God’s Battle Axe- George Whitefield

George Whitefield, also known as George Whitfield, was among God’s battle axes in the 18^th Century. He was one of the founders of Methodism and the evangelical movement. Largely forgotten today, he was probably the most famous religious figure of that era. In fact, some secular newspaper called him the “marvel of the age”. Whitefield was a preacher capable of commanding thousands on two continents (Europe and North America), through the sheer power of his oratory. In his lifetime, he preached at least 18,000 times to perhaps ten million hearers.

Whitefield was born on December 16, 1714, in Gloucester, Great Britain to Thomas Whitefield and Elizabeth Edwards. As a boy, he read plays insatiably and often skipped school to practice for his schoolboy performance. Later in life, he repudiated the theatre, but the methods he imbibed as a young man showed in his preaching.

He put himself through Pembroke College, Oxford, by waiting on the wealthier students. While there, he fell in with a group of pious “Methodists” who called themselves “the Holy Club, led by John and Charles Wesley. Under their influence, Whitefield experienced a “new birth” and decided to become a missionary to the new Georgia colony in North America. When the voyage was delayed, he was ordained a deacon in the Anglican Church and began preaching around London. He was surprised to discover that wherever he spoke, crowds materialized and hung on his every word.

          These were no ordinary sermons. He portrayed the lives of biblical characters with a realism no one had seen before. He cried, he danced, he screamed. Among the enthralled was David Garrick, then the most famous actor in Britain. “I would give a hundred guineas”, he said, “If I could say ‘Oh’ like Mr Whitefield”.

           Once, when preaching on eternity, he suddenly stopped the message, looked around, and exclaimed, “Hark! Methinks I hear (the saints) chanting their everlasting hallelujahs, and spending an eternal day in echoing forth triumphant songs of joy. And do you not long, my brethren, to join this heavenly choir?”

           Whitefield eventually made it to Georgia but stayed for only three months. When he returned to London, many churches closed their doors to his unconventional methods of preaching. He then experimented with outdoor, extemporaneous preaching, where no document or wooden pulpit stood between him and his audience.

          In 1739, he set out for a preaching tour of the American colonies, starting with Philadelphia, the most cosmopolitan city in the New World. But even the largest churches could not hold the more than 8,000 people who came to see him, so he took them outdoors. Every stop along Whitefield’s trip was marked by record audiences, often exceeding the population of the towns in which he preached. Whitefield was often surprised at how crowds “so scattered abroad, can be gathered at so short a warning”.

           The crowds were also aggressive in spirit. As one account tells it, crowds “elbowed, shoved, and trampled over themselves to hear of ‘divine things’ from the famed Whitefield”. Once he started speaking, however, the frenzied mobs were spellbound. “Even in London”, Whitefield remarked, “I never observed so profound silence”.

          Though mentored by the Wesley’s, Whitefield set his own theological course: he was a convinced Calvinist. His main theme was the necessity of the “new birth”, by which he meant a conversion experience. He never pleaded with people to convert, but only announced, and dramatized, his message. The wife of Jonathan Edward, a foremost American evangelist, remarked, “He makes less of the doctrines than our American preachers generally do and aims more at affecting the heart. He is a born orator. A prejudiced person, I know, might say that this is all theatrical artifice and display, but not so will anyone think who has seen and known him.”

          Whitefield also made the slave community a part of his revivals, though he was far from an abolitionist. Nonetheless, he increasingly sought out audiences of slaves and wrote on their behalf. The response was so great that some historians date it as the genesis of the African-American Christianity. Everywhere Whitefield preached, he collected support for an orphanage he had founded in Georgia during his brief stay there in 1738, though the orphanage left him deep in debt for most of his life.

          The spiritual revival he ignited, the Great Awakening, became one of the most formative events in American history. His last sermon on this tour was given at Boston Commons before 23,000 people, likely the largest gathering in American history to that point.

          He next set his sights on Scotland, to which he would make 14 visits in lis life. His most dramatic visit was his second, when he arrived at the small town of Cambuslang, which was already experiencing a revival. His evening service attracted thousands and continued until 2:00 in the morning. “There were scenes of uncontrollable distress, like a field of battle. All night in the fields, might be heard the voice of prayer and praise”. Whitefield concluded, “It far outdid all that I ever saw in America”.

           On Saturday of the same week, Whitefield, in concert with area pastors, preached to an estimated 20,000 people in services that stretched well into the night. The following morning, more than 1,700 communicants streamed alongside long Communion tables set up in tents. Everywhere in the town, he recalled, “you might have heard persons praying to and praising God.”

            With every trip across the Atlantic, he became more popular. Indeed, much of the early controversy that surrounded Whitefield’s revivals disappeared (critics complained of the excess enthusiasm of both preacher and crowds), and former foes warmed to a mellowed Whitefield.

          Before his tours of the colonies were complete, virtually every man, woman, and child had heard the “Grand Itinerant” at least once. So pervasive was Whitefield’s impact in America that he can justly be styled America’s first cultural hero. Before Whitefield, it is doubtful any name, other than royalty, was known equally from Boston to Charleston.

         Whitefield’s lifelong successes in the pulpit were not matched in his private family life. Like many itinerants of his day, he was suspicious of marriage and feared a wife would become a rival to the pulpit. When he finally married an older widow, Elizabeth James, the union never seemed to flower into a deeply intimate, sharing relationship.

             In 1770, the then 55 years old Whitefield continued his preaching tour in the colonies as if he were still a young itinerant, insisting, “I would rather wear out than rust out”. He ignored the danger signs, in particular asthmatic colds that bought him great difficulty in breathing. His last sermon took place in the fields, atop a large barrel at Newburyport, Massachusetts.

           “He was speaking of the inefficiency of works to merit salvation” one listener recounted for the press, “and suddenly cried out in a tone of thunder, ‘Works! Works! A man gets to heaven by works! I would soon as think of climbing to the moon on a rope of sand.” The following morning, he went home to be with his Master, Jesus Christ.

         Europe and North America of the 18^th Century is radically different from the current reality. Apostasy is intense in both continents and most preachers propagate doctrines of devils. Some of them even deny the Lord Jesus Christ openly by insisting that all religions lead to God. Certainly, it is a challenge to find people of spiritual integrity in the mould of Whitefield in the Western world today. Our consolation is that the God who moved mightily in the hearts of men to birth the Great Awakening is still on the throne. We must not relent in our prayer for the great harvest of souls in both continents and across the world as we await the Day of the LORD.                           

Culled from https://www.christianitytoday.com and https://www.en.m.wikipedia.org