By REV. D. M. MACDONALD, Edinburgh.
(Continued from page 13.)
Strong appeals now began to reach Whitefield from America to resume his work there. He failed to get a passage from Portsmouth and had to go to Plymouth. There was work for him there, but when the news spread that he was in the town a gang of men had conspired to do away with him. One effort was made to decoy him out to a supper in the town by a man who represented himself as the nephew of a friend in New York. Whitefield invited the man to sup with him instead. “He came; we supped. I observed that he frequently looked around him and seemed very absent, but, having no suspicion, I continued in conversation with him and with other friends till we parted. I now find that this man was to have been the assassin; and that, being questioned by his companions as to what he had done, he answered that being used so civilly he had not the heart to touch me.” A crony of this man, however, did actually assault Mr. Whitefield in his room with a golden-headed cane, but speedy aid was rendered and Whitefield refused to prosecute his assailant. As happened in other places, great opposition here was met with great success. Over a period of about six weeks he preached with effect in Plymouth and its neighbourhood. The ferrymen at Plymouth became so friendly that they wanted no fares from the multitude that came to hear him preach, saying, “God forbid that we should sell the Word of God.”
The remarkable conversion of Henry Tanner, a youth of 26, took place at this time. He was working in a shipwright’s yard when he heard Whitefield’s voice from a great distance. Thinking the “Awakener,” a name given to the evangelist, mad he, with half a dozen friends, stuffed stones into their pockets and set off to assault him. Whitefield’s text was Acts xvii. 19, 20: “May we know what this teaching is.” Tanner was arrested by the coincidence of the text with his own amazed curiosity and decided to hear him again next evening. On that occasion he was convinced of sin and cried out in agony of mind. He came the third time and found the peace his soul needed. He afterwards became minister of the Tabernacle at Exeter.
At last the way was opened for him to leave for America, and he arrived there after a dangerous and rough voyage in October, 1744. England and France were at war and ships sailed in convoys. A collision occurred between the Wilmington, the vessel on which Whitefield was, and another to the damage of the latter. When this was reported to the convoying ships there was some blasphemous language which Whitefield took as a challenge, and raising his powerful voice, he cried, “God of the sea and of the dry land, this is a night of rebuke and blasphemy; show thyself, O God, and take us under thine own immediate protection; be thou our convoy and make a difference between those who fear Thee and those who fear Thee not.” The next day during a furious gale the Wilmington was parted from the convoy for the rest of the voyage and made the trip in perfect safety.
After his arrival he had two serious attacks of illness from which he recovered. During the second attack he said to the three doctors attending him, “My pains are suspended; by the help of God, I will go and preach and then come home and die.”
He goes on to say: “With some difficulty I reached the pulpit. All looked quite surprised. I was as pale as death and told them they must look upon me as a dying man; and that I came to bear my dying testimony to the truths I had formerly preached amongst them and to the invisible realities of another world. I continued an hour in my discourse and nature was almost exhausted but, O what life, what power spread all around! All seemed to be melted and were in tears. Upon my coming home, I was laid on a bed upon the ground near the fire, and I heard them say, ‘He is gone,’ but God was pleased to order it otherwise. I gradually recovered.”
After this he preached in Boston and its neighbourhood to large crowds for three months and then proceeded to Philadelphia. It is interesting to record that on the way he had the pleasure of preaching, by an interpreter, to some converted Indians and of seeing 50 young ones in a school learning the Assembly’s catechism. A blessed awakening, he said, had been begun among the Delaware Indians by the instrumentality of Mr. David Brainerd. He has been described as a great missionary genius, and after labouring amongst the Indians for some time he took ill and died in the house of President Jonathan Edwards at the age of 29. Thus a great and promising career was cut short in early life. That other outstanding witness for Christ, the Rev. R. M. M’Cheyne, Dundee, died about the same age. Whitefield, as he felt he needed a complete rest for a season he retired to Bermuda, and from there returned to England. He was received in London by thousands with almost overwhelming joy and many flocked to hear the Gospel from his lips.
One of Mr. Whitefield’s most prominent supporters was one of the foremost Christian ladies in England, the Countess of Huntingdon, whom we have mentioned already. The Apostle Paul expresses his indebtedness to the worthy women who helped him by their services, and the world in its moral and spiritual progress owes much to godly and devoted women who have done what they could for Christ and His cause. She opened her drawing-room for religious services. To these she invited in England many of her aristocratic acquaintances. She got Mr. Whitefield to act as her chaplain, and soon there was a gathering of eminent people about him in the home of the Countess. Lord Bolingbroke said of him, “He is the most extraordinary man in our times. He has the most commanding eloquence I ever heard in any person.” David Hume, the Scottish philosopher and sceptic, described him as “the most ingenious preacher he had ever heard,” and also, “It was worth going 20 miles to hear him.”
The nobility of the Countess was revealed more in her noble christian life than in her title. She repaired and built many churches in different parts of England, founded schools, and a college for training preachers. Her home was described as a Bethel and her life, to the end was filled with good works.
In England, Scotland and America Mr. Whitefield carried on his labours, visiting these countries in turn and rejoiced at the advancement of the Saviour’s cause in them. In Ireland also he proclaimed the Gospel faithfully at the risk of being killed by fanatical papists.
He was a pioneer in philanthropic work, pleading for those in distress in two great nations. He associated the Gospel with practical charity and was extremely generous himself. This feature in his character received at one time an unexpected reward.
He was travelling with a friend through rather lonely country when they passed a cottage where there seemed to be trouble. Upon inquiring they found a poor widow in straits for money and food. Whitefield immediately parted with a five-pound note—all the money in his possession. They proceeded and his companion lectured him on his extravagant charity. Whitefield said such a crisis was an act of Providence and that God would not see him in want. Presently on the moor they were held up by a highwayman, and this time it was Whitefield’s turn to crow, for he mentioned that he had nothing to lose whilst his friend’s pockets were emptied. The robber, however, before he left compelled Whitefield to exchange his good broadcloth coat for the gangster’s ragged jacket, at which the friend laughed heartily. They went on their journey when suddenly the noise of galloping hoofs sounded behind them, and they saw the thief returning at top speed. By now, however, they were nearer habitations, and by spurring their horses they escaped. Later on Whitefield discovered in the ragged coat he was wearing a bundle of notes amounting to one hundred pounds, evidently the proceeds of several crimes. The exchange of coats had been disastrous for the highwayman but Whitefield’s friend was compelled to admit that it showed a very handsome profit for the evangelist upon an investment of five pounds!
The life of this Apostolic man was now drawing to a close. He had frequent turns of illness through the weakening of his frame by excessive labours. The last two months of his life were spent in a triumphant tour of preaching in various parts of America, and his last sermon in the open air was preached at Exeter, not far from Boston. This effort exhausted him, but he was able to travel by boat to Newbury Port. At the parsonage he revived, and when at supper crowds began to gather in front of the house. When he saw them on his way to his bedroom he paused on the staircase and began to address them, pleading and exhorting for some time. At two o’clock in the morning he had a violent attack of asthma, and at six o’clock on Sabbath morning, September 30th, 1770, he passed to his eternal rest. It seems that even his death was blessed to one soul at least. A young man named Benjamin Randall, who had hated and reviled him for proclaiming the truth, on hearing that he was dead was so impressed that he said, “Whitefield is dead, Whitefield is in heaven, but I am on the road to hell.” He was shaken to his innermost being and gave himself up a willing prisoner to God. His remains were buried in the Presbyterian Church of Newbury Port, which he himself had been instrumental in founding. The scene at the funeral was uncommon, six thousand members and ministers of all Churches crowding and surrounding the building. The crying and sobbing were extraordinary and the demonstrations of grief seemed to pass from the little town to many places in two nations. Vast audiences began to gather in America and Britain to express their loss and to feel once more the power of the Gospel the evangelist had preached with such love.
In bringing this sketch to a close we may refer to some interesting points. First, one may ask what accounts for the singular prostrations manifested at the services where Mr. Whitefield preached? These were, no doubt, due to unusually powerful convictions of sin and of the powers of the world to come. There may be occasions when such demonstrations are produced to impress on others their need of salvation. As there are diversities of gifts, so there are diversities of operations. According to I Cor. xii. 6, the Holy Spirit is sovereign in his work so that while He brings some gradually to believe in the Saviour like Lydia, others go through great distress of soul before He brings them into Gospel liberty. It seems that many when they heard of what was happening were led to the services out of curiosity and were themselves brought to a knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus.
The opinion has been expressed that the people of Britain might have started a revolution such as took place in France in 1789, when the populace rose against the ruling classes and slaughtered many of the aristocracy and a number of priests, finally executing their King and Queen, were it not for the fervent preaching of the Gospel by Whitefield and other faithful ministers and laymen who succeeded him. The evangelical revival had a calming effect on the minds of the common people with the result that they sought to do away with abuses and oppression not by bloodshed but by legal and constitutional methods. The reforms that took place in due time throughout the nation were the fruit of the splendid work of these courageous and devoted witnesses of Christ.
The influences of his immense labours continue to this day. That other great preacher of the Gospel, the late Rev. C. H. Spurgeon, who was prominent in his day as a faithful minister of Christ, took Mr. Whitefield as his model and his labours were blessed to many souls throughout the world by means of his published sermons.
It is of interest to note that Mr. Whitefield visited Scotland 14 times. These visits were spread over a period of not less than 27 years, his last visit being in the year 1768. According to his own repeated statements, in no country had he so experienced in his own soul the power of divine love, and in no other had he been so enabled to speak as of God; and the effects of his ministrations corresponded. It has been well said, “The friends of religion in Scotland ought never to forget how much their country was blessed by the labours of that truly great man.”
Like the prophet Habakkuk our prayer should be, “O Lord, revive thy work in the midst of the years, in the midst of the seasons make known; in wrath remember mercy.”
I would sooner preach to only half a dozen people every Sabbath than disobey the dictates of conscience, and employ means I considered unscriptural to assemble a crowded church.—H. Bazely.