Transcript for:
History 2 Lectures/ 1. The Evangelical Revival (25:08)

now we are focusing on the Evangel revival of 1739 we need to understand that 739 was a pivotal year for the beginnings and development of Methodism in england we need to understand that Methodism was part of this move of god known as the Evangel revival in england in order to understand this revival we're gonna look at it through a number of highlights and how it directly affected the development of Methodism so the first highlight would be the fetter Lane Pentecost as you may recall the fetter Lane society was the outgrowth of the small group meeting that was taking place at the home of James Hutton in London but when Whitfield returned by the late 7:38 or December at 7:38 coming from America this group gained popularity it grew and so because of this growth they had to find a much bigger space whereby they can do their meetings at about the same time we need to understand that Whitfield returned after coming from Georgia actually he left America or the colonies on September 9 738 and landed back to London in December of that same year and so with Whitfield's return and with John and the others being part of the society at further Lane things were about to spear up and to increase in terms of this mighty book of God known as the Evangel revival in England and we have here on the slide shown the location of the society in satyr Lane I also have here a picture of a marker marking that spot were the further a society was formed and also later on that society became a Mehrabian chapel so what you have but fetter Lane was a more in society you need to understand that at the Wesley's and Oxford Methodists and the others were more avians at this point okay but on new year's eve of 1739 something happened to the society while they were gathered the whole spirit moved mightily in their meeting and this captured in general Wesley's journal entry for that day he writes mr. Hall kimchee in Ingham Whitfield Hutchings and my brother Charles were present at our lab fees in fatter Lane with about 60 of our brethren about 3:00 in the morning as we were continuing instant in prayer the power of God came mightily upon us in so much that many cried out for exceeding joy and many fell to the ground as soon as we were recovered a little from that Oh an amazement at the presence of His Majesty we broke out with one voice we praise thee O God we acknowledge D to be the Lord so this event is what I may call the Methodist Pentecost we have this outpouring of the Holy Spirit which was accompanied by some manifestations Wesley reported that they fell to the ground and in other words they were slain in the spirit and as they were recovered they ended up racing praising God this particular event would usher the beginning of the Evangel revival and fetter Lane would become the center for this revival aside from this Saturday in Pentecost Whitfield leads the way or becomes the leader of this revival even though we know that he was already acknowledged leader of the Methodists before he left for Georgia well within Starr would continue to rise during this period and by the way when he returned a few days later he was ordained priests in Oxford he became a priest of the Church of England this would also help after him in this move of God our Steve Angello revival as he would engage in field preaching a good example was he established a base in Bristol among the coil miners there or the co-leaders there in Bristol which was a mining town with a population of 50,000 people and George would go to the Colliers and would preach them it was reported that there were mostly deeds of people who came to hear him as you can see on the slide we see a painting of George this was done in 1742 you know trying it's an art trying to portray his preaching prowess and actually in front of him you can see there's this lady looking at him intently well that lady later became his wife that was ELISA that James who was a widow and I think was eight years his senior you can see on the right side the younger George Whitefield by the way if you look at his eyes his eyes are a little bit squinted some obvious detractors would call him dr. squint um because of a squinted eyes by the way he contracted this as a child after about with missiles and so George 18 at preaching ministry would take him two different places in London and another towns and countryside in England for example here is another painting for portraying George preaching during that period at the Moorfields by the way the Moorfields is one of the few open lamps in London at that time and it became a center for the revival specifically the Matis revival and here we have George preaching on a big ship stage with some affected by his preaching as for example this woman below him praying intently you also have people from different walks of life some there just to stir up the meeting like for example this guy playing the drums and this guy behind him playing what appears to be a flute and there's also another guy on the left side playing a trumpet to disrupt the meeting it's kind of chaotic another example of the traffic perception of this meetings is shown in this other drawing here of George preaching at the Moorfields being carried by two women it's interesting to see the woman on the Left labeled as hypocrisy and the woman on the right labeled as BC again another example of perception by detractors is found in this drawing titled doctors Clintons and siltation of the Reformation this is a drawing done later in the 1760s but again it's indicative of George's itinerant preaching ministry and certainly here he's not being complimented it's being criticized essentially the same things emerge here as if he is being powered by demonic forces which were the reason for his preaching prowess you see demons on the side you see a demon below him picking up the money given to him and again it's this chaotic scenario and being portrayed here and another slide by the way shows the layout of the more fields the more fields again as I mentioned it's only one of the few open spots in London this were actually the first Methodists preaching house in London was established the foundry was built close to this area also Whitfield's Tabernacle was built in this area in the war films in 1741 so this is basically a center for Methodists or revival activity during that time with fields itinerant ministry preaching ministry would also take him to the North American colonies as shown in this drawing and you see these multitudes of people gathered to listen to him and this particular work of Whitfield would be part of what's known as the first Great Awakening in North America alongside with other great preachers like Jonathan Edwards and Gilbert tenet and other American evangelicals as a result of this preaching tour Whitfield became good with Benjamin Franklin who would talk about the great evangelists in his autobiography I think we have their very interesting description by Franklin regarding the preaching prowess of George Whitfield he writes the multitudes of all sects and denominations that attended his sermons were enormous and it was matter of speculation to me to observe the extraordinary influence of his oratory on his hearers it was wonderful to see the change to made in the manners of our inhabitants from being thoughtless or indifferent about religion its symbols if all the world were growing religious so that one could through the town in an evening without hearing some son in different families of every street so what we see here is Whitfield really having an impact in the colonies because of his preaching would result revival or awakening that's why it's called the first Great Awakening and probably as I'm talking about day in gathering up crowds during this revival probably were wondering about the numbers that were being given it's not even possible to have 40,000 people to listen to a preacher during this time without the aid of any microphones or amplifiers to amplify their voices well even Benjamin Franklin had that curiosity and in that same autobiography he did an experiment to count the people Franklin was visiting London and he made the following observation he writes I had the curiosity to learn how far he could be heard by retiring backwards down the street towards the river and I found this voice distinct till I came near France trip when some noise in that suite of car did imagining them as semicircle of which my distance should be the radius and that it were filled with auditors meaning listeners to each of whom I allowed to square feet I computed that he might well be heard by more than 30,000 this reconciled me to the newspaper accounts of his having pledged to twenty-five thousand people in the films so as whitfill leads the way into bringing the gospel to masses of people in the spirit known as evangelical revival the Wesley brothers would also follow suit they too would go viral by engaging in field preaching as in the case of John Wesley this would take place on April 2nd in 739 we need to understand that this took place in Bristow when Whitfield requested John to take over the work that he started there in Bristol so John being the high churchmen that he was found this method this new method not only unconventional but also just too much but later I'm as I'd mentioned in April second he will find himself engaging in that new method as he writes in his journal at 4:00 in the afternoon I submitted to be more vile and proclaim in the highways the glad tidings of salvation speaking from a little eminence in a ground enjoying the city to about 3,000 people the scripture on which I spoke was this the spirit of the lord disappoint me because he had anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor he has sent me to heal the brokenhearted to preach deliverance to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind to set at liberty them that are bruised to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord I think this particular quotation from Wesley shows us how he found this event pivotal not only in his own life but also in his ministry for him it was is ushering into this ministry of reaching out to the poor of bringing the gospel to the poor bringing the gospel to where they were and so not only John began to engage in fill preaching but also his brother in this next slide we see I think an excellent example of how Charles also preached during this period as he engaged in film preaching and this one comes from an outside observer who was visiting some time that same year in 1739 here's what he said next day I came to Bristol and hearing in the afternoon that mr. Charles Wesley was preaching in the brick field I found him standing on a table board in an erect posture with his hands and eyes lifted up to heaven in pray are surrounded by I guess more than a thousand people some few of them fashionable persons both men and women but most of them of the lower rank of mankind I know not how long he had been engaged in that service before my coming after which he continued there in scarce a quarter of an hour during which time he prayed with uncommon fervency fluency and variety a proper expression he then preached about an hour in such a manner as I have scarce ever heard anyone preach though I have heard many a finer sermon according to the common taste or acceptation of sermons yet I think I never heard any man discover such evidence science above behind a desire or labor so earnestly to convince his hearers that they were all by nature in a sinful loss and then the animal state that notwithstanding there was a possibility of their salvation through faith in Christ one of the things we see here is how Charles was preaching on this improvised stage he was standing on a table board we also see here the type of people who were in attendance during this meeting there were more than a thousand people and found them from the higher strata of the society fashionable persons both men and women but mostly were people from the lower classes and also we see a that he preached about an hour in a manner that is quite unconventional and he also talks about here the type of ceremony why did they talk about here well he talked about the state of his hairs and he tried to convince them that they were sinful and that they were living in a dangerous state and that they need to be awakened from that state and that there is a way and that is true salvation in Jesus Christ take note of the word faith here so basically Church was preaching about salvation by faith or justification by faith and so deep in the Wesley brothers entrance into field preaching just like with film and given the number of crowds that were gathered to hear them preach well dumb holy spirit move mightily in the midst of these meetings and so it was not uncommon to see different manifestations of the spirit being manifested in this meetings as a result of the preaching a good example was captured in the Journal of John just a few days after he started preaching outdoors in Bristol he writes this immediately one and another and another Sun to the earth they drop on every side a standard rock one of them cried aloud we without God in our behalf and he turned her happiness into joy a second being in the same Anthony we called upon God for her also and he spoke peace unto her soul one was so wounded by the sword of the Spirit that you would have imagined she could not live in a moment but immediately his abundant kindness was showed and she loudly sang of his righteousness so what do we see in this particular quotation well we see here was the saying that people were fawning they were essentially being slain he caused that phenomena thunderstruck and there's one here that cried aloud one as if being in a state of agony and then being delivered from that and so mostly Wesley would interpret this occurrences or this phenomena as God's Way of awakening people God's Way up awakening people but I will talk more about that later but this is important to understand what is Satori ology this term awakening and so not only that if we're gonna look at general journal journal entry for 1739 and the months that followed during the height of this revival it is not uncommon to see accounts of this occurrences people falling on the ground people having convulsions people shouting people groaning people howling people rolling on the floor and all of this different phenomena that we would associate with with revival and we would associate with modern Pentecostalism or the charismatic movement today by the way we need to understand that John was not opposed to this occurrences but rather whenever they would happen he would see them as tokens to caught him saying tokens from God he would see them as science of God blessing the meetings where he was preaching in fact even George was so opposed to this occurrences but John helped him see the light regarding these occurrences and so be given this phenomena that were happening during this time it was not uncommon for the tractors to to call this phenomena the display of emotion in these meetings as a sign of enthusiasm or a sign of fanaticism again going back to the same drawing I showed awhile ago of George preaching Adam Warfield's well if you look at the title of that drawing it says enthusiasm displayed or the Moorfields congregation there you go they are being accused as in two CS a later drawing drawn by a famous cartoonist during that time by the name of william Hogarth also captures that criticism in this plate or engraving entitled credulity superstition and fanaticism a medley so this is basically a criticism of the Methodists most particularly George Whitfield and as you can see here this engraving you find George Whitefield with this wig falling down as she's shouting preaching to this congregation and again you see that same teen I showed a while ago of being sort of empowered by Devils or demons in a way he's preaching prowess disability to sway people to convince people has something to do with witchcraft that's why there's a witch in its right hand and then you see also a cherubim with a sign to st. Mary trap meaning this dis apply to gain money to gain well an accusation to this day is being thrown at you know popular preachers and then if you look below the engraving on the right you see a woman sort of fainted and you see a rabbit coming out in between her legs you see a man throwing up on her right probably to portray those people who were having convulsions and to her right we see a man throwing up and then on his lap you see a bucket with Whitfield's giorno written on it more interesting is on the right side of this engraving you find a book titled Wesley sermons and below that I start to do with witches and there's a thermometer on the right you know there's a scale beginning from suicide then going up to madness despair settled grip agony sorrow low spirits lukewarm love heat loss expectancy convulsions madness raving so where is it now pertaining to this meeting well they're now at look warm okay but it's going up basically and so interesting observation from the tractors during that time because of the occurrences the phenomena that were happening during the revival and so given the manifestations of the Holy Spirit not accompany the revival it is not hard to understand why the Holy Spirit takes a central role in Wesley's understanding of salvation or is we find that versus pneumatology develops it to something more dynamic remember this was in the means of innocent evangelii Revival not only were they experiencing conversions here and there but also Wesley had this great sense that the Holy Spirit was moving mightily in their myths on account of this phenomenal displays of power that accompanied the revival so given this it is clear that the Holy Spirit takes a central role in his suit radiology and according to Richard Heights invader in an article he wrote in a book titled Aldersgate reconsidered it is the point in his fatal pilgrimage at which he experiences the power of the Holy Spirit and at which his theology is confronted by a dynamic new mythology from that point on the Holy Spirit has a central role in versus definition of the true Christian its understanding of how one becomes a Christian and its explanation of how one knows he or she is a Christian so so essentially if you may recall when Wesley had this first conversion in 1725 he realizes that the end of the Christian life is what it's about holiness it is about leaving the holy life but later on he encountered the Moravians and soon his understanding of salvation changes you you add this understanding of what of conversion of salvation by faith or justification by faith so which happened to him in 1738 for just a year before this and so you have now with this understanding of conversion and you have this understanding of wholeness as the end of Christian life so how can he reconcile the two well it's because of his understanding of the moon ozone spirit suddenly the whole spirit becomes the glue that puts the two together he realizes as a generator says that the whole spirit help him in his understanding of what constitutes a true Christian of how one becomes a Christian and his explanation about how one knows he or she a Christian you