This is Mr Timms.
I want to share his life’s story as told in his eulogy.
His eulogy was written by Pastor Wyeth, the then-pastor of Brimpton Baptist Church. That was the church I grew up in and where I later was the pastor for 7 years.
Wyeth took the pastorate at Brimpton temporarily around 1935 and his temporary ministry lasted until the 1980s. He took the office upon the counsel of his friend, Samuel Pearce Carey, descendent of William Carey and author of his biography.
Before I share the eulogy I want to note a couple of things. Wyeth pastored a small church in the middle of nowhere and he kept the doors open. The church has never been large and made little impact outside of its immediate village. But it has been a lighthouse for nearly 200 years and continues faithful to this day.
Its strength has been in the salt-of-the-earth types personified by the likes of Mr. Timms. I’ll let Pastor Wyeth describe Timms with an eloquence I’ve rarely seen.
Mr Timms died almost 40 years before I was born. But I did meet two of his children who still attended the church in the 1980s.
Finally, Wyeth’s writing never ceases to amaze me. He served in a little village in the middle of nowhere, but he did not let that stifle his studying or striving for excellence. Pastor, you must grow in grace and knowledge of our Savoir and His Word, but also of the world in which He has placed you.
I have to say, I’m looking forward to seeing Mr Timms and Pastor Wyeth in heaven one day and shaking their hands.
Both men amaze me for different reasons. They were kind of opposites in many ways, but the hearts and lives of both men are challenging me tonight.
Wyeth’s love for the Lord, his eloquence, and education…
Timms’ love for the Lord, simplicity, faithfulness…
God give us such men in pulpit and pew.
John Timms Senior died 12th March, 1943.
Funeral Service 16th March
Memorial Service 21st March both in the church.
Memorial service preached by our pastor.
How shall he become wise that holds the plough?
Ecclesiasticus 8:25 (Apocrypha)
On the banks of the River Nile lies the land of Egypt, famous for its pyramids, the sphinx are the products and pride of the great civilisation of the near east. From early times Egypt was a land a wonderful achievement, and with a spade of the discoverer has laid bare many of its secrets.
In the infancy of man Egypt was the home of what is called the “old civilisation”. In the six the dynasty, when the pyramids were being built a wonderful adventure took place. By this time Egyptian craftsmen had reached a high degree of excellence in their work. Over them stood their rulers, known as the “children of the son.” These “children of the son” conceived the idea of venturing beyond the seas to plant their civilisation wherever they might find land.
So they went out, like Abraham of old, not knowing whether they went, impelled by the spirit of adventure, carrying with them the secrets of their craft and culture. They were seeking for gold, pearls, copper, jade because they regarded their substance as being ‘givers of life’. The range which they penetrated is amazing. Their megalithic monuments had been found as far away Ceylon. The Indian shores bear witness to the extent of their voyaging.
But who sustained them on their efforts? They depended upon thousands and thousands of common folk who tilled the soil and produced the wealth to finance this far flung effort. We still may look upon the ancient pictures depicting the workers in their fields ploughing, sowing, reaping. Rich where their cornfields, as Israel found it was proverbial, ‘there was corn in Egypt’.
The ‘children of the son ‘depended upon those sons of the soil who created their wealth and made possible the series of widespread adventure in the wider world.
We are gathered here today to keep only the remembrance of one who would well have understood the life of those ancient Egyptian sons of the soil.
John Timms was a veritable son of the soil. His early life was spent in an apprenticeship to it, and the conditions were so different from those of today. The lessons he applied in manhood were learnt at the lap of stern necessity in his early youth.
From time to time I learn from him the story of his early experiences. It was over 60 years ago that he came to Brimpton, so we may say that he had in early life long experience of the land. He knew nature in all its varying aspects through spring and in summer, autumn and winter he wrestled in toil that the fields might yield their increase. Giving bread to the sower and fodder for the cattle.
His daily study was not in books, save for one, the book of books, but of the physical forces of the earth in order that he might cooperate with the power God had implanted in the soil. He knew that a nature could only be controlled by obeying her. That only patience could perfect his work, and that experience proved the truth of the Lord’s the Beatitude ‘the meek shall inherit the earth’.
It was in this spirit that he put his hand to the plough, sowed or reaped and devoted himself in his later life to his favourite pastime of caring for the calves.
There was another truth which he grasped in his manly way. It is expressed in a handbook of the Roman poet Virgil written for farmers at the request of the Roman government in the words ‘that all things yield to toil’.
John Timms believed in work and not only believed in it, he did it with his own hands. He was tireless in industry. He realized that ‘Satan often finds some mischief for idle hands to do’. He taught by example and would not ask others to do that which he would not do himself. He was a manly man of great strength of body and of mind, but strength touched with gentleness.
“The bruised reed he would not break nor quench the smoking flax.”
Friendly, but reserved, with a countrymen’s caution, he did not dare his heart upon his sleeve. He never went from his appointed place and would have agreed with William Cowper that ‘God made the country, but man made in the town.’ What wonder then that health and virtue should be found and least be threatened in the fields and groves.
The sense of duty was strong in him as his record of service in the village testifies. He was the witness of many and great social changes and often he expressed his satisfaction with the betterment of social conditions.
Once when the sermon of a lay preacher on Amos was being discussed he made this clear. The lay preacher had forcibly expressed his agreement with Amos passion for social righteousness. It had been suggested that this sort of thing ought to be kept out of sermons. But John Timms would have none of it, he pointed out in his homely way that it was always a good thing for a young man to experience life in the light of Bible teaching. Oppression was always against God’s will.
Moses had been called by God to deliver Israel from social bondage in Egypt. He was thankful that the hard and unjust times of his youth had past and that men were living under better conditions. Justice and righteousness were cardinal principles for him. It was important he thought that “a man should be expanded in thought by the right party because that takes you a smartish way in life’. It was characteristic of him to be prepared to learn from others as well as
from nature.
But John Timms was more than a son of the soil. He reached beyond nature to natures’ God. Beyond human nature to Him who had redeemed it. He had a profound conviction that a man’s life was more than food and clothing. His mind was not exhausted in the practice of his craft as a Farmer. Like Isaac he meditated in the fields and even tied and saw the outlines of eternity. Beyond his own family he saw and served the wider family of his heavenly father. He knew that man was more than flesh and blood. That the immortal spirit in man is the candle of the Lord.
Life was more than a passage of time between the cradle and the grave. It was the vale of soul making and the spirits of the just were on their probation and for them for a more enduring endless hereafter life beyond. He understood the great truth enshrined in the ancient Genesis story of man’s creation, that God had made man in his own image. If he saw the finger of God directing the stars in their courses he also heard the authentic voice of God speaking in his own conscience and declared in majesty in the pages of his Bible.
The necessities of life made him a son of the soil, destined to toil, dependent for his living upon the land, but he was also well aware that by the gift of divine free pardoning grace he had been made a son of the loving God. A partaker in the inheritance of the sons of light. His conviction of sonship by adoption into the family of God was the mainspring of his life. How then did he whose hand held the plough, find this wisdom?
On May 4th, 1879, two brothers, John and Jospeh Timms, made profession of their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, in this church at Brimpton. They were Baptised having been buried with Christ in baptism and having risen with Him in fellowship in His mystic body, the church.
Joseph was afterward, in May 1883, to emigrate to New Zealand to find his fortune in the world. John remained to be a pillar in the house of his God for nearly 64 years. What kind of experience underlay the public profession of faith by these 2 young men? I do not know the story concerning Joseph, but his brother’s story I head from his own lips some years ago amid the beauty of Easter flowers. There is a phrase in his story about the promise Christ made to him on that eventful night, “I have promise to keep thee.” This promise was abundantly fulfilled in the years of his experience.
Simple, yet profound, straightforward and strong as his character, so was his conversion. How deep and real that experience must have been to keep him in his long and faithful years of service!
Shall we wonder if it was daily renewed in his habit of devotion? He who held the plough proved wiser than Nicodemus, for he knew he must be born from above. From that day forward, he went straight on never forswearing that allegiance. He had seen the King in His beauty and knew that no man putting his hand to the plough and looking back was fit for the kingdom.
He knew the transforming power. All was changed for him; all was made new for he too was a new creature formed to reveal the story. The old law was done away in a new. “A life for a life, and eye for an eye,” was the old principle of righteousness and served the old people of God. “A life for a life” was the new principle of the new people of God. The difference was that Jesus had come and had given a new understanding. It was expressed in the words above the altar in Saint Paul’s Cathedral, “God so loved the World that He gave His Son.”
He could say with St. Paul, “the Son of God loved me and gave himself for me.” A life for a life, yes, his life must be given to the Lord. So he lived a dedicated life. He was not his own. He was bought with a price. He served under an obedience, yet by the perfect law of liberty He was free.
As church member, Sunday School worker, Secretary and Treasurer of this church, as Deacon, he was a pillar of the church. Set up as a Witness in this village to bespeak the infinite mercy and to declare the power and peace of a devout and holy life. Constant in attendance at worship he knew the mystery of applied godliness.
“Old friends old scenes will loveless be
As more of Thee in each we see
Some softening gleam of love and prosper
Will down on every cross and care.”
But God not only met him in the appointed place, or in the home or in the fields, He had placed a guide book in his hands. Many times have I seen him with his Bible before him, as he went over the promises of God and drew life from the book of life. He knew the Bible. The figures in its pages were living men and women to him. They were of his world and spoke his language.
It was on the Bible that he modelled his prayers, he often led us in prayer at the Communion Service and opened up to us the glory of the Mercy Seat. “Keep me as the apple of your eye” was a touching and a favourite phrase. It echoed his daily converse with His Father in Heaven.
Fredrich Heiler in his masterly study of Prayer thought the angels speak of the payers of those great men the prophets of old. Recounts the sense of a loving and creative experience which was theirs in prayer. So with our own John Timms. Prayer for him was creation of new power, new zest, new joy.
His power to surmount obstacles was nowhere better shown than in his reaction to his serious accident in 1938. He turned his necessity to glorious gain. His sojourn in hospital made him less reserved, more than ever deeply grateful for every kindness shown. During his period of convalescence in hospital the Sister in charge said he often witnessed to the other patients of the faith that was in him. When Dr. S Pearce Carey met him last year, I thought of the words on the title page of Pearce Carey’s book “Jesus” how they applied especially to both men:
An aged man is but a paltry thing
A tattered coat upon a stick unless
Soul clap its hands and sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress.
John Timms louder sang as life went on, for his soul was in harmony with the Divine purpose. This was how he answered the ancient Hebrew question.
He found wisdom, as he followed the plough, by following His Incarnate Lord.
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