pipes but do we ever ponder the sin and depravity that can accompany their manufacture?

The match girls were only earning 1s. 4d. for a sixteen hour day. They were also risking their health when they dipped the match-heads in the yellow phosphorus supplied by manufacturers such as Bryant & May. A large number of these women suffered from 'Phossy Jaw' (necrosis of the bone) caused by the toxic fumes of the yellow phosphorus. The whole side of the face turned green and then black, discharging foul-smelling pus and then the match girls died.

Women like Catherine Booth and Annie Besant led a campaign against the use of yellow phosphorus. They pointed out that most other European countries produced matches tipped with harmless red phosphorus. Bryant & May responded that these matches were more expensive and that consumers would be unwilling to pay these higher prices. In other words profits were more important than ‘disposable' working class cockney sparrows.

Catherine, along with other evangelicals like Josephine Butler and William Stead, was also appalled by the "white slave trade", a Victorian euphemism for child prostitution. Wicked people would kidnap and force destitute girls into a life of prostitution that was nearly impossible to escape. Catherine and her husband exposed the white slave trade in England. Three hundred and ninety-six thousand signatures later, they saw the practice outlawed. The Booths believed that this kind of political activity was an essential part of their Christian witness.

Catherine died of cancer in October 1890. The campaigns that were started by Catherine were not abandoned. William Booth was determined to force companies to abandon the use of yellow phosphorus. In 1891 the Salvation Army opened its own match-factory in Old Ford, East London. Only using harmless red phosphorus, the workers were soon producing six million boxes a year. Whereas Bryant & May paid their workers just over twopence a gross, the Salvation Army paid their employees twice this amount!  

William Booth encouraged MPs and journalists to visit this 'model' factory. He also took them to the homes of those "sweated workers" who were working eleven and twelve hours a day producing matches for companies like Bryant & May. The bad publicity that Bryant & May received forced the company to reconsider its actions. In 1901, Gilbert Bartholomew, managing director of Bryant & May, announced that the firm had stopped using yellow phosphorus. Catherine's hard work had produced copious quantities of ripe, luscious, attractive fruit (Mark 4:8).

Catherine Booth had eight children, all of whom were active in the Salvation Army. William Bramwell Booth (1856-1929) was chief of staff from 1880 and succeeded his father as general in 1912. Catherine's second son, Ballington Booth (1857-1940), was commander of the army in Australia (1883-1885) and the USA (1887-1896). One of her daughters, Evangeline Cora Booth (1865-1950) was elected General of the USA in 1934.