A Town of Hell

I had been up visiting my friend Richard Owen Roberts in Wheaton, Illinois, and on the drive home, I was passing through a farm community in the Midwest, and I had to stop and buy some gas. I will never forget stopping in that particular town, because it was as if I just dropped into hell. I was in the town of hell.

It was a Sunday afternoon, a pretty summer day, but it was as if everybody I saw was in a state of agitation and anger and blasphemy. People were screaming at each other, and as I drove up to the gas station, a van drove by with photos of naked women all over the van. It was advertising a local strip club, but the women on the van were completely naked.

I saw a patrol car drive by, and I tried to get the officer's attention and point out that I've seen vans because where I come from in the South, that driver of the van would get arrested for public indecency, but the police car just passed the van as if everything was normal. I thought to myself, this is a Sunday, and that van is driving around town with those naked women all over it. Something should be done about it, but nobody cared.

At the gas station, the man next to me at the pump was swearing his head off, taking God's name in vain, and yelling at the top of his voice. It was upsetting just to stand near him. Other people all around me were arguing and fighting over one thing or another.

The whole atmosphere of that town was hellish. It was as if I had dropped down to the regions of hell, and to top it off, as I drove out of the gas station, a woman driving a pickup truck made an obscene gesture at me, and screamed at me as I passed her. Everybody was in a mad rush, as if they were crawling over each other's backs on their way to hell.

I could not wait to get out of that town of hell, and as I drove home, I realized that little town was a composite of larger towns throughout America, that every city in this land is a town of hell. Listen, friends, there's enough hell going on in your community this evening to bring down the judgment of God on the entire nation. Then, as I reflected on that town of hell, I recalled a story I had read about Trolls Fanny.

Now, old Trolls Fanny ended up outplagian, old plagious when it came to doctrine, but you can't deny that God used Fanny in the early stages of the Second Great Awakening. I have a copy of my book, Realities of Revival, with me, and I want to read you chapter 5, which talks about Fanny preaching in a town, a town that was a town of hell. It was similar to the town I visited, but I want to read it to you because it demonstrates how, when God is moving by his spirit, an entire community can be transformed from a region of hell to an outpost of heaven.

Here now are the words of Trolls Fanny. I must now give some account of my labors and their results at Antwerp, a village north of Evans Mills. I arrived there the first time in April and found that no religious services of any kind were held in that town.

In passing around the village, I heard a vast amount of profanity. I thought I'd never heard so much in any place that I ever had visited. It seemed as if the men in plain ball upon the green and in every business place that I stepped into were all cursing and swearing and damning each other.

I felt as if I had arrived upon the borders of hell. I had a kind of awful feeling. I recollect as I passed around the village on Saturday, the very atmosphere seemed to me to be a poison and a kind of terror took possession of me.

I gave myself to prayer on Saturday and finally urged my petition till this answer came. Be not afraid to speak and hold not thy peace, for I am with thee and no man shall set on thee to hurt thee, for I have much people in this city. Acts 18.

This completely relieved me of all fear. On the third Sabbath that I preached there, an aged man came to see me as I came out of the pulpit and asked me if I would go and preach in a schoolhouse in his neighborhood, saying that they had never had any services there. He told me that it was about three miles in a certain direction.

He wished me to come as soon as I could. I appointed the next day Monday at five o'clock in the afternoon. It was a warm day.

I left my horse at the village and thought I would walk down so that I should have no trouble in calling along on the people in the neighborhood of the schoolhouse on the way. However, before I got to the place, having labored so hard on the Sabbath, I found myself very much exhausted and sat down by the way and felt as if I could scarcely proceed. I blamed myself for not taking my horse.

When I arrived at the appointed hour, I found the schoolhouse full, and I could only get a standing place near the door which stood open, and the windows were all open. I read a hymn, and I cannot call it singing, for they seem never to have had church music in that place. However, they pretended to sing, but it amounted to about this.

Each one bawled in his own way. My ears had been cultivated by teaching church music, and their horrible discord distressed me so much that at first I thought I must go out. I finally put both hands over my ears and shook my head and tried as far as possible to get rid of the horrible discords that seemed almost to make me mad.

I stood it, however, until they were through, and then I cast myself down on my knees, almost in a state of desperation, and began to pray. The Lord opened the windows of heaven, and the spirit of prayer was poured out, and I let my whole heart out in prayer. I had taken no thought with regard to a text upon which to preach, but waited to see the congregation, as I was in the habit of doing in those days, before I selected a text.

As soon as I had done praying, I rose from my knees and said, Up, and get ye out of this place, for the Lord will destroy the city. I said I did not recollect where the text was, but I told them very nearly where they would find it, and then went on to explain it. I said that there was such a man as Abraham, and also who he was, and that there was such a man as Lot, and who he was, their relations to each other, their separating from each other on account of differences between their herdsmen, and that Abraham took the hill country, and Lot settled in the vale of Sodom.

I then told them how exceedingly wicked Sodom became, and what abominable practices they fell into. I told them that the Lord decided to destroy Sodom, and visited Abraham, and informed him what he was about to do, that Abraham prayed to the Lord to spare Sodom, if he found so many righteous there, and the Lord promised to do so for their sakes, that then Abraham besought him to save it for a certain less number, and the Lord said he would spare it for their sakes. Then he kept on reducing the number, until he reduced the number of righteous persons to ten, and God promised him that if he found ten righteous persons in the city, he would spare it.

Abraham made no further request, and Jehovah left him, but it was found that there was but one righteous person there, and that was Lot, Abraham's nephew. And the man said to Lot, Hast thou here any besides, son-in-law and thy sons, and thy daughters, and whatsoever thou hast in the city, bring them out of this place, for we will destroy this place, because the cry of them is waxing great before the face of the Lord, and the Lord hath sent us to destroy it. And Lot went out, and spake unto his sons-in-law, which married his daughters, and said, Up, get ye out of this place, for the Lord will destroy the city.

But he seemed as one that mocked unto his sons-in-law. While I was relating these facts, I observed the people looked as if they were angry. Many of the men were in their shirtsleeves, and they looked at each other and at me as if they were ready to pitch into me and chastise me for something on the spot.

I saw their strange and unaccountable looks, and could not understand what I was saying that had offended them. However, it seemed to me that their anger rose higher and higher as I continued the narrative. As soon as I had finished the narrative, I turned upon them and said that I understood that they never had had a religious meeting in that place, and that, therefore, I had a right to take it for granted and was compelled to take it for granted that they were an ungodly people.

I pressed that home upon them with more energy, with my heart full to bursting. I had not spoken to them in the strain of direct application. I should think more than a quarter of an hour, when all at once an awful solemnity seemed to settle down upon them, and a something flashed over the congregation, a kind of shimmering, as if there was some agitation in the atmosphere itself.

The congregation began to fall from their seats, and they fell in every direction, and cried for mercy. If I had had a sword in each hand, I could not have cut them off their seats as fast as they fell. Indeed, nearly the whole congregation were either on their knees or prostrate.

I should think in less than two minutes from this first shock that fell upon them, everyone prayed for himself, who was able to speak at all. I, of course, was obliged to stop preaching, for they no longer paid any attention. When I went down the second time, I got an explanation of the anger manifested by the congregation during the introduction of my first sermon there.

I learned that the place was called Sodom, but I knew it not, and that there was one pious man in the place, and they called him Lot. This was the old man who invited me there. The people supposed I had chosen my subject, and preached to them in that manner, because they were so wicked as to be called Sodom.

This was a striking coincidence, but as far as I was concerned, it was altogether accidental. I have not been in that place for many years. A few years since, I was laboring in Syracuse in the state of New York.

Two gentlemen called upon me one day. The older man, in his turn, introduced the younger, saying, This is my minister, the Reverend Mr. Cross. He was converted under your ministry.

Whereupon, Brother Cross said to me, Do you remember preaching at such a time in Antwerp, and in such a part of town, in a schoolhouse, in the afternoon, and that such a scene, describing it, occurred there? I said, I remember it very well, and can never forget it while I remember anything. Well, said he, I was then but a young man, and was converted in that meeting. He has many years since been a successful minister.

Well, listen, friends, old Charles Fanny did not fear man, but he feared the Almighty, and he preached to convince sinners of their need of a Savior. He called sin black and hell hot, and he warned men not to go there. Listen, friend, if your town resembles a region of hell, do what you can to reach it with the gospel of Christ.

Don't be like Lot, and be content to live there, and make your living there, and enjoy your family there, while others are perishing all around you, and dropping into a burn of eternity in a place of torment and anguish called hell. Warn your hellish community about hell, and warn them not to go there.