Social Aspects of Revival — Bill McLeod

Something just occurred to me about Gordon Bain, I should share probably with you now. He was invited to a church in Ontario, and he was invited there because one of the church members was a member of the Ebenezer Church in Saskatoon, but who moved down east before the revival, and so he missed the revival, and he desperately wanted to see something of revival, so he invited Gordon to come down, but the pastor told him, I'll let him preach, but no invitations.

I don't want him giving any public invitation. So they told Gordon this. Well, Gordon's very wise, you know. So he said he preached, and he could see conviction everywhere, you know. So at the end he said, now, I think we should have a time of prayer, and he said, you can pray right where you're sitting, but you might feel more comfortable just coming forward to the altar and kneeling and praying here, and if you feel more comfortable doing that, feel free to do this.

And he started praying, and he heard this stampede of feet, he looks almost the whole church was kneeling at the front, you know. And the preacher had only planned to have him Sunday morning, so Gordon only could stand, but his telephone just about burned off the wall Sunday afternoon.

People wanted him to have Gordon Sunday evening, so he had to have him come back in the evening as well. It was interesting, though, just to watch him to see how, you know, how the Lord would lead him to do the right thing at the right time.

And I was in meetings down in the States one time, and they told me the preacher doesn't like altar calls. Don't give an altar call, whatever you do, otherwise you can preach what you want. And I forgot all about this.

I preached, I gave an altar call, and my wife was throwing me hand signals, and I thought, what's wrong with my wife? She's waving, you know. And all of a sudden, who comes down the aisle but the preacher.

He was the first one at the altar, you know, so the Lord had me forget so the preacher could make it to the altar and get his life straightened out. And there's different ways. Like, I remember being in a church one time, and they told me a very clear, it was in Winnipeg, and they never had an altar call, the preacher was opposed to it, so I preached there.

And so here's how I handled it. I said, now, it may be that God has touched many of your lives, you want to meet with God, so when the others are leaving, you just remain seated. So we had 45 people remain seated, you know.

And so I worked with these people. It was exactly the same as if you called them for the altar, you know. There's all these different ways of handling it, and God gives us wisdom in these situations as we look to him.

Revival's Social Effects on Christian Conduct

Now I want to talk this afternoon, this session, about the social aspects of revival. What does revival leave behind? What does it do in the culture, in the community? And to introduce that, I want to read from the book of Titus a number of verses that deal with this particular problem.

Titus 1, 16, I quoted that this morning. They profess that they know God, but in works they deny him. And that describes many professing Christians today. They profess that they know God, they don't really possess God, and so their life doesn't back up their lip.

And so they profess that they know God, but in works they deny him, being abominable and disobedient. Now to every good work reprobate, or as the Marginal Reading says here, void of judgment. Chapter 2, verse 7, in all things showing yourself a pattern of good works, in doctrine showing uncorruptedness, gravity, sincerity, sound speech that cannot be condemned, that he that is of the contrary part may be ashamed, having no evil thing to say of you.

Spurgeon, when he first got to preaching, he was sometimes quite bombastic, and he had, I think it was a grandfather, a Christian, and Spurgeon said he'd come home from church, and after having uttered some bombastic things, and he'd find in his room his Bible open with a pin stuck in this verse, by his grandfather.

Sound speech that cannot be condemned, that he that is of the contrary part may be ashamed, having no evil thing to say of you. He said, I learned a lot from my granddad. Then in chapter 3, verse 1, put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready, it means eager, to every good work.

Ready to support every good work. And it doesn't say every Christian work. There may be something going on in the community, sponsored by the government, whatever, that's a good thing, and often Christians stay away from that sort of thing, because they say it's of the world, it has nothing to do with it.

And I don't think that's right, because they often complain about the Christians, that they never get involved in things of this kind. If it's not Christian, we have nothing to do with it. And that's not right.

We're to be eager, ready, to every good work. Then further down the same chapter, verse 8, this is a faithful saying of these things, I will that thou affirm constantly, he's talking to Titus the preacher, that they who have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works.

These things are good and profitable unto men, but avoid foolish questions in genealogies and contentions, and striving but the law, for they are unprofitable in vain. And verse 14, it may run, I don't know what translation you use, it may run a little differently here, let us also learn to maintain good works.

Now, the Marginal Reading says to profess honest trades, for necessary uses, that they be not unfruitful. But all through the New Testament you find this, let your light so shine before men, that they may see what?

Your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven. When they watch your life and mine, do they see anything? Am I involved in good works? They're not impressed if they don't see something of this kind going on, and they have a right to think that way.

Then go over to Ephesians 2 .10 for one more, it simply says we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has before ordained, or prepared, that we should walk in them. God has ordained that we Christians should walk in good works, so we need to get involved, we need to pray and ask God to lead us to show us where we can be effective in supporting good works.

Revival and Social Reform

I think I have about 50 books on revival in my library, and in all these books there's references to the social impact of revival, scattered references. I wish somebody would do a book, bring it all together, because it's really a thrilling story.

Many years ago a fellow named Breedy, he wrote a book entitled This Freedom Wents. I don't think it's on the market anymore. I read it as a young Christian, that's a long while ago, probably 40 years ago.

And This Freedom Wents, and he was showing how that many, many of the freedoms we enjoy today, we enjoy because evangelicals touched by God in revival had instituted reforms, and he mentioned, for example, prison reform, child labor laws, slavery, and things of this kind, which we take for granted today, were a real problem back in those times.

And then revival came, and people got concerned and began to move into these areas and change things. You take Wilberforce, they call him the butterfly. Apparently he flitted around a lot, and if there's 30 people in the room, he flitted the whole time, and he talked a great deal, and he really had a lot to say.

When he got up to speak in the house, if it was known before as a politician, and he was going to speak, everybody was there. He had a tremendous gift for communicating with people, but he fought slavery for 25 years.

And many times he had enough guys lined up to vote it out of the British Empire, and it seemed to always happen, and half of them stayed home, and then the vote was lost. And he stayed with it for 25 years, and finally they got the vote they needed, and slavery was abolished through the whole of the British Empire.

But he was an ardent evangelical, touched by God in revival, and he was doing what we Christians need to do to get involved in whatever areas we possibly can. Asahel Neville, and I mentioned him this morning, in Farmington, Connecticut, here's something he said after revival there.

The change in the moral aspect of the things was astonishing. Inveterate, hard-headed sinners who once appeared hopeless were now in their right minds at the feet of Jesus. The greedy worshippers of money left their idols and parted with everything for Christ's sake.

Clashing interests based on selfishness and pride were reconciled, and neighborhood quarrels and much hostility of spirits ceased. Many who formerly would not speak to one another now joined hand-in-hand in the work of Christ and earned the New Testament description, behold how they love one another.

Revival's Transformation of Communities

A place called Nig in Scotland, 1729. Of the many converts in the revival, not one in 40 had fallen back after five years. Almost every household practiced family worship. The civil magistrate has had no crimes here for many years.

Can you believe it? A community no crime for many years after the revival. So many people have been converted, and the whole public conscience had been awakened and quickened, and people's morals had risen whether they were Christians or not as a result of the work of God.

Here's another reference to a revival in Scotland. People infamous for brutality, differing little from hottentots, were now moral and sober. Churches recently empty were now well filled. The subjects of this work of God were made another sort of people than ever they were before.

This is somebody speaking back from those times. The Camuslang revival. Camuslang in Scotland. There was a natural amphitheater in the hills, and Whitfield was there for meetings, and nobody knows. They say between 50 and 100 ,000 people gathered.

And you know, Glasgow in those days only had 17 ,000 people. Where'd all those people come from? They came from all over Scotland. And there's open-air meetings. No public address system. But Whitfield had a supernatural voice.

They said he could make people tremble in their pews simply by pronouncing the word Mesopotamia. Benjamin Franklin tested his voice on the Boston Commons. He stood at a measured mile, and as Whitfield began to speak before he was warmed up, he heard the first words of the opening sentence clearly at a distance of a mile.

I mean, there were giants in the earth in those days. And nowadays, people who speak to 60 people, they have to have the system, you know. They can't be heard, you know. I mean, what's happened? I really don't know.

But anyway, Whitfield did the preaching there, and they heard him. 50 ,000, 100 ,000 people in the open air. Of course, in those days, they didn't talk about how many people. They talked about how many acres of people were there.

You know, 20 acres or 30 acres or 50 acres of people or whatever, you know. And then God just did—and you know, Whitfield had TB, and he spit blood almost every day he lived. He died fairly young, age 56.

Preached only 16 ,000 times before he died. Here's—this has to do with canvas-laying, actually. The Court Bailey deputy said, there have been no pleas before our court for many months now, although before the revival, there were many such every week.

A pastor tells of changes he witnessed in the canvas-laying revival. Cursors and swears now speak with clean tongues. Those who formerly spent much time in taverns drinking and playing cards until morning now found pleasure in their own homes.

The former drunkard who lay in bed late every morning to sleep off his last night's drinking now gets up at 3 or 4 in the morning and reads his Bible and good books till 7 or 8 before he calls his household together for family devotions.

Wives who formerly were thorns in the flesh now live in peace and love and harmony with their husbands. In one case, the pastor had to restrain some of his people from giving too much money for the cause of God after experiencing revival.

One revived person said, I can safely say in the sight of God that I have no malice or ill will to any person on earth. I want and heartily desire that his kingdom may be advanced all the world over. My heart has been so filled with love to Christ and the souls of others that I could have been content, if it had been possible, to have taken all the multitude in my arms and to have carried them all up to heaven.

The work of God in people's hearts, this doesn't come naturally. It's something God has to do in our hearts. Somebody else said, the formerly covetous and worldly-minded and selfish have now got a public spirit and a zealous concern for promoting the kingdom and glory of Christ and the conversion and salvation of others.

And for this end are careful to live usefully to others. To put it briefly, they were thoroughly missionary-minded. Revivals gave a tremendous impetus to missionary work around the world. There's a book called The Great Awakening.

Here's something they said there. The effect of revival in one town. That there is an alteration in it for the better must, I think, needs to be owned by every unprejudiced observer. That there is not that profane cursing and swearing which had formerly been usual, that the Sabbath is more strictly observed, is out of all matter of dispute.

Family worship where it was neglected in a variety of instances is now set up. Some that were manifestly of a narrow, selfish, and worldly spirit and seemed unwilling to part with anything of what they possessed to any good and charitable use, to any good and charitable use, whatever, appear to now have their hearts much enlarged and are ready to distribute of their substance as the honor of God and the ones that others have called for it.

Many that have dealt dishonestly have not only acknowledged the wrongs they've done, but made restitution for the same. And in Wales, a place called Amalford, Bibles were sold out. Swearing in the mines gave way to praise in the mines.

The taverns were emptied of rowdy customers. Ministers were rejoicing because the police were now unemployed. The streets were so quiet and the local councils were quite willing to continue supporting the police, even if they had nothing to do.

Oh, what a change. And so it says, in some cases police were forming quartets and then going around singing in the churches since they had nothing else to do. Feuds and quarrels from a recent strike were settled.

The Swansea County Police Court, after 1905 New Year, announced that there had not been a single case of drunkenness over the holiday weekend, a new record. Such a great wave of sobriety swept over the country that it caused severe losses to men in the liquor trade and closed many of the taverns.

A great improvement in public morals resulted in turn from the closures. Cursing and profanity to which the miners had firmly used and driving the pit ponies now ended and the ponies did not understand the new way the miners spoke to them and in some instances stood still and refused to move.

I mean before they cursed them to get them moving and now they weren't. Somebody said they were using the language of Zion and the ponies didn't understand it so they didn't move. There were many instances of working people bringing their parents home from the workhouse they'd formerly sent them to and taking care of them tenderly at home.

There were many striking cases of restitution, long-standing debts were paid, stolen goods were returned, pugilists and gamblers were converted, colleges were affected, and sometimes classes had to be suspended as students were gathering for prayer and praise meetings.

One pastor said the revival had accomplished more in two months than the temperance laws had done in two years. There was a decrease in sexual immorality in every area where the revival was felt. Then a revival in Norway in the early 1900s.

Revival Across Nations and Generations

By the way there was powerful revivals in Norway and Sweden and Finland and Finland it's a small nation. Finland sends out more missionaries in proportion to the Christian population than any country in the world.

The United States think they have the record they don't have the record there Norway has it. There's been great revivals in Norway and Sweden and these countries in the past and oh by the way just before Dunkirk and the last world war there was a tremendous revival in Hungary the revivalist was James Stewart maybe you've read about him I don't know there's been a book written about it I'm not sure we even have the book or can get it but it was a powerful revival and thousands were converted.

I remember reading about that as a young Christian and longing to see revival in Canada such as they were experiencing in Hungary and some neighboring countries at that particular time. Revival in Norway in the early 1900s old debts were settled, conscious money was paid up, misappropriated articles were returned, intoxication was abomined by many and a pure moral atmosphere was noted everywhere.

I think I mentioned this this morning about Atlanta Georgia 1905 city of 65 ,000 and here not more than perhaps a hundred people were left unconverted in that city. There were cases where whole villages were converted were cases where every family in an area would be converted to Christ just a spontaneous working of the Holy Spirit entirely apart from men to a large extent and this is what God can do in times of revival.

Houston Texas a revival this resulted in the crowding of churches and the closing of gambling dens and the ordering out of the gambling gentry. In Wales during the 1905 revival many many sporting events were closed out because nobody was attending.

They were all being in the churches almost night and day. Many outstanding athletes were converted and some of them went into full-time Christian work. Four top cricketers at Cambridge went out as missionaries to Africa and things like this were happening as a result of the revival.

One newspaper editor called a 1905 revival a revival of honesty and he acknowledged a distinct awakening of the public conscience. He spoke of the revival as a way of civic and commercial righteousness.

Someone whimsically suggested that for the Presbyterians the revival had finally put love into the Westminster Confession. In 1896 before the revival there were around 2 ,000 students engaged in missionary studies in the year after the revival there were 11 ,000 students so involved.

So the tremendous change there also. From the outbreak of the revival for years there was an average of 300 students going out annually as missionaries. Within six months of the beginning of the revival in 1905 in the United States almost 6 ,000 new young people societies were organized around the country.

6 ,000 young people's organizations as a result of the revival. A Christian editor made the following observation regarding the 1905 revival in the United States and by the way Canada was touched as powerfully as the States was at that particular time.

We find evidence of a revival of righteousness in the popular and public protest against the sharp practice and double dealings of insurance managers, the indignation against rate swindling, oppressive corporations, dishonest officials of banks and trust companies, the public wrath against political scoundrels and the successful overthrown elections of many such, and the elevation to power of fearless honest competent men in many states and cities.

Revival, Political Integrity, and Public Conscience

You know Billy Sunday his most powerful meetings were held before the First World War in the wake of the 1905 revival. He had a revival in Pennsylvania and there were 40 ,000 men quit drinking liquor as a result of his crusade.

Now nothing like this seems to happen in the wake of great crusades today but it happened in those days. And Billy Sunday was so hated by the liquor interest that they hired a team of men. If Billy Sunday was coming to Minneapolis they sent this team of men there three months before Billy got there and then these guys were spread all through the country all through the area telling lies about Billy Sunday.

He's got three wives, he's doing this, he's doing that, he's crooked, he drinks, he's a drunkard in the side, telling all these kind of stories. When the meetings were on nobody said anything. When Billy was through the meetings and he sometimes was there for a month or longer that they moved into action began spreading the same kind of lying stories to try and destroy his effectiveness.

I met people in the States who told me that Billy Sunday was a drunkard, that Billy Sunday had three wives and all this garbage that they picked up from this team that the brewers had hired to try and destroy his effectiveness.

But Billy Sunday they said he was a prophet with a burning zeal for social effectiveness and change. He wanted to see change and he saw change. I met people in the States who were converted in some of those early Billy Sunday revivals, people 80 and 90 years old and they just want to tell us about what happened then.

Our church got 300 people saved one lady told me. She was so excited. This was back in 1906 or something. In some areas following Billy Sunday's crusades no politician could get elected to a public office unless he'd been born again.

That was the question see. If we had that for a criteria today there wouldn't be any politicians in Ottawa you know. Do you know the difference between the politician and the statesman? See the politician lives for himself like Colson tells in that book called The Kingdoms in Conflict that the name of the game in politics is get elected.

You can't do anything unless you're in power. So get elected by any means fair or foul. Lie all you have to. Run the other guy down. Tell all the lies you want to tell. You got to get elected. That's the name of the game and that's all a politician thinks.

A statesman is a person who puts the country ahead of his own personal interests. And to illustrate this a story a custom in some areas apparently among Jewish families. When the baby boy is born when he's old enough to sit up by himself they have a meeting.

They call all the relatives and friends in and they set the kid on a table and in front of him they put a whiskey bottle and a dollar bill in the Bible. If he takes a bottle he'll be a rabbi. If he takes a dollar bill he'd be a bank or financier of some kind.

If he takes the bottle he'll be a you know a bootlegger or whatever. So they set little Ike down there and the people are all watching intently you know he's looking at these three things and he grabbed all three.

And his daddy hollered ha ha he's gonna be a politician. Methodist reviewing the results of this revival said throughout the Republic that's the American Republic there are signs of the revival of the public conscience which in many states and cities has broken party lines, rejected machine-made candidates, and elected senators, assemblymen, mayors, and county attorneys of recognized honesty and independence.

First fruits of a new zeal for the living Christ is the Lord of all human activity, social, industrial, commercial, and political. Well it's certainly not like that today right. That's why we need to pray for another awakening by God the Holy Ghost.

God can do it again and there's I'll tell you a lot of prayer going on. I see Bill Bright he's trying to line up three million Americans to to fast for 40 days and 40 nights for revival. He's done this himself he fasted for 40 days and 40 nights and something's going to happen I'm sure of it.

All right then a Presbyterian writer said the movement is awakening the moral sense of cities where for too long a combination of vested interests and the whiskey gambling and prostituting rackets has thwarted the will and the mass of decent people by outrage of the ballot boxes.

Corrupt regimes are now toppling here and there. Results of a revival of Malawi in Africa there were permanent and ethical fruits for feuds were healed, debts were paid, bitter quarreling gave way to brotherly kindness, prayer became joyous, candidates volunteered for Christian service, and the heathen were the heathen were brought into the Christian faith.

Prayer, Discipleship, and Lasting Revival

Missionaries would often report that the power of God in public meetings was simply indescribable. In the 1950s there was a revival in Africa. In this particular missionary station they had had a series of very successful evangelistic crusades and thousands apparently have professed the faith but all of them are struggling and getting nowhere.

And so they picked out a bunch of men who were the best men they could think of in the area, Christian men, and gave each one a responsibility list of these new converts to disciple these new converts and get them walking with God.

And after two years of the program they were all backslidden, including the disciples, and they didn't know what to do. What's God doing here? What in the world's gone wrong, you know? And somebody said we need to pray for revival.

We need to pray for God the Holy Ghost to come and do something lasting and real. And so they began praying. I forget how long they prayed, two years I think. And one night, a very quiet night, they were having, they began by having one extra prayer meeting for revival a month.

Then they began having one extra prayer meeting revival a week. Then they began having a prayer meeting every night of the year for revival. And people were supporting this. And after a couple of years, one night they were praying and they heard the sound of a great wind coming.

And people got up to close the windows, but when they looked out not a leaf was moving on a tree. It was God the Holy Spirit. And that place was swept by the power of God, and hundreds of people were converted, totally converted, soundly converted, lastingly converted.

I read of this in a book. And it was an interesting story to read, because this is not anything new. This is what happens when God comes in this kind of power, this kind of way. And when they say that the power of meetings was indescribable, I know exactly what they mean.

You can't explain this. You can't pass the feeling on to anybody else. You have to be there to see it. I remember reading of a young man in Africa, and he got converted. He could read and write. He'd been to a Christian school.

And he went to the missionaries and said, God's given me the gift of a pastor. Give me a church. And the missionaries had a meeting. They thought, well, this kid, who in the world? Give him a church. What in the world?

He doesn't know a thing about it. You know, he's just a new convert and doesn't know anything. So let's put him on. Let's tell him to come back in six months, and he'll forget about it. So they said to come back in six months.

He came back in six months, and they'd forgotten about it. In the meantime, he hadn't. He said, have you got a church? They said, oh no, that kid, he's back again, you know. So they put him off for another three months.

And he came back in three months, and he kept coming back. And where is this church? Give me a church. God's called me to preach. So these rascally missionaries got their heads together, and they decided to handle it in this way.

They had a church that had been fighting for so long. Somebody said they could have written their own history of the wars of the Lord, you know. And so they were reduced to 12 members. Let's give this kid this church, and it'll go belly-up.

There's no way he can save the situation. And then we'll be able to tell him, look, son, God never called you to be a pastor. So that's what he did. When the article was written, he was still a pastor of the church, only now it had 5 ,000 members.

Well, the kid knew he didn't know anything, so he went to God in prayer. He found a cave in the hills somewhere, and every now and then he'd tell the church, God is calling me away. I don't know when I'll be back.

And he'd carry a little sack of food and go to this cave. He might be gone a week, two weeks, three weeks, and fast many days, and pray, and call on God. And every time he came back to the church, there was an outburst of revival power, and sometimes hundreds were converted.

Now if a pastor did that in North America, we'd fire him, right? I mean, what? He's going to do what? He's going to go away for three weeks. What's he going to do, go on a fishing trip, or he's going golfing or something, you know?

I mean, we'd fire the preacher if he did that here. They had more sense over there than we have here. Before the 1858 revival, there was a decline in the churches everywhere, in spite of much evangelism.

Isaiah's Promise of Growing Churches

During the revival, there were around 50 ,000 converts a week for a year or more. Prior to this revival, suicide, murder, and prostitution were rampant in the United States. As a result of this revival, feeble churches became strong.

Little bands have increased to large churches. Remember that promise in Isaiah 60? A little one shall become a thousand, a small and a strong nation. I, the Lord, will hasten it in its time. That's how the chapter ends, and Chapter 61 begins, with the Spirit of the Lord God is upon me.

A little one become a thousand, a small and a strong nation. And so he's saying here, feeble churches have become strong. Little bands have increased to large churches. Sanctuaries have been erected, notwithstanding the financial pressure.

Large numbers of young men among the new converts have commenced preparation for the ministry, and older members have been brought to new engagedness and activity in the service of God. People living common law were married.

Conversion of the vilest and most abundant of people was followed by their untiring ministry on behalf of others. New converts went by the hundreds from house to house, by day and by night, in treating sinners to repentance.

All over the United States, there were thousands of people going out, teams of two, men and women, every night of the week, beating on doors, winning people to Christ, as a result of the revival. It was a marvelous thing.

It had a tremendous impact on the country as a whole. During the Civil War in the United States, there were great revivals among the soldiers in both armies. I mentioned that, I think, before. Thousands were converted.

Revival among the general population resulted in perhaps 10 being converted. In the armies, it was 21%. In the Confederate Army, the Southern Army, one-third of the soldiers were godly. And then for 40 years after the revival in 1858, Christian enterprises belted the globe.

The majority of the converts were adults. Businessmen began to pay their debts. The awakenings of 1858 persuaded many men to be sober when all other efforts had failed. Bartenders, as well as distillers, professed conversion and changed their livelihood or their business.

The revival induced intensive moral reforms and closed places of debauchery and taverns by the hundreds. Some towns were purged entirely of beer parlors, and hotels and saloons where liquors had been freely purchased before became places of prayer, with drunkards reclaimed in large numbers.

And on and on it goes. I want to read, and I know this is not perhaps as interesting as other things might be, but I want to read. I haven't had time to type out as much as I would like to have done. You'll find this interesting, though, I think.

The 1904–05 Revival's Lasting Blessings

This book is called A Flaming Tongue, The Impact of Twentieth-Century Revivals by J. Edmund Orr. After this revival, Bibles were sold out, swearing in the minds gave place to praise in the minds. The taverns were empty of rowdy customers, and within a decade, the Amonfort Convention for deepening the spiritual life was established by a man called Nathalus Williams, who traced his conversion to the time of the revival.

Then we have a reference here. I think we mentioned this perhaps before. By December, one of the local ministers was rejoicing because the police were unemployed. The streets were so quiet. Feuds and quarrels inherited from a bitter strike recently passed were settled.

The whole community was uplifted by the revival. The Cardiff police, after the revival in Wales, reported a 60 percent decrease in drunkenness and 40 percent fewer people in jail at the New Year. That's before the revival had run more than a few months.

Then he gives some figures here about the decrease in drunkenness in that particular area following the revival. David Lloyd George, he was the prime minister in Great Britain at the time, a master of rhetoric, compared the revival to an earthquake and a tornado, predicting far-reaching social changes.

At a public gathering in Scotland, he spoke of a town in his constituency where almost nobody was attending taverns any longer. Almost everybody had been converted. The great wave of sobriety which swept over the country caused severe financial losses to men in the liquor trade and closed many of the taverns.

A great improvement in public morals resulted in turn from the closures. Many were the evidence of the Spirit of God working in this country. Long-standing debts were paid. Stolen goods returned. Pugilists and gamblers were converted.

In a student lounge at University College in Bangor, an undergraduate started to sing an old Welsh hymn. Another student prayed. An unbroken succession of hymns, prayers, and testimonies followed. Lectures were cut as 300 or more gathered for prayer.

There were similar scenes in other academic communities. During the revival, children held meetings of their own in homes, in barns, and in some cases even in empty pigsty's. The records were full of instances of young children taking part in public meetings in prayer, or song, or exhortation.

The four major non-conformist denominations were reported to have gained 80 ,000 converts in the months of the revival. There's an interesting reference here. Who can give an account of the lasting blessing of the 1904 -05 revival?

Is it possible to tabulate a sum total of family bliss, peace of conscience, brotherly love, holy conduct? What are the debts that were paid and the enemies reconciled to one another? What are the drunkards who became sober and the prodigals who were restored?

Is there a balance that can weigh the burden of sins that was thrown at the foot of the cross? It's a good question. The Methodist journals welcomed the awakening as a glance at their news columns indicated.

Drunkenness and blasphemy disappear. Ministers meetings for prayer. Revival missions column. The revival. More and more it spreads and grows. The revival is shaking the trembling gates of hell. Not an instant of adverse criticism appeared in the secular newspapers apparently at that particular time.

There was an awakening in Norway and it says, under a man called Albert Lunde, has had no parallel in a hundred years. Old debts were settled. Conscious money was paid up. Misappropriated articles were restored.

Intoxication was abounded by men and a pure moral atmosphere was noted by observers of social conditions. The awakening reached even jails where convicts and warders professed conversions to Jesus Christ.