Opposition from within...

William Carey (1761 - 1834) was a missionary to India who faced great opposition against his desire to go to India. Strangely and sadly this opposition came from other church people.

Carey became associated with a group of particular Baptists and acquainted with men like Andrew Fuller and John Ryland.  Carey had a burning desire for the souls of men and wanted to go to India to spread the gospel.  He argued that Jesus' Great Commission applied to all Christians of all times, and he castigated fellow believers of his day for ignoring it: “Multitudes sit at ease and give themselves no concern about the far greater part of their fellow sinners, who to this day, are lost in ignorance and idolatry.” 

When Carey submitted the subject of world missions for discussion at a ministers' meeting, “Whether the command given to the apostles to teach all nations was not obligatory on all succeeding ministers to the end of the world, seeing that the accompanying promise was of equal extent.”  Dr. Ryland shouted, "Young man, sit down: when God pleases to covert the heathen, He will do it without your aid or mine."