This attractive and readable little volume gives the mature thoughts of a president of Andover Theological Seminary in Massachusetts on the revivals which began in New England in 1798 and continued for several years. The letters which make up the book originally were addressed to the students of the Seminary who formed the Committee of the Revival Association there in 1832. These letters were then published in a contemporary periodical and later issued in book form. They are full of scriptural wisdom, and their republication is to be warmly welcomed.
In a time of intense spiritual darkness we should be very conscious of our need of a genuine outpouring of the Spirit to turn multitudes of sinners “from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God”. But even in his time, Porter had to refer to “sections of our country where scarcely one in 50 exhibits any evidence, or makes any profession, of piety”. And he pointed to “the flood of ungodliness which has been aiming to sweep away her Sabbaths and blot out her memorial from under heaven”. Apart from revival, Porter believed, “the Church could scarcely hold her own” even during the half-century before he wrote – “comparatively a favoured period”.
What sermons were being preached during the time of revival which Porter describes and analyses? “They were decidedly evangelical, Christ crucified being kept prominent in every pulpit where this spirit of revivals prevailed.” Besides, they were organised, biblical, plain, easily-understood, earnest and instructive. Porter quotes the comments of another pastor: “No preaching seems so effectual to drive [awakened sinners] from their hiding-places as to tell them plainly that they are eternally undone if the unpromised mercy of God is not displayed in their favour, that they have not the least claim on God and, if He does not have mercy, they are gone for ever”. This, as Porter reminds us, was the experience also of Jonathan Edwards.
The author is anxious to distinguish between impressions and convictions. “The former were often produced by sympathy, by solemn appeals to the
1A review article on Letters on Revival by Ebenezer Porter, published by the Banner of Truth Trust, paperback, 144 pages, £4.95, available from the Free Presbyterian Bookroom.
passions, by alarming providences, or by dread of punishment. . . . Under their influence, sinners sometimes exhibited very hopeful appearances, seemed to be very anxious, ‘resolved to lead a new life’. . . . But soon they were as careless as ever. These were mere impressions, sometimes serious indeed, or even distressing, for the time, but more commonly slight and evanescent. Conviction of sin, on the other hand, has a deeper origin. It is a vivid sense on the sinner’s conscience, not of his danger chiefly, but of his guilt as a transgressor against God. Conscience arrays this before him in the light of the divine law, shows him its curse, righteous and dreadful as it is, falling upon his own head, and no escape or remedy but through Christ. Now ministers who were skilful as guides to inquiring sinners deemed it of vital importance to keep the above distinction prominent in all their instructions and encouragements; whereas men of impetuous temper and little experience often treated anxiety in different sinners as amounting to just the same thing as conviction of guilt.”
“No sinner”, he emphasises, “was brought thoroughly to feel his guilty and lost condition, and his need of salvation by grace, except by being clearly instructed in the primary doctrines of the Bible.” Those who were under genuine convictions realised “that an amiable temper and a moral life are of no account if the heart is supremely in love with sin. They saw that they were justly condemned by the divine law, which they had continually broken in thought, word and deed; that they were utterly without excuse, as transgressors of that law; that, though repentance is their indispensable and immediate duty, they never should repent if left to themselves, without special, divine influence; and that, if they should ever be saved, it must be through the merits of Christ, applied to them by the Holy Spirit, through the grace of that God who has mercy on whom He will have mercy.”
As an example of one brought under deep conviction of sin, Porter describes a middle-aged man who, during a sermon, “said at once to himself, ‘The salvation of my soul is of immediate and infinite importance; I now resolve that I will delay it no longer, but will immediately reform and lead a new life’. In this resolution he considered himself as immovably fixed. But in walking home alone, two difficulties came upon him. He had made this resolution in mere reliance on himself, and only a part of himself had consented to it. His understanding and conscience were for it; his fears and hopes were for it; his ‘vile, ungodly, obstinate heart’ was against it. His decision, and the comfort derived from it, were dashed to atoms when he came to look into himself.
“The whole of the following night he spent in horror, without a moment’s sleep. The next day was a day of anguish in view of his own guilt, and exposure to everlasting ruin. He tried to labour, but could not; he heard another sermon, but found no relief. Instead of having his heart melted and mended, it became more obdurate still, for he had been relying on his own selfish resolutions and on the means of salvation, and not on the God of salvation. A second sleepless night and a second day of anguish ensued. The third night, being exhausted, he had a little broken sleep, but awoke to keener sufferings. About the dawn of day a new train of thoughts engrossed his mind concerning the absolute perfection of God and His administration, and the duty of unreserved submission to His will. All was right on the part of God and the gospel. The fearful agony was over; and the conflict was followed by a serenity which, he afterwards hoped, was the peace of God, passing all understanding.” But instances of such a degree of mental distress were relatively rare.
Charles Backus, “one of the most judicious and able ministers of this period” is quoted on the general pattern of conversions: “The first alarm was followed with a more full discovery of their moral pollution. In general they said that, when divine truth first appeared in a new and pleasing light, they scarcely thought of their own safety, or whether they were, or were not, converted. They were abundant in acknowledging that, if gospel grace were not free and sovereign, there could be no hope for such great sinners as they were, who had not made any advances of themselves towards submission to the will of God. None manifested high confidence of their conversion.”
Another minister expanded on this last point: “When God had taken off their distressful burden, they at first had no suspicion of their hearts being renewed, but were rather alarmed with the apprehension that the Spirit of God had forsaken them and that they were becoming more hardened than ever. In this situation, longing for the return of their anxiety, they, if asked, ‘How does the character of God appear to you?’ readily answered, ‘Great, excellent, glorious. I wish for no other God to govern the world, no other Saviour but Christ, no other way of salvation but the gospel.’ They wondered what had become of their burden. In time, however, experience taught them that their load was taken off in consequence of their hearts being brought to love that very religion which they had been opposing.” It was, in the words of a third minister, “increasing light and a comparison of their exercises with the gospel [that] have led them all on to a comfortable hope of their good estate”.
Porter emphasises that part of the experience of the converts was the realisation that “the salvation of a sinner is wholly of God; so that, aside from the influence of sovereign mercy, he never would have done anything towards submitting to the terms of the gospel”. Preachers, of course, must have the same view, as they seek the good of their hearers. Asahel Hooker, one of the “most eminent” ministers of the time, told the author: “I never fully understood the Apostle’s comparison of ministers to ‘earthen vessels’ till I saw, in a revival, the utter inefficacy of my own preaching to save a single soul without divine influence”. Another, whose preaching one assumes was also blessed, commented: “I desire to be thankful to [God] that He has allowed me to stand and behold His glorious work, though I must confess that I never felt so useless since I entered on the ministry. God hath wrought, and to His name be all the glory!”
It is not surprising then that the author objects strongly to tendencies towards Arminianism. He explains: “I regard all speculations which tend to exalt human instrumentality and diminish a humble reliance on God as fundamentally erroneous and fatal to the spirit of genuine revivals”. And again: “When it is said, ‘It is as easy for a sinner to repent as to remain impenitent’ . . . the language is not proper for the pulpit. There is no difficulty for a man to choose that to which his whole heart is inclined; but is it as easy for him to counteract all the moral habits, affections and inclinations of his heart as to comply with them? . . . Gabriel is a free agent, but who would think it proper to illustrate his free agency by affirming that ‘it is as easy for him to blaspheme God as to praise Him’? As to the expression which represents conversion as consisting in ‘the sinner’s making up his mind to serve God’ . . . the effect is that of a colloquial caricature of a sacred scriptural truth. I mean that such is the effect when this and other forms of expression are so employed as virtually to leave out of view the Holy Spirit, and reduce the sinner’s moral renovation to the familiar level of an ordinary transaction.”
Porter accordingly raises strong objections to the practice of calling on converts to separate from others in the congregation. “What I object to in these proceedings”, he explains, “is that sinners are encouraged to entertain premature hopes; that they are encouraged to proclaim these hopes; and that these hopes, true or false, are confirmed by the influence of ministers and churches.” He agrees that “the work may be done in a moment, and God may see it to be done effectually; but the proof to ourselves and to other men that it is done is not the work of a moment nor of a day. . . . No voice from heaven has announced the fact; if it is a fact, omniscience only can know it; for the ordinary principles of evidence cannot reach the case. . . . This requires opportunity for calm thought, reading, and examination into his own heart and the evidences of grace. He may be truly born again, and yet be ignorant as a child respecting the proper evidences of this change.” In any case, who will respond to such a call? “It requires but little acquaintance with revivals and with men to know that the confident, the ignorant and the sanguine will be first in responding to the call; while the judicious, the modest and the heart-broken will stand back from so sudden and public an exhibition of themselves.”
As one would expect, Porter could speak of “a manifest increase in the religious observance of the Sabbath and the duties of a family religion” as effects of the revival. In a Connecticut community previously, “public worship was greatly neglected by many whole families, but now we see them flocking to hear the Word of God on the Sabbath and at other seasons. . . . While there were formerly but very few who called upon the name of the Lord in family prayer, now almost whole neighbourhoods have engaged in this duty, so that if one were to pass among them at certain seasons he would be constrained to say, Surely God is in this place; parents devoting themselves, their little ones, and all that they have, to the Lord.”
It is encouraging to know that very few of those who professed conversion went back to the world. Porter attributes this to “the ample instructions given by ministers as to the evidences of grace, and the incessant warnings on the dangers of self-deception”. Clearly this is a matter which always needs attention from the pulpit, not only when multitudes are flocking into the Church of God. Of the hopeful converts – these men’s terminology was cautious – Asahel Hooker said, “They have generally conducted [themselves] hitherto as well as could reasonably be expected. It is hoped that their religion will not be as the early cloud and the morning dew, that passes away. But it is greatly to be feared that all will not persevere, that some will be found with a lamp of profession, but no oil in their lamp.”
As we look at the ungodliness of the present, and look on with concern to a future influenced by that ungodliness, we should be all the more earnest before God in pleading for fresh outpourings of the Holy Spirit. Scripture is full of suitable petitions, among them those of Isaiah: “Oh that Thou wouldest rend the heavens, that Thou wouldest come down, that the mountains might flow down at Thy presence, as when the melting fire burneth, the fire causeth the waters to boil, to make Thy name known to Thine adversaries, that the nations may tremble at Thy presence!” (Is 64:1). We cannot doubt that these petitions will yet be answered on a scale that the world has never before seen. But if we are spared to see that answer in this generation, we are likely, humanly speaking, to be handicapped by our lack of experience of times of revival. In such a situation the supreme help must, of course, come from above, but the wisdom which comes from years of experience and has been distilled into such volumes as this is highly valuable. And this little work should also encourage us to plead with greater earnestness that God would indeed “come down” in His infinite mercy and bless us, however much we as a generation deserve to be visited by Him in judgement.