The Awakening of 1727 Onward - Part 3

After Wesley came back from America, he was very unhappy. He had met a Moravian missionary on the ship. And he said, he told the missionary, I just don't have the faith. And Peter Bowler said something to him that was very strange. He said, preach faith until you have it. In other words, don't give up the ministry, but preach it until you get it yourself. Now one night, John Wesley went to St. Paul's Cathedral, that lovely cathedral in London. And the choir sang a magnificent number. He went to a prayer meeting at Aldersgate Street afterwards. And someone was reading from Luther's introduction to the Epistle to the Romans. And suddenly it dawned on John Wesley that sins were forgiven. Now it's strange today that something like that dawns on our soul. Well, we show it in certain ways, don't we? They fell to their knees and sang, We praise thee, O God, we acknowledge thee to be the Lord. Those old-fashioned words. From that time on, John Wesley became a powerful preacher of the gospel. Now, George Whitefield started preaching in Bristol, the second largest city of England at that time. But he had to move off to somewhere else. So he asked John Wesley, Would you take my place? The churches were closed to them. They were preaching in the open air. John Wesley said in his diary, I thought it was a sin to preach in the open air. He believed as a clergyman, you ought to preach in a consecrated building. A parish church. At least I could scourge, reconcile myself at first to this strange way of preaching in the fields. Of which he set me an example on Sunday. I should have thought the saving of souls almost a sin if it had not been done in church. But he tried it. Twenty-four hours later, John Wesley preached in the open air. And in his diary he said, I made a bright succession of appeals to the reason, the conscience, and the heart of my hearers. I used to think John Wesley must have been a genius of an evangelist. That strong men were broken down and wept. Not at all. He was a very stuffy high churchman. But the point was this, the Holy Spirit at that time was poured out upon believers to revive the church. And at the same time, the Holy Spirit was poured out upon the people to awaken the masses. The result was these minors who had come out to gamble and to fight and to misbehave in every possible way were deeply convicted of sin and began to repent and be converted. So John Wesley formed a society. The churches wouldn't open their doors to him. But formed a little society that meant, quote, to confess their faults one to another and pray for one another that they may be healed. That was the first Methodist class movement and out of that came the whole Methodist denomination. In 1739, by the way, John Wesley was converted in 1738, George Whitfield began his London ministry. The only church in London that was willing to have him was that great St. Mary's Church in Islington in North London. But the vigor was overridden by the church wardens. They locked the doors against Whitfield. The result was he preached in the churchyard. And then he began preaching in the open airs. And he used to have 10,000, 20,000. Oh, I would have loved to have heard George Whitfield preach. In those days there was no amplification, no loudspeakers. You know, when Whitfield was crossing the Atlantic on those little sailing ships, they would form like a V of ducks for a convoy, for protection against the wind, to help each other. If a storm came up. And if it was a calm Sunday, because it took a month or more to come across, if it was a calm Sunday, Whitfield would conduct divine worship for the fleet. He had such a voice, he could lead worship from the leading ship to the whole ship and all the ships present. When he preached in Philadelphia at the Custom House Steps, crowds used to gather across the river in New Jersey to listen to him. Benjamin Franklin was no fool. He was a mathematician. He calculated by pi r squared and all the rest of it that the total number listening to Whitfield's unaided voice was 25,000. His enemy said he could reduce an audience to tears by the way he pronounced the word Mesopotamia. Now when he came, there had been glimmerings of revival in the American colonies already. Revival began...