If sacrificial service for others be a mark of a living church, the brethren of the Baptist faith manifested its spirit early.
Time was necessary to permit of the growth of the organism before a church could venture with effect on missionary activity, and hence individual effort led the way. A zeal for the salvation of his fellows burned in the heart of Henry David Inglis, and in 1783 he was set apart by the Edinburgh church to preach the gospel in the surrounding towns and villages – a work to which he devoted himself twice or thrice a week after discharging his daily duties.
The spiritual condition of the Highlands excited the compassion of earnest-minded men in the later years of the 18th century. The Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge had catechists and teachers in some districts, and in Ross, several evangelical ministers stood out as stars in the night. But the region as a whole was in thick darkness, and soul-concern was viewed by the official clergy as a species of insanity. There was little sympathy with the vital religion, and a revival in Easdale, which arose about 1780 from the public reading of Alleine's "Alarm to the Unconverted" – a book that awakened Peter Grant twenty years later – was crushed by the local presbytery, who inveighed against the converts and threatened with excommunication any family that retained a copy.
The memorable first tour of James Haldane was not, however, to Highland districts, but to the towns and villages of the east and north coasts; but enough of gospel destitution came into view to shock the Christian conscience and to provoke it to consider redress. "We hardly found," said the itinerants on their return, "an instance of that zeal which leads many ministers and others in England to go to the neighbouring towns and villages, proclaiming the joyful sound where the gospel is not preached." The novelty of lay preaching, and that by gentlemen in their ordinary coloured coat and tied-back hair of the period, and their direct appeals startled, as they attracted the multitudes. Their audiences were summoned by hand-bell or tuck of drums, and town halls, barns, market places, church yards, and the meeting houses of the Secession and Relief Churches, when given, were used, and experiences were diverse. At Montrose they were not welcome; the town "had already enough of the gospel." In Fort George preaching was delayed as the Governor had "never heard of a sermon in any fort on a week-day." In crossing from Burghead to Orkney the sailors, out of respect, made a law that anyone guilty of swearing should suffer corporal punishment. Caithness and Orkney were responsive to the Word; multitudes heard and many hearkened, but the conclusions formed regarding the parochial ministry were more than disquieting. The Orkneys were, as regards preaching, as much need of the gospel as any of the islands of the Pacific while in Caithness the public profession of repentance for a moral offence was commuted for a money payment, and thereafter the offender was received to the Communion. The final judgment was that multitudes were "taught to put their trust in a refuge of lies."
The publication of the Journal of their tour and the sending out of missionaries to the neglected districts by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel at Home raised a storm of opposition in the Church of Scotland. The intrusion into their parishes was bitterly resented by the ministers. But the evangelical zeal of other bodies was fired. The Scotch Baptist church in Edinburgh, under its three pastors, following its earlier appeal for Foreign Missions, now issued in November 1798 an urgent message on behalf of Home Missions to all the churches in the connection, inviting them to co-operate in the spread of the gospel through the efforts of their elders and preachers as far around the places of their abode as possible. It also suggested a monthly collection to provide a fund for the expenses of journeys and meeting-places. The proposal must have succeeded beyond hope, for from 1804 onwards we find the Edinburgh church administering an Itinerant Fund contributed by itself, Glasgow, Paisley, Dunfermline and one or two other churches; and rendering aid to missionaries in the north as well as meeting the expenses of elders who visited throughout the connection or made Highland tours. Archibald M'lean paid an annual visit to the churches both in Scotland and England, and while this may be regarded as having been more of a connectional duty than a strictly missionary activity, both were combined. In like manner his colleague Henry David Inglis, an advocate by profession, comforted the churches and preached the gospel in various parts of the country during the summer vacations of the Court.
In the meantime James Haldane had continued his tours and the Church of Scotland had fulminated against "vagrant preachers" and teachers of Sunday Schools. The Acts of Assembly and the Pastoral Admonition of 1799 suggested that these faithful ministrants of truth were seditious persons who pretended to "some novel method of bringing men to heaven." The result was persecution and interference. At Ayr, even before this, James Haldane's address was interrupted by the magistrates, and he was forbidden to continue. In Kintyre he and his companion were arrested and carried many miles to the Sheriff, before whom, to the confusion of their persecutors, the freedom of field preaching was vindicated. And in North Berwick he was ordered off the street by the Provost and some boon companions, and when he retired to a neighbouring field they tried to drown his voice by beating a drum. John Farquharson was seized for preaching in Braemar and imprisoned in the cell in Aberdeen where Samuel Rutherford had written many of his imperishable letters a century and a half before.
But all these things turned out rather for the furtherance of the gospel, and lives were renewed and little companies of Christians gathered. With Mr. Innes a tour was extended as far as northern Shetland and seed sown that bore fruit in due season. These long tours were continued for nine years, and nearly all the English-speaking parts of Scotland were visited and much attendant blessing enjoyed.