Preaching and revival – Walking With Giants

This entry is part 9 of 21 in the series: Revival

Having considered the central place of the Bible and of biblical doctrine in revival, we move on to examine how the word of God is proclaimed during periods of spiritual awakening. R.E. Davies asserts that a factor which constantly recurs in revival and awakening is ‘powerful, urgent, relevant, Christ-centred preaching’. As the same writer reminds us:-

On the Day of Pentecost, the 120 disciples were filled with the Spirit, and immediately began to speak in various languages about the wonderful works of God. This was followed by Peter’s preaching, which was accompanied by such spiritual power that 3,000 people were convicted and converted (Acts 2). The work continued and spread, as the Christians preached publicly and testified personally to the great saving acts of God in Christ (Acts 3ff). (Davies, I will pour out my Spirit, 221f.)

There are two aspects of subject which must be discussed: first, the substance; and second, the manner, of revival preaching.

THE SUBSTANCE OF PREACHING

It might be thought that, given the excitement generated in a revival, people would become impatient of doctrinal and expository preaching. In fact, the opposite may be the case: the spiritual quickening produces a hunger for biblical and theological instruction which is not quickly satisfied. Indeed, the very progress of the revival depends on this:-

Let God’s Spirit be poured out upon a community well instructed in the truths of the gospel, and the happiest results may confidently be expected; for here is the natural preparation for a revival on the one hand, and the best pledge against all perversion and abuse on the other. (Sprague, Lectures on revivals, 143.)

And there are special reasons why, during a revival, there should be more, not less public teaching:-

During a season of revival, a larger amount of public religious instruction is demanded, than in ordinary circumstances. For then there is a listening ear; and the understanding and conscience are awake; and the truth of God tells with mighty effect upon all the powers of the soul. (Sprague, Lectures on revivals, 133.)

The kind of preaching which will best promote and guide the progress of a revival is that which applies the great doctrines of Scripture to the heart and life of the hearers:-

If the great doctrines of the Bible are not brought into contact with the conscience and the heart, I expect to look in vain for any thing like an intelligent conviction of sin; much less for the peaceable fruits of righteousness. It is when the law of God is exhibited in all its extent and spirituality, and the gospel in all its grace and glory, that we may expect to see men brought to a sense of guilt, and believing on the Lord Jesus Christ that they may be saved. (Sprague, Lectures on revivals, 130.)

Which doctrines in particular should be emphasised by revival preachers? An observer and participant in the New England revival in 1740s reflected as follows on the doctrines which received most prominence:-

The points on which their preaching mainly turns, are those important ones of man’s guilt, corruption, and impotence; supernatural regeneration by the Spirit of God, and free justification by faith in the righteousness of Christ; and the marks of the new birth. (Cooper, in Edwards, Works, II, 258.)

The preaching of Asahel Nettleton in 1821 was characterised as follows:-

The topics on which he principally dwelt, were the unchangeable obligations of the divine law, the deceitful and entirely depraved character of the natural heart, the free and indiscriminate offers of the gospel; the reasonableness and necessity of immediate repentance; the variety of those refuges and excuses to which awakened sinners are accustomed to resort; and the manner, guilt and danger of slighting, resisting and opposing the operations of the Holy Spirit. (in Sprague, Lectures on revivals, App 72f.)

The same doctrinal emphases are advocated by another writer in the same volume:-

The doctrines which have been most successfully exhibited in the promotion of revivals of religion, I think have been those which are peculiar to the gospel of Christ. Of these I believe the following to be some of the most important – The entire want of holiness in all men by nature; the justice of God in the everlasting condemnation of sinners; the exceeding sinfulness of sin; the total inability of man, by his own works, to reconcile himself to God; the sufficiency, freedom and fullness of the atonement; the duty of immediate repentance, and faith in Jesus Christ; the inexcusableness of delay; the exhibition of the refuges of lies under which sinners hide themselves; the sovereignty of God in the salvation of sinner; the clear exhibition of the truth that he is under no obligation to save them; and the necessity of the agency of the Spirit of God to the conversion of any individual of the human race. (in Sprague, Lectures on revival, 11f)

Revival preachers considered it part of their duty to give due attention to the biblical doctrines of judgement and damnation:-

When men don’t preach much about the danger of damnation, there is want of good preaching…If sinners don’t hear often of Judgement and Damnation, few will be converted…Ministers should be sons of thunder: Men had need to have storms in their hearts, before they will betake themselves to Christ for refuge…If they be but thoroughly convinced of their danger, that will make them go to God and take pains. (Solomon Stoddard, in Evans, Daniel Rowland, 36.)

Many revival preachers considered that they would be most effective if they were to instruct their hearers in the law and righteousness of God, so as to lead to deep conviction of sin and repentance:-

The most successful method of preaching is that which aims at thorough and radical convictions of sin. The law must be applied with power to the conscience, or the preciousness of grace will be very inadequately known. (Thornwell, in Murray, Jonathan Edwards, 114.)

Common sense shows how foolish it would be to neglect such vital matters:-

If any of you who are heads of families saw one of your children in a house all on fire, and in imminent danger of being soon consumed in the flames, yet seemed to be very insensible of its danger, and neglected to escape after you had often called to it – would you go on to speak to it only in a cold and indifferent manner? Would not you cry aloud, and call earnestly to it, and represent the danger it was in, and its own folly in delaying, in the most lively manner of which you was capable?…If you should continue to speak to it only in a cold manner, as you are wont to do in ordinary conversation about indifferent matters, would not those about you begin to think you were bereft of reason yourself? (Edwards, Works, II, 266.)

It is needless to point out that we are very unfamiliar with this kind of preaching in the present day. Why should this be so?-

Rationalist religion, reacting against exaggerated and overexplicit portrayals of human wickedness and divine wrath among many Puritans, began to stress the goodness of man and the benevolence of the Deity. By the time of the Second Awakening, many leaders of the revival were adjusting to this critique by presenting an increasingly kindly, fatherly and thoroughly comprehensible God. In the late nineteenth century, D.L. Moody determined to centre his message around the truth that ‘God is love’ and to tone down the mention of hell and the wrath of God to the point of inaudibility. (Lovelace, Dynamics of spiritual life, 83.)

There is, of course, a danger in over-emphasising the sterner aspects of God’s truth, but the reality is that it is only against the background of law and justice can we see clearly the nature, truth and necessity of salvation by grace:-

There is no doubt that American Puritans did overstress ‘Hellfire and damnation.’…I am not calling for a return to this. It is only in the light of the revelation through the cross of God’s overwhelming love for his creation that we can understand his anger against the distortion or destruction of that creation. The cross, in fact, is the perfect statement both of God’s wrath against sin and of the depth of his love and mercy in the recovery of the damaged creation and its damagers. God’s mercy, patience and love must be fully preached in the church. But they are not credible unless they are presented in tension with God’s infinite power, complete and sovereign control of the universe, holiness, and righteousness. And where God’s righteousness is clearly presented, compassionate warnings of his holy anger against sin must be given, and warnings also of the certainty of divine judgement in endless alienation from God which will be unimaginably worse than the literal descriptions of hell. It is no wonder that the world and the church are not awakened when our leadership is either singing a lullaby concerning these matters or presenting them in a caricature which is so grotesque that it is unbelievable. (Lovelace, Dynamics of spiritual life, 84.)

It took Daniel Rowland some time to achieve the right balance in his preaching between law and grace:-

[Philip Pugh] had observed the alarm and despair which was common among many of the people under Rowland’s ministry, and felt that the full offer of God’s grace should be made to them…’Preach the Gospel to the people. dear Sir, and apply the Balm of Gilead, the blood of Christ, to their spiritual wounds, and show the necessity of faith in the crucified Saviour.’ ‘I am afraid’, said Rowland, ‘that I have not that faith myself in its vigour and full exercise.’ ‘Preach on it’, said Pugh, ’till you feel it in that way; no doubt it will come. If you go on preaching the law in this manner, you will kill half the people in the country, for you thunder out the curses of the law, and preach in such a terrific manner, that no-one can stand before you.’ (Evans, Daniel Rowland, 43.)

One aspect of theology which is intimately connected with revival and which therefore requires especial emphasis is the biblical doctrine of God; this needs to be taught in a thorough, balanced and searching way:-

The tension between God’s holy righteousness and his compassionate mercy cannot be legitimately resolved by remoulding his character into an image of pure benevolence as the church did in the nineteenth century. There is only one was that this contradiction can be removed: through the cross of Christ which reveals the severity of God’s anger against sin and the depth of his compassion in paying its penalty through the vicarious sacrifice of his Son. In systems which resolve this tension by softening the character of God, Christ and his work become an addendum, and spiritual darkness becomes complete because the true God has been abandoned for the worship of a magnified image of human tolerance. (Lovelace, Dynamics of spiritual life, 85.)

The doctrines of sin and judgement have been picked out for special consideration here because of the difficulty modern Christians have in accepting the prominence given to them by revival preachers. The fact is, however, that the full range of evangelical doctrines featured in the pulpit ministry of men like Edwards, Whitefield, Wesley, Rowland, Nettleton and others. J.C. Ryle, writing about the Christian leaders of the 18th century, says the following about the content of their teaching:-

The spiritual reformers of the last century taught constantly the sufficiency and supremacy of Holy Scripture…the total corruption of human nature…that Christ’s death upon the cross was the only satisfaction for man’s sin…the great doctrine of justification by faith…the universal necessity of heart conversion and a new creation by the Holy Spirit…the inseparable connection between true faith and personal holiness… God’s eternal hatred against sin, and God’s love towards sinners. (Ryle, Christian leaders of the 18th century, 26ff)

Notwithstanding then the emphasis which revival preachers place on law and sin, they were also at pains to bring the doctrines of regeneration and justification into their proper place:-

If… one doctrine received more prominence than any other during the eighteenth century awakening, it was that of regeneration. It was as characteristic of that movement of the Spirit, as justification was of the Reformation of the sixteenth century. (Evans, Revivals, 25.)

THE MANNER OF PREACHING

When the apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthian Christians about his approach to preaching, he was making a point which would become very meaningful to the preachers and hearers during times of revival:-

1 Cor 2:1ff When I came to you, brothers, I did not come with eloquence or superior wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power.

Speaking of the need for ‘unction’ or ‘anointing’ in preaching, D.M. Lloyd-Jones has written:-

What is this? It is the Holy Spirit falling upon the preacher in a special manner. It is an access of power. It is God giving power, and enabling, through the Spirit, to the preacher in order that he may do this work in a manner that lifts it up beyond the efforts and endeavours of man to a position in which the preacher is being used by the Spirit and becomes the channel through whom the Spirit works. (Lloyd-Jones, Preaching and preachers, 305.)

Lloyd-Jones supports this contention by reference to Scriptures such as Lk 1:15ff; 3:15ff; 4:18ff; Acts 1:8 and various other passages in Acts in which preachers are said to be ‘filled with the Holy Spirit’; 1 Thess 1:5 and so on.

Such spiritual power is very apparent in the preaching of the great revivalists. The ministry of Robert Bruce (1554-1631) may be cited as a worthy example of mighty preaching:-

No man in his day spoke with such evidence and power of the spirit; no man had so many seals of conversion; yea, many of his hearers thought that no man since the apostles’ days spoke with such power. (in Gillies Historical collections, 176.)

Another Scot, John Livingstone (b 1603) reflected thus on his own preaching:-

I used ordinarily to write some few notes, and left the enlargement to the time of the delivery. I found that much studying did not so much help in preaching, as the getting of my heart brought to a spiritual disposition; yea, sometimes I thought the hunger of the hearers helped me more than my own preparation. Many a time I found that which was suggested to me in the delivery, was more refreshing to myself, and edifying to the hearers than what I had premeditated. (in Gillies, Historical collections, 174.)

Isaac Watts recognised that something more than orthodoxy was required for preaching to be effective. What is required is preaching which is from, and to, the heart:-

There are too many persons who have imbibed and propagated this notion, that it is almost the only business of a preacher to teach the necessary doctrines and duties of our holy religion by a mere explication of the Word of God, without enforcing these things on the conscience by a pathetic address to the heart. (Isaac Watts, in Murray, Jonathan Edwards, 126.)

Jonathan Edwards possessed and used a magnificent intellect, and yet he was well aware of the inadequacy of mere orthodoxy:-

Was there ever an age wherein strength and penetration of reason, extent of learning, exactness of distinction, correctness of style, and clearness of expression did so abound? And yet, was there ever an age, wherein there has been so little sense of the evil of sin, so little love to God, heavenly-mindedness, and holiness of life, among the professors of the true religion? Our people do not so much need to have their heads stored as to have their hearts touched, and they stand in the greatest need of that sort of preaching which has the greatest tendency to do this. (Edwards, Works, I, 391.)

Daniel Rowland recognised the need for the special assistance of the Holy Spirit in order to give his preaching converting power:-

Several people testified to occasions when Rowland was reluctant to preach unless he was granted some prior assurance of the Spirit’s assistance in the great work. David Griffiths found him one Sunday morning still in bed, and urged him to get ready for the pulpit. ‘I am not quite ready’, he replied. ‘I have nothing from the Lord to say to the people! I was looking up for divine help in preparing my discourse all last night, and had no sleep!…Griffiths was told that he should go ahead, and that Rowland would follow him into the chapel, which he did. ‘He went like lightning into the pulpit, full of the Holy Ghost and the heavenly treasure. He was not ten minutes into the sermon…before the gracious influence came from above upon him and the vast assembly. The people were overcome with feelings, the most keen and powerful; some were filled with intense joy, and others with the deepest sorrow.’ (Evans, Daniel Rowland, 374.)

Sometimes this spiritual anointing was such that very ordinary abilities were transformed into quite extraordinary capabilities:-

One might consider the beginning of the Beddgelert Revival, which in time spread across the best part of North Wales. It was a Sunday night in August 1817. A company of country folk had gathered from the high valleys and mountain slopes of Snowdonia to the farmhouse of Hafod-y-llan, where a service was being led by a very ordinary lay-preacher…The preacher’s text was one of Christ’s words of invitation to sinners to come to him. As he warmed to his subject the little congregation felt that it was not Richard William at all who was speaking; it was not his voice, not his style, not even his sermon! The preacher himself said afterwards that he was not very sure whether he was preaching or listening to someone else. (Roberts, Revival and its fruit, 14.)

The Scottish preacher and theologian, Thomas Chalmers, was concerned for the dignity of the preaching office and the seriousness of the message to be proclaimed:-

By far the most effective ingredient of good preaching is the personal piety of the preacher himself…How little must the presence of God be felt in that place, where the high functions of the pulpit are degraded into a stipulated exchange of entertainment, on the one side, and of admiration, on the other! and surely it were a sight to make angels weep when a weak and vapouring mortal, surrounded by his fellow-sinners, and hastening to the grave and the judgement along with them, finds it a dearer object to his bosom to regale his hearers by the exhibition of himself, than to do, in plain earnest, the work of his Master. (in Murray, Thomas Chalmers and the revival of the church, 14f.)

In a letter to a young minister, Humphrey Jones, revivalist of the 1859 revival in Wales, conveyed his own views about preaching:-

Two things are necessary to be a successful preacher: first, to pray much in secret – to be there many times in the day, wrestling with God – to wrestle each times is if it were the last, and not to rise from your knees until you have a proof that the Lord has heard you. Ask the Lord in faith, and with great fervency, what to say to the people. Go straight from your closet to the pulpit each time, (like Moses from the mount to the camp,) then will the anointing follow your preaching, and every word you say will be received as from an angel of God. Another thing is, to preach pointedly and rousingly – aiming at the conscience each time – telling the people their sins to there faces – caring nothing for the good or bad opinion of men, but to keep ‘a conscience void of offence toward God and toward men;’ and beware of displaying yourself in any of your sermons. (in Phillips, The Welsh Revival, 10.)

The preaching method of David Morgan during the Welsh revival of 1859 is worth noting:-

As a rule his discourse would dwell upon truths specially applicable to church members. Then, before giving out a hymn to be sung, he would ask the whole congregation to remain for a short times after singing, as he had a further message for them. He would then leave the pulpit and take his stand in the ‘big seat’. This message would be a fiery and urgent appeal to the unconverted portion of his audience, when he would ply them with homely arguments and telling illustrations to bring them to the ‘valley of decision’. All the converts who ‘stayed behind’ with the church members would be invited to come forward to the front seat. Here the Revivalist would converse with them individually, inquiring with friendly interest about their family connections and responsibilities, and after winning their confidence he would proceed, like a skilful surgeon, to probe their spiritual wounds, and administer the cordial of corrective which his diagnosis of the case enjoined as necessary. Then he would kneel and commend the converts to God, individually and by name, however numerous they might be, his petitions moulded with minuteness and detail upon his conversations with them. ( Evans, Two Welsh revivalists, 42.)

A 20-century preacher, J.S. Stewart, has made a similar plea for earnest, anointed preaching:-

It is one thing to learn the technique and mechanics of preaching: it is quite another to preach a sermon which will draw back the veil and make the barriers fall that hide the face of God. (J.S. Stewart, in Murray, Jonathan Edwards, 142.)

But, consistent with the view that revival is the work of God, and not the work of man, we should point out that ‘anointed preaching’ is not so much a cause, as a result, of an outpouring of the Spirit of God:-

Many who have spent a lifetime in earnest ministerial labours have confessed that at certain periods they witnessed far more conversions than they did at other times. Whitefield crossed the Atlantic thirteen times but although he lives until 1770 he never say again the degree of blessing witnessed in America in 1740-42. Spurgeon preached in London from 1854 to 1891. Once in the 1850’s he could write, ‘In one year was my happiness personally to see not less than a thousand who had been converted’ but that, also, was not repeated. William Chalmers Burns evangelised with great success in Scotland and elsewhere in the years 1839-1846. Then in 1847 he went to China and for 21 years until his death he laboured with apparently little fruit. Did Whitefield, Spurgeon and Burns degenerate as preachers? On the contrary, they matured; they were faithful unto death. Their experience confirmed their biblical theology: ‘It is not of him that willeth, not of him that rennet, but of God that sheweth mercy’ (Rom 9:16) (Murray, The necessary ingredients of a biblical revival, I, 22.)

But we must refer, in closing this section, to the other side of the coin. For power in preaching is not only to do with the preacher, but also with those who hear the word preached. Traceableness and obedience to God’s word is essential. Brian Edwards writes:-

Always in a time of revival there is a hunger and a thirst for what God has to say. We are in an age of ‘Be your own Bible student’. People listen to the sermon and consider that their opinion is as valuable as that which they hear from the preacher. If they agree, they agree and if they do not, they have every reason not to. But in revival, it is almost always true that there is a respect for God’s Word not only written but preached, expounded and explained…Submission to leadership is a biblical condition of worship and it runs right through both Old and New Testaments. The description of the Christians in the Acts of the Apostles was that they were dedicated to the apostle’s teaching (Acts 2:42). And when revival comes, one of its hallmarks is not independency, but a holy dependence upon Scripture and a respect for those whose task it is to explain and apply it. (Edwards, Revival!, 110f.)