Five years ago, people were talking about the
Bicentennial.
Supposing someone had said, well, what happened two
hundred years ago?
Would you have been able to answer?
All right, I'm going to ask you then,
what was God doing a hundred years ago?
You say, is that important?
Of course it's important.
We wouldn't be here if it wasn't for
what God has done in the past.
Now, the last time I talked to you
on the subject of spiritual awakening, we talked
about the wonderful prayer movement of 1858, which
not only filled every downtown theater and public
hall with praying people at noon, but filled
every church in the evening, so that out
of a population of 27 million, about a
million people professed conversion and added to the
churches.
Now, out of that movement of 1858, there
came a great surge of lay activity.
We take for granted that lay people help
in church work.
Before that time, church work was the work
of ministers, so that it wasn't a new
doctrine that came out of the Revival, but
a new activity.
Another thing that came out of the Revival
was a new activity in missions.
In 1860, all the missionary societies got together
in Liverpool in England for a conference on
missions.
That was followed by another one in 1878
in Mildmay, then London in 1888, and then
in New York in 1900.
One of the leaders of that great conference
on missions was Hudson Taylor.
But the great evangelist of those days was
Dwight Lyman Moody.
I remember when I was visiting Moody's home,
Now, don't misunderstand, I've never met Moody personally,
but I have visited his home.
His granddaughter was a good friend of ours.
I used to be base chaplain at Westover
Field in Massachusetts, and directly north from the
Connecticut Valley, up at Northfield, was Moody's home.
I asked lots of questions of his son
-in-law and his granddaughter about Moody's way
of working.
Now, some people talk about Moody as if
Moody was an embodiment of Revival.
I was talking once to a great Church
of Scotland minister, D.P. Thompson.
He said to me, How do you distinguish
between Revival and successful evangelism?
Well, I said, it's like this.
When D.L. Moody was in Toronto, 1884,
practically every church in Toronto was blessed.
But there wasn't anything much happening in Buffalo
or Cleveland or Chicago or Philadelphia or Montreal.
In other words, the blessing of God followed
Moody's ministry.
But in the 1858 Revival, there was a
revival in every city in the United States
and Canada.
That's the difference.
He said, D.P. Thompson said, It's exactly
the same as what happened in Scotland.
When Moody came to Scotland in 1873, there
was a revival everywhere.
But when he came back in the 1880s,
there was blessing in his campaign in Edinburgh,
then an expectation and blessing in Glasgow, then
in Aberdeen and Belfast, Dublin and so forth.
So we've got to distinguish between an outpouring
of the Holy Spirit in general Revival and
the blessing of God upon a very faithful
evangelist.
One of my professors, Professor William Warren Sweet
of the University of Chicago, said the attempts
of sociologists and psychologists to explain D.L.
Moody seem trite and foolish.
Now, there are men who are blessed through
Moody's ministry.
I once met a German professor, and he
said as a result of the revival of
1858, and especially as a result of Moody's
first campaigns in London, some Germans living in
London or visiting London caught fire for God.
The result was 30 years of revival in
Germany.
Now, in 1881, that sounds a little familiar,
1881, there was a Swede called Frederick Franson
who came to the United States.
He was a friend of Moody, he'd been
converted wonderfully, became an evangelist to Scandinavians in
the United States, went back to his native
Sweden, and there began times of revival in
Norway and Sweden and Denmark and other parts
of Europe.
Another man who was greatly blessed 100 years
ago was a man whose name you ought
to know, Andrew Murray.
Andrew Murray was Dutch Reformed.
Isn't it wonderful how God uses people, no
matter what their label may be.
He was moderator three times of the Dutch
Reformed Church.
But in 1882, he came into new experience
of God at the Keswick Convention, and he
became a great power for holy living, great
man of prayer.
I trust you've read some of Andrew Murray's
books.
Now, at the same time, 1880, there was
an Australian evangelist, John MacNeill.
Not the famous Scottish evangelist John MacNeill, this
man spelt his name a little bit differently,
M-A-C capital N-E-I-L.
Another man of God was George Grubb, an
Anglican.
I take it you've heard of Norman Grubb
of the Worldwide Evangelization Crusade?
He's an old man now.
I knew him and also his brother Sir
Kenneth Grubb, who died in London last year.
I didn't know their uncle, but their uncle
was a great power for God.
Of course, that name Grubb is an Irish
name.
I remember once I was in Leeds in
Yorkshire, and at that time there was a
very famous Scottish scholar connected with the Sunday
School movement, Alexander Smelly was his name.
And then there was a very famous Bible
teacher at Keswick, Graeme Scroggie.
You may have read his books.
And then, of course, this famous evangelist George
Grubb.
And there they had this convention in Leeds.
It said, Smelly, Scroggie, and Grubb.
And I thought, what a kettle of fish.
There was something else happened in 1881.
There was a revival in a congregational church
in Portland, Maine.
The pastor was a man called Francis Clark.
He wanted to conserve the benefits of the
local revival.
So he started a young people's society of
Christian endeavor.
And it caught on.
Let's see, is there anyone here ever belong
to the Christian endeavor movement?
Oh, yes.
You notice quite a number of those who
raise their hands have grey hair.
The movement was very strong.
As a matter of fact, 1886, there were
a thousand delegates at the first Christian endeavor
convention.
1888, five thousand came to Chicago.
Philadelphia, 6,500.
St. Louis, 1898,000.
And by 1895, there were 38,000 local
societies with 2,225,000 members.
You say, what was Christian endeavor?
It was like a kind of junior church.
They taught young people how to work within
a congregation.
They had a prayer meeting convener and someone
in charge of music and so forth.
It was a Christian endeavor society.
And I learned to use my voice.
Learned to forget shyness and so forth.
Learned to preach in the open air.
Why hasn't that movement continued?
It was interdenominational.
And I find that denominations don't like interdenominational
movements.
So after it became so successful, the Methodists
said, would it be alright if we had
a special Epworth League of Christian Endeavor?
And the Presbyterians said, let's have a Westminster
Fellowship of Christian Endeavor.
And the Baptists had the Baptist Young People's
Society of Christian Endeavor.
And the Lutherans had the Walter League of
Christian Endeavor.
Then they chopped off the Christian Endeavor and
they were left with the Westminster Fellowship and
the Epworth League and the Walter League and
the Baptist Young People's Society.
They had them under their control.
It broke up that interdenominational movement.
But Christian Endeavor was greatly used of God
for many years.
Now you may be surprised to know that
Dwight Lyman Moody was not an educated man.
He couldn't spell to save his life.
He spelled orthodox, O-T-H-E-D
-E-X, orthodox.
On occasion he said, how do you spell
Philadelphia?
F-I-L-A, what comes after that?
You say, well when you read Moody's sermons
you don't find this out.
Oh no, Christians during the Victorian age always
smoothed things over a little bit.
They felt it wouldn't be glorifying to the
Lord if you allowed Moody's bad spellings to
get into his books.
We always had someone edit them.
But Moody was not an educated man.
Out of the 1858 revival there came lots
of student groups, student associations in the major
universities of the United States.
And their leader was a young man called
Luther Wishart.
By the way, the second in command was
a young man called T.W. Wilson.
That sounds familiar, doesn't it?
T.W. Wilson.
Not Billy Graham's sidekick, T.W. Wilson.
I was talking to him the other day.
But an earlier T.W. Wilson.
He was secretary of this student group at
Princeton.
He became president of Princeton University, became governor
of New Jersey, finally became president of the
United States.
T.
Woodrow Wilson.
Did you know that he was a student
evangelist?
And a man of God.
Now Wishart and Wilson and others said to
Moody, why don't you have meetings for students?
Well, Moody saw good reasons for not having
them.
He couldn't spell.
He didn't want to make a fool of
himself with students.
But when Moody went across to England in
the 1880s, some group of students, the Cambridge
Intercollegiate Christian Union, invited Moody to hold a
campaign at Cambridge University.
Now in those days, Oxford and Cambridge were
universities for the sons of the wealthy or
the noble.
And when these undergraduates heard that, quote, an
illiterate American was coming to speak to them,
they were outraged.
They determined to teach him his place.
And there's nobody quite like an Englishman for
teaching you what your place is.
Moody came with Sankey.
And the very first night, the place was
packed.
Now it may be a great surprise to
those of you who have gone to university
or college here in the States to know
that to this day at Oxford, when you
go to a class, you wear a gown.
When you go to the library to borrow
a book, you wear a gown.
You say, why do they put up with
that?
They get like the United States Marines.
They're sort of proud of the uniform after
a while.
I remember I had to wear a gown
to go to an examination when I was
studying at Oxford.
A thousand university students piled in, all dressed
up in their gowns, to hear this illiterate
American.
Moody called upon the vicar of St. Mary's
to lead in prayer.
When he prayed, the students rudely interrupted him
with, hear, hear, which is not polite in
prayer.
It's all right in Parliament, but not in
prayer.
When Sankey sang, the students sang a parody
along with him, to make fun of what
he was singing.
Moody preached on Daniel in the Den of
Lions.
I think he must have felt like that.
Now the Hebrew word Daniel has three syllables,
Dan-ee-el.
The English word has at least two, Dan
-ee-el.
But in those days, the American had just
one.
I'm not joking.
Have you ever heard of Daniel Boone, Daniel
Webster?
In those days, they spelt the name D
-A-N-L.
They pronounced it in one syllable, Daniel.
And every time Moody referred to, then God
spoke to Daniel, and Daniel said to the
Lord, there was a great cheer, they clapped
their hands, they tramped their feet, they were
enjoying this.
Brought the house down.
Every time Moody mispronounced the name Daniel.
But Moody kept his temper.
When he got home that night, he said
to Sankey, Sankey, I've got no hankering for
that crowd.
But he wasn't a coward either.
He went back the next night, there were
only a hundred at the meeting.
On the Wednesday, they had begun on a
Monday, but on the Wednesday, the maid in
the lodgings where Moody was staying brought a
visiting card.
Mr. Gerald Lander wished to see Mr. Moody.
Moody did bring him in.
This was Mr. Gerald Lander of Trinity College,
the most aristocratic college in Cambridge.
That's where Prince Charles studied.
When the young man came in, Moody saw
he was one of the ringleaders of the
riot of two nights before.
So he said, what can I do for
you, sir?
He said, Mr. Moody, I was one of
those who thought that you were singularly unequipped
to speak to gentlemen.
But sir, he said, as I observed you
on the platform, I came to the conclusion
that you were the only gentleman in the
meeting.
Sir, he said, I wish to apologize.
It was the British sense of fair play.
There is a very strong sense of fair
play.
You know, when somebody fumbles the ball in
a rugby game, the spectator shouts, hard luck,
sir.
When he hits the ball, they shout, well
played, sir.
What do they do over here?
Throw them out.
So Gerald Lander said, Mr. Moody, I wish
to apologize.
Moody shook his hand.
He said, I'll forgive you if you come
to the rest of the meetings.
And Gerald Lander sat in the front.
Moody waited five nights before giving any kind
of invitation.
The first man forward was Gerald Lander.
He became Bishop of Hong Kong.
Moody turned that university upside down.
Stanley Smith, the chief oarsman of the Cambridge
rowing crew, was converted, became a missionary.
There were two brothers called Paul Hill Turner.
They became missionaries to China.
Sir Monica Beecham, nephew of Lord Radstock, was
converted, became a missionary.
W.
Castle, son of a famous importer in London,
was converted, became Bishop of Sichuan in China.
There was a young man there that was
not converted under Moody, but greatly stirred through
this time of reviving.
His name was C.
T.
Studd.
He was the Babe Ruth of English cricket.
And they formed a team called the Cambridge
Seven.
They turned the universities upside down.
Students began, turned to God by the hundreds.
In the meantime, Moody was preaching in London,
in North London.
They built a big tabernacle seating 25,000.
While he was preaching in North London for
a month, they built another tabernacle in South
London.
And when Moody finished North London, he went
to South London to preach.
Meanwhile, the people in North London moved the
tabernacle a few miles over.
And Moody finished there, went to the next
place, North London.
Turnabout.
Then there was such a demand for his
preaching, they wanted him to preach in both
places at once.
Not even Moody could do that.
So Moody alternated, and sometimes got others to
help, including the Cambridge Seven.
There was a young atheist who went to
hear Mr. Moody preach.
Moody called upon a Presbyterian minister to lead
him in prayer.
The man had never prayed before 25,000
before.
He got sort of carried away.
Now, I once heard an Irishman say, If
a man prays for three minutes, you pray
with him.
If he prays for another three minutes, you
pray for him.
And if he prays for another three minutes,
you pray against him.
This good brother had been praying for quite
a long time when Mr. Moody got up
and said, While our brother is finishing his
prayer, let's sing hymn number 11.
And the young atheist said, There's an honest
man.
He came back the next night, but Moody
wasn't preaching there the next night.
The Cambridge Seven were there, and he was
converted.
He became the famous pioneer to Labrador, Sir
Wilfred Grenfell, whose name was famous in your
grandparents' day.
One of the great pioneer missionaries.
That was the sort of thing that was
happening in England just a hundred years ago.
When Moody got back to the States, Luther
Wichert and Tommy Wilson said, Now what about
American students?
Moody said, Well, let's start with a Christian
convention.
So they had a meeting for students only
at Mount Hermon in Massachusetts, near Moody's home.
250 students came.
One student said to Mr. Moody, I want
to speak to the students.
Moody said, I'm sorry, son, but we have
Professor McCosh speaking.
We've got Henry Drummond from Scotland.
Finally, he said, All right, you can speak
to the students at lunchtime.
This young man got up and said, My
father was one of the students that sat
under the haystack in Massachusetts and went out
to be a missionary to India.
He's come back to die.
But he's praying that God will raise up
a thousand university students from the mission field.
He spoke so powerfully that 100 out of
the 250 volunteered to the mission field.
This young fellow just finished his law degree
at Princeton.
Instead of going to law, he went around
the universities and the theological seminaries recruiting university
students for missions.
2,000 volunteered the first year.
It began a movement called the student volunteers.
And in a long generation, in about 30,
40 years, more than 30,000 university students
went to the mission field.
Kenneth Scott Latourette, the great church historian, said,
A large proportion of the outstanding leaders in
the worldwide spread of Protestant Christianity in the
20th century were recruited through this movement.
Their slogan was the evangelization of the world
in this generation.
In half a century, they sent out to
the mission field evangelists, educators, doctors, agriculture specialists,
and astounding work with social implications, but all
subordinated to evangelism.
Now, why did that movement die?
1920, they reached their peak.
Every four years, they had a convention.
This time, they met in Des Moines.
6,890 students came, of whom 2,783
volunteered, and 637 actually left for foreign service
the next year.
But in 1940, 20 years later, instead of
6,890, there were only 465.
Why?
Well, you see, after World War I, students
were greatly taken up with the horrors of
war.
The British lost a million men in World
War I.
The French lost more than the British.
The Germans lost more than the French.
The Russians lost more than the Germans.
World War I was a slaughter of the
young men of Europe.
Consequently, students everywhere were greatly concerned with peace
propaganda.
Ah, the scripture says, blessed are the peacemakers.
But the trouble was, the students began putting
this before the preaching of the gospel.
The result was, their interest was completely captured
by social action.
I believe in social action, but not at
the expense of preaching the gospel.
And just a few years ago, this movement
voted itself out of existence.
It went out with a whimper, not with
a bang.
Now, in the 1880s that we're talking about,
there was a great revival in the Congo.
It was called Pentecost in the Congo.
2,000 converted in one year at Bantamanteke.
The revival increased.
On the other side of Africa, an Anglican
bishop, Hannigton, was murdered in Uganda in 1885.
But seven years later, a young missionary called
Pilligton read a tract on the work of
the Holy Spirit, came into new experience.
The result was a revival among the Anglicans.
The number of lay teachers increased from 75
to 2,032.
Communicans from 230 to 18,000.
Communicans and Christians.
Baptized Christians from 1,100 to 62,000.
There was a revival also in southern Africa.
In 1881, 100 years ago, there was an
extraordinary revival in the Mosquito Coast of Nicaragua.
Church membership trebled within 10 years.
1884, a great revival in Chile.
Even the Presbyterians agreed it was an outpouring
of the Holy Spirit.
Great revival in the 1880s among the Armenians
in Turkey.
And in the 1870s and 1880s, a great
movement of God among the aristocrats of the
Russian Empire.
Now you see, from the 1857 revival to
1882 was quarter of a century.
There was no recession.
Rather, there was a resurgence of blessing.
I used to think the tide had to
go out before it could come in again.
But not in God's way of doing things.
Sometimes he adds blessing to blessing.
And this certainly is what happened in that
century, the 19th century, before the death of
Moody.
Moody died in 1899.
He was still preaching.
He said just before he died, I would
like, before I go hence, to see the
whole Church of Christ.
Quickened as it was in 1857.
And a wave going from Maine to California
to sweep thousands into the kingdom of God.
In 1906, there was an editorial in the
Christian Missionary Alliance Weekly, which spoke of 1905
as the year of the Holy Ghost.
And so next time I speak to you,
God willing, I'm going to tell you about
the sweeping worldwide revival of 1905.
Now nearly everyone in Pentecostal churches or among
Charismatics has heard of Azusa Street.
But not many people know that before that
remarkable local work at Azusa Street, there was
a great revival sweeping the whole world, including
Los Angeles.
I'm going to tell about that revival next
time I have an opportunity to talk to
you.
What's the lesson for us?
Let's pray, Oh God, do it again.
Do it again.