On March 13, 1838, he was ordained as pastor of a congregation at Cavendish, Prince Edward Island, and in 1846 he was sent as a missionary to New Hebrides (now Vanuatu), where he served for over twenty years.

Another missionary, Thomas Powell, was selected to replace Bullen and on May 27, 1848, the LMS barque, John Williams arrived in Samoa to take the group to the New Hebrides.

The final party included Geddie, Archibald, Powell, their families, Samoan servants and another LMS missionary named James Nisbet.

[4] The existing French Catholic mission on the island was disbanded shortly after Geddie and his colleagues arrived due to sickness amongst the priests.

Some years later Geddie discovered that their early attempts at preaching in the Aneityum language had not been understood by the congregation, but they had been too polite to point this out.

The indigenous people on the South Sea Islands had become suspicious of outsiders due to the violence of ruthless traders and to the practice of blackbirding.

Eventually they were informed that their "crime" had been threefold: first they had cropped coconuts during a period when this was prohibited; they had also removed coral from the sea to burn for lime and their worst offence was attempting to build a chapel on a sacred path.

Geddie worked to convert the islanders in the hope of eliminating some of their practises such as cannibalism, infanticide and the sacrifice of the wives after the death of their husbands.

Archibald started working for a boat builder and one day he was seen removing his property from Geddie's house without discussing the matter.

Geddie confronted the boat builder and was told that the islanders who carried out the attack had been incited to do so by traders who resented him interfering in their business.

[8] The boat builder, a man named William Underwood, worked for the proprietor of the island's sandalwood trade, Captain James Paddon.

He had initially been of great help to the missionaries when they first arrived, placing boats at their disposal plus providing timber for their homes and for the chapel.

[9] Unbeknown to Geddie, Isaac Archibald had sent a second letter to the Canadian Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions withdrawing his resignation.

This terrible loss was not in isolation, in late 1860 a measles epidemic began on Aneityum and it killed over one thousand of the indigenous islanders – almost a third of the population.

Charlotte Geddie, who helped teach the children and women on the island, mourned the loss of many including one girl she called Mary, whom she had come to regard as a daughter.

At this time he had not converted any of the islanders but did measure progress as follows: "For many months after our arrival almost every day brought some new act of theft to light, and altogether we lost property to a considerable amount; but now locks and keys are entirely useless.

Geddie was at first afraid to leave the safety of this district because of threats to his life in other areas, but gradually he was able to spread his message across the island.

Teachers were trained and worked in upwards of 60 religious schools; the pupils were taught to read in order that they could study the Bible, transposed by the missionaries into Aneityumese.

Geddie organised his congregations using elected deacons and ordained ruling elders; these were each assigned a number of church members with whom they held meetings for "conversation, exhortation and prayer".

They continued to work on the New Testament and eventually received approval and funding from the British and Foreign Bible Society to publish the full transcribed text.

It was agreed that the printing would be carried out in London; at first Geddie and his family were to accompany the manuscript, but his new baby was too young to travel, so Inglis and his wife went on the John Williams in 1859, a journey of seven months duration.

He put forward nine hundred pages of edits before the manuscript – containing over a quarter of a million words – finally got approved and was printed.

During his absence the other missionaries of the New Hebrides were holding one of their meetings on the island of Aneiteum when HMS Curacoa arrived in harbour under the command of Commodore William Wiseman.

The missionaries (including Paton) on board their schooner Dayspring, accompanied HMS Curacoa to Tanna, where Wiseman sent word to the chiefs of the village at Port Resolution that he wanted them to account for their action in this dispute.

After another deadline was missed he sent word that he was going to destroy their village and at the appointed time opened fire and later sent a landing party with rockets.

His business interests included whaling, coca-nut oil and in 1863 he started growing cotton (later sugar) in Queensland, Australia.

Towns told his captain that if he came across a missionary, he was to explain that the workers would be well fed, given only light work and returned to the island within 6 months.

[29][30] When, John Inglis returned from England in 1863 he noticed a change in Geddie, saying he was "broken down", a condition probably brought on by the terrible events of the measles epidemic.

He died December 14, 1872; a tablet, prepared in Sydney, was placed behind the pulpit of the church in the village of Anelcauhat on Aneityum, where he had preached.

[36] Their youngest daughter Helen Jessie Macdonald Geddie, was born September 19, 1858, at Aneiteum, New Hebrides and died unmarried on September 11, 1945, at Elsternwick, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia [37] Their son John Williams Geddie, was born February 2, 1852, in the New Hebrides and died c. 1934 in Sale, Victoria, Australia.