The Life And Ministry Of Griffiths Vaughan

Gospel Standard 1958:

William Bailey Griffiths Vaughan died on 26th January.

From his own writings the following paragraphs are extracted:—

“Brought up under the truth at Zoar Chapel, Bradford, Yorks, I was from early youth accustomed to hear the faithful proclamation of the gospel, which my carnal nature often resented and upon which its enmity often sat in judgment. In about my seventeenth year, the sudden affliction of my dear father brought me to my knees for the first time in earnest prayer in felt helplessness.” 

After his father’s death he studied with a view to entering the teaching profession, but after a course of three years at Liverpool University, he was unsuccessful in one subject. Of this he thus writes: “This bitter disappointment and shame was indeed a precious mercy of the Lord’s appointment. My schemes were overturned, projects crossed, gourds blasted. I had tried to ask the Lord for success, but He withheld this favour for seven years. How hard it was to discern the Lord’s hand for good!”

In 1916 he was called to the forces and joined the army, being wounded in 1917, and after many months in hospital was discharged in 1918. During hospital treatment he was favoured in soul, and wrote: “I had such a sense of the love of God and the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ as I have never had before nor since [written in 1932]. Also these words: ‘They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.’ Oh what hope was revived! He had weakened my strength in the way. Surely before honour is humility. Humbled under a sense of His love and mercy, I indeed wept for joy!” After discharge from the army he was enabled to sit again and passed the examination “through the help of God”. “Thus,” he continues, “we have been taught of the Lord through bitter experience that in our blindness He led us in a path we had not known. He made darkness light before us, and crooked things straight.”

He was baptized in 1919, being constrained to return to Bradford from Bishops Stortford where he had a teaching post, by the words: “Arise, go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do; “and having felt under Mr. Booth’s preaching: “This God is our God for ever and ever.” “Having arisen and gone into the city,” writes Mr. Vaughan, “I thought this was all I had to do; having no thoughts at that time of the public ministry. As time went on, however, such a course seemed suggested to my mind more and more forcibly. I begged the Lord that if this were His will, would he exercise others about me? I felt I could not broach the solemn matter myself. About this time there came a letter from the deacons at Southport. They felt the Lord had a work for me to do. Would I consult Mr. Booth and should the church at Bradford be agreeable, would I go and preach for them in January, 1920? Mr. Booth was not surprised, and said with my permission he would lay it before the deacons; which he did. As a result, I was given permission to go to Southport, with their prayers and wishes; and at our next church meeting the matter would be brought up.” Mr. Vaughan then describes his relating before the church his exercises and thereafter preaching three Thursday evenings at Bradford; then at a church meeting on 7th March he was sanctioned to go forth to preach the gospel “wherever and whenever a call should be made upon him”; the church minute concluding with the desire “that he may be made an honoured instrument in the hands of the Lord for the spiritual welfare of the churches where he supplied”.

Extracts from notes by Mr. Walshaw (present Pastor at Bradford}:

“The wise fatherly counsel of Mr. Booth was as freely given as it was freely received by Mr. Vaughan, and how much this was needed in the arduous duties which fell upon him at Mr. Booth’s death in 1928! It was to Mr. Vaughan that the Bradford church looked for ministerial and secretarial work during the long years between 1928 and 1945…Mr. Vaughan’s pastorate at Zoar was short. (He was instated in 1946.) Nevertheless to a group of young believers who had received blessings under his ministry, it was an answer to prayer…There are still a few left in the north who can look back to those spots and places where under the felt presence of the Lord they proved Mr. Vaughan’s ministry to be a savour of life unto life.”

In 1950 Mr. Vaughan “notified the church that in the near future he contemplated moving south, should the way be opened “mentioning his own health and that of his wife, and the Scripture which was on his mind: “It is expedient for you that I go away.” He seems to have been very discouraged and wrote: “I feel in bondage to the things that are seen empty pews, unresponsive hearts, fears for the future which at times looks so unpromising. I feel so taken up with many things about the gospel rather than with the gospel and its glorious Lord…Satan seems, as ever, to work on our feelings, and we pray that the Spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him.” In that same year he was, however, given a gracious seal, and baptized his last member at Zoar who had been blessed under his ministry.

A few notes by Mrs. Vaughan:—

“My dear husband was taken ill on Wednesday, 22nd January, but after medical aid he seemed slowly to improve; but there was a consciousness that he was deeply exercised. He wanted to be alone. One feels he thought his end might be near; he was troubled about his engagements with the churches. On Lord’s Day (26th) there was felt a solemn awe about the house. He felt several engagements should be cancelled. Then afterwards, he said: ‘I think my work is done; they had better all be cancelled. These engagements are made only provisionally only, If the Lord will. I have laboured nearly forty years. I know I have not been a big light in the ministry, but I have filled many a gap, and maybe I have been a help to a few. I am quite resigned now to what the Lord has willed for me.’ He then closed his eyes and repeated the verse:

‘When this poor lisping, stammering tongue

Lies silent in the grave,

Then in a nobler sweeter song

I’ll sing Thy power to save.’

“He got up during the afternoon, and asked for his large print Bible; but remarked the words were blurred. He sat some time with his eyes closed, as though in prayer. About an hour later he quietly passed into the presence of his Lord. In his pocket diary for January 10th is written: ‘A sweet savour resting on my spirit. My Beloved is mine, and I am His.’ We truly deeply mourn a gracious, helpful, loving partner, but have to say: ‘Although our cup seems filled with gall, There’s something secret sweetens all’.”

Mr. Burgess, Pastor at Bournemouth, writes: “Ever since they were led to Bournemouth seven years ago, Mr. Vaughan has been a great help to us. He was often tried about his ministry, but often helped in it; he was much esteemed by the friends, being used of the Lord to help His tried ones. His sudden death came as a shock. It has been an unbroken friendship, a oneness of mind and spirit in the truth. He is much missed.”