The Spirituality of William Ward

History tends to remember the pioneers. This is understandable, for they enter the story first. They blaze the trail that others follow. In the case of Protestant missions, this honor goes to William Carey (1761-1834) who is often considered the "father of modern missions."[1] Consequently, numerous biographies have been written about him in his own day and ours.[2] But Carey's life work took place in the context of a bustling mission comprised of numerous other missionaries sent out by the Baptist Missionary Society (BMS), Asiatic missionaries of mixed native and European ancestry, and native Indian evangelists and pastors. And at the center of this missiological orbit was not Carey alone, but a fellowship of three-the famed Serampore Trio-consisting of Carey and two other seldom-mentioned colleagues, Joshua Marshman (1768-1837) and William Ward (1769-1823). These enjoyed an amazing twenty-three years of harmonious service together in the Serampore Mission and rarely did anything without consulting each other.