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Daisy Barclay died in November, just a few weeks after her 100th birthday.

Born in 1916 in the east end of London, Daisy Emma Barclay (née Hickey) was the youngest of seven children. After the death of her mother, when aged two, she was fostered by a Baptist couple in Cheshire. Through them she came to faith in Christ.

Joan served with China Inland Mission (CIM) as an evangelist from September 1945 until her expulsion from China in April 1951.

She continued as a missionary, working in Thailand with OMF International, until her ‘retirement’ in 1983. In her 70s and 80s she was able to return to China on short-term teams, teaching English. Her biography, Point Me to the Skies (Monarch Publications), was published in 2007.

Ray Porter

Date posted: 1 Jan 2017

Adèle MacBeath was set on an academic career in the early 1960s. An MA graduate from Glasgow University with a double first, she then completed an MLitt on the Italian author Lampedusa and had embarked on doctoral studies in Rome when God intervened to redirect her life into missionary service.

She had fallen in love with David Ellis, a student at the Bible Training Institute, where her father, Andrew MacBeath, was Principal.

Audrey Laura Osei-Mensah was born in East Ham and professed faith in Christ aged 14, through her confirmation class in Wanstead. In 1955 she went up to Birmingham University to read geography. As she wrote in her memoirs: ‘It was during my first year that Bible study replaced geography as my first love, which it has remained ever since!’

She served on the Birmingham CU Exec alongside a thoughtful student from Ghana: Gottfried Osei-Mensah, with whom she maintained a friendship while teaching at Clarendon School from 1959 to 1962. In 1962 she applied for a position with SIM in Nigeria, whereupon Gottfried, by now with Mobil Oil in Accra, proposed to her. At her father’s suggestion, she first went to Ghana for three months to get to know Gottfried’s family and context. They married the following year.

Jim Sayers

Date posted: 1 Oct 2016

Roger’s great contribution in his many years of service was developing radio ministry in both France and Francophone Africa.

Known widely among Grace Baptist churches for his work in GBM Radio at Abingdon, he and his wife Helen began their missionary service in Belgium. In 1967 they were the first GBM missionaries to be sent into Europe by their church in Hounslow, as GBM adopted a church-based approach to mission. In 1969 they moved to Mons, where they worked to plant a church, coming face to face with the growing ‘practical atheism’ of an otherwise Catholic culture.

Paul Yeulett

Date posted: 1 Jun 2016

On 8 April 2016, Dr Enid Parker, known as ‘Asamolta’ or the ‘Red Lioness’ to the Afar people of East Africa, went to be with the Lord she served for so long.

By the time she was born in Edenfield in Lancashire in 1920, her father’s health had been ruined by the Great War; he died when Enid was only seven. Her mother was unable to care for Enid and her two brothers, who were all cared for by relatives.

Ghana’s First Lady, Ernestina Mills, described Nigel Sylvester as ‘Ghana’s Wesley’. His influence was to spread across English-speaking Africa and then across the world.

Nigel Sylvester professed faith in Christ as a fresher in the Cambridge 1949 Barnhouse mission; shortly afterwards he lost both his parents in an aircrash. As a very young Christian, Nigel followed Mike Griffiths as CICCU President. With a First in Maths, he entered Ridley Hall with Mike Griffiths (later General Director of OMF) and Michael Allison (later PPS to Margaret Thatcher). Breaking with precedent, none was ordained.

On Tuesday 22 August almost 500 people packed into a church in South Bristol. Was this for a person with an international ministry, or for someone well known within the Christian community? Well no, actually. The Thanksgiving service was for Elaine Todman, the wife of Neil, the lead pastor of Headley Park Church.

Elaine became a Christian at the age of 16 through the witness of a friend at school and through a Billy Graham campaign.

Monty Barker was born in Glasgow on 12 March 1934. After studying classics he turned to a career in medicine, training at St Andrews and Dundee.

In 1954 he was diagnosed with TB meningitis and for one month was expected to die. He recovered and a career in psychiatry followed, partly though the advice of a senior college who told him ‘You don’t have to be bonkers to become a psychiatrist’. He was appointed as a consultant in Bristol, where junior staff and medical students found him an excellent teacher, although at times quite intimidating.

Clifford Pond grew up in Welwyn Garden City, his father was an itinerant preacher and Clifford came to faith at quite an early age and had a strong impression that one day he too would be a minister of the gospel.

He left school at 14 and worked as a messenger boy for the GPO. At the start of the Second World War he joined St John Ambulance Brigade and then transferred to the RAF Medical Service.

Ken Wycherley served with UCCF from 1975 to 1989, first as a Travelling Secretary, then on the senior staff team.

In the early 1980s he played a strategic role in restructuring the student department to meet the needs of rapid growth in the tertiary sector. Ken’s clarity of thought was appreciated by staff and student leaders alike, as policies and guidance were formulated on a range of campus issues. He always retained a strong commitment to evangelism and mission.

Pastor Harry Waite was called into the Lord’s presence on August 19, aged 91.

He was one of those men who came under the influence of Doctor Martyn Lloyd-Jones at Westminster Chapel during the 1940s and 1950s and embraced the Reformed doctrines in a way that then shaped his preaching throughout his long ministry.

Steve Metcalf, OMF International missionary to Japan for 38 years and a pastor of the Japanese Christian Fellowship, London, died on June 7, aged 86.

As a teenager Steve was interned by the Japanese, following their occupation of north China, during the Second World War. In his first internment camp Steve made a personal commitment to Christ. In a second camp at Weifang, Shandong Province, Steve met the Olympic gold-medallist, Eric Liddell, who had a profound influence on his life.

The Revd Dr Ian Malcolm Tait, a true man of God, died on December 17, 2013.

He was formerly pastor of Welwyn Evangelical Church (1950-80) and before that of the FIEC church in Hurstpierpoint. He was elected President of the FIEC in 1969. He also served as a visiting lecturer at Covenant Theological College.

Ray Porter

Date posted: 1 Jan 2014

‘In life they were loved and gracious and in death they were not parted’ (2 Samuel 1.23) could be applied to Guy and Barbara Longley, who died within 24 hours of each other on November 7 and 8.

They met as members of the last group of CIM missionaries to go into China in 1949. Guy was from Broadstairs in Kent and his three brothers also served as missionaries. Barbara (née Beck) was a nurse from Ontario, Canada. They married in Hong Kong in 1951.

Elizabeth Margaret Braund MBE passed away on May 20 at her home, East Shallowford Farm on Dartmoor.

She was 91 years old. Born in Kensington in 1921, she was the only child of His Honour Judge Sir Henry and Lady Margaret Braund. Her early years and life experiences in India and Burma encouraged her ability to think critically and after the war she began to work for the BBC, writing scripts and undertaking research. One unlikely research project was the history of the Bible for a radio series, but under God this began the journey that led to her life’s work.