Testimony — Mary Peckham

Revival as a Visitation from Heaven

I've discovered since coming to the States, that when you talk about having a revival, you're talking about a series of meetings. When I talk about revival, I'm talking about a visitation from heaven.

And that is a different thing from just having a series of meetings. You can have a series of meetings and the people go away just as they came. But when revival comes, nobody goes away the same. Everybody is changed.

Even though they don't come to Christ, they will never forget being involved in a revival. Colin read to you, Oh, that thou wouldst rend the heavens, that thou wouldst come down, that the mountains might flow down at thy presence.

As when the melting fire burneth, the fire causes the water to boil, to make thy name known to thine adversaries, that nations may tremble at thy presence. And that is exactly what happens in revival.

Men and women tremble at his presence. God says in his word, to this man will I look, even to the man that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word. Revival is not the discovery of something new.

Returning to the Old Paths

Let me make that plain. But it is a return to the old. Some of us may not like that. But that is exactly as the word of God puts it. Do you remember what Jeremiah said in the sixth chapter? As he called out to Israel, under the condemnation of God because of their compromise and because of their sin, he said to them, Stand ye in the ways and see.

Ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk in them, and ye shall find rest unto your soul. But what did they say? We will not walk in them. We don't want to walk in the old path of righteousness and truth.

As was said, I was brought up on the island of Lewis. And the island of Lewis, as a culture of its own, through the influence of revival down the centuries, the word, the book, has a prominent place in the homes of the people.

As Colin said, it has been a long time now since that visitation of God to the island. And I understand that the people of God are becoming burdened again. There is not only mercy in a season of revival, but there is also judgment.

And many rejected the claims of Christ in these days. And sadly, many in leadership in the churches rejected the movement of the Spirit of God. Nevertheless, it happened. And in an island where so much emphasis was laid upon the word of God, when God came upon them, there was fuel to burn.

And the word of God became alive to them. Family worship was held in the homes morning and evening. Families who were Christians sang the Psalms together, morning and evening, and thus started and ended the day.

The curriculum of the day school, not Christian school, but government school, because of the influence of past revivals, great emphasis was laid on the memorization of the word of God in two languages.

So we had to learn chapters of scripture off by heart in Gaelic and in English. And if you want to give an inheritance to your children, teach them from the beginning to memorize the word of God. The easiest one to memorize is the one that I have here in my hand, the old King James Version with its beautiful English.

But we learned it. And along with it, we were presented with the Westminster Confession of Faith, the shorter Catechism of the Presbyterian Church with its hundred questions and answers. And we knew what man was to believe concerning God, as the Catechism says, and what duty God requires of man.

And we learned that God is a spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in His being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth. And we learned off by heart Exodus chapter 20 with the Ten Commandments.

We knew the commandments. And the psalmist said,. And we found as we went out into life that though we were not Christians, committed Christians, the word of God was there. I am the Lord thy God. Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. Thou shalt not bow down to them, nor serve them. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.

Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not covet. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor. All these were indelibly written upon, as the scripture says, the fleshly tables of our hearts.

And we knew what was right, and we knew what was wrong. That didn't make Christians of us. So as a teenager I left the island and went the 200 miles to the city of Glasgow on the mainland to find out about life, to see how other people lived, to get a job there, and to be away from the religious influence of the island of Luz.

Resistance to Revival in Glasgow

And so I went on with my life. I was with the Gaelic Society in Glasgow, taking part in their ceilidh, their dances, their concerts, and life to me was a lot of fun. But this book, which was put in my case by my grandmother, I never opened.

And the 300 churches in Glasgow I never noticed. I was not interested in these things. And then in the midst of my enjoyment came the news from the island of Luz that they were in the midst of a heaven-sent revival.

Now you children of God, you would have rushed onto the train and onto the ship and gone up to the island of Luz to become involved, not I. I was afraid. I knew from childhood that there were people who encountered God in their lives and came under concern for their souls and left the old paths of sin and pleasure and were now worshipping in the house of God.

Now and again one would hear of them. And I knew what it was all about. And the news that I heard from Luz I found very disturbing because many of the young people were coming to the Lord and were no more interested in my way of life.

The Bible says the sinners in Zion are afraid. Fearfulness encompasses the hypocrite. And I was afraid. I thought, I'll not go back to Luz until this wave of revival passes over. Now the great T .H. Spurgeon said that we should never testify of our own experience but of the truth of the Word of God.

And the Bible says that the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost. And if He didn't seek us, we would never seek Him. And God in His providence so organized the circumstances in my island home and in my home that I found myself on the train and on the boat making for Luz which I vowed I would not do.

But the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which is lost. My parents were sick and I was called home to care for them. And home I came. And no sooner was I home than the news of revival became the talk of the village and of the community and of the island.

The whole center of conversation was about those who were being converted, the lives that were being changed, the alcoholics who were now in the prayer meeting. And it was a disturbing atmosphere for someone who was out of Christ and who did not want to have an encounter with God.

My heart was at enmity against God as the Bible says. I was as a sheep going astray. As the Bible says. To cut a long story short, one night I found myself right at the back of the meeting in the church.

The Revival Meetings and the Preaching of Sin

Church crammed to capacity. No music in our churches. No organ, no piano, no guitar, nothing. No hymns, no choruses, just the Psalms of David. And they sang them without music. And the order of service never changed, not even in revival.

It was still the same. Two verses of a psalm, an opening prayer, two verses of a psalm, a reading from the word, two verses of a psalm, an hour long sermon, two verses of a psalm and a benediction. Now you would think that was dead.

But I sat at the back of that service that night and I was afraid. As they sang the word of God, for that's what they were doing. As they sang the word of God, it vibrated through the building. And I felt the shivers going down my spine.

As they sang. What did they sing? Oh, you know the Psalms. I waited for the Lord, my God, and patiently did bear at length to me. He did incline my voice and cry to hear. He took me from a fearful pit and from the mighty clay and on a rock He set my feet, establishing my way.

He put a new song in my mouth, praise unto my God. And there I sat. And I shivered inwardly as I heard. And then as the picture got up to the rostrum, to the pulpit, and he stormed up and down the pulpit preaching with a perspiration in wintertime.

And I don't recall that there was heating in the church. But the perspiration was rolling down his face. And I knew one thing, that Duncan Campbell was in earnest about what he was saying. I knew that he believed what he was saying.

And he wasn't saying what so many evangelists say today, come to Jesus and be happy. Come to Jesus and He will put a spring in your step. Making a convenience of Jesus Christ. No, he preached the gospel as your grandparents used to hear it.

And mine. He proclaimed the Word. It seemed as if he went from Genesis to Revelation. Quoting Scripture, quoting Scripture. Though the wicked join hand in hand, they shall not go unpunished. The wicked shall be turned into hell and all nations that forget God.

And sin was preached. And the sinner's condition was preached. And the sinner's destination was preached. And the people would leave the services quietly. You could almost hear the proverbial pin drop.

As the congregation would leave under a sense of the presence of God, and the sinners under the sense of the condemnation of God making their way home. Not in Mercedes, but Shanks Pony. You know what that is.

Walking. And so we would walk night after night through the winter. Two miles, two and a half miles to church in all kinds of weather. Constrained, drawn as if by a magnet. Inwardly I didn't want to go.

But I found myself going. I was being drawn there. I couldn't stay away. And so we followed the meetings from district to district. And everywhere there was that sense of God. In fact, the congregation came into the church.

They came in quietly and sat down. And with expectation, you could almost sense the expectation of the congregation as they sang their way to the ceremony. And then, as the sermon was being preached, they would put their heads in their hands and they would sit.

And oftentimes the tears would flow, the white handkerchiefs would come out. And you would hear a sob here and there, but no disturbance, no confusion, nothing. But an awesome, we were singing about our awesome God.

I tell you, my friend, we were singing there about gazing on Him. I think one moment, one glimpse of Him in His holiness was enough to reduce you to a penitent heap. Awesome, you say? He sits upon the circumference of the earth and all the inhabitants thereof are as grass up.

Isaiah, when he saw Him, he saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and His train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphims, each one at six wings. With twain He covered His face, with twain He covered His feet, and in holy activity with twain He did fly.

And one cried to another and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of His glory. And so it was in that season of revival. The whole earth, every blade of grass, every little flower, every star in the heavens, every fish in the sea, we lived by the seaside, everything seemed to proclaim aloud to us that God was God and God was holy and we were sinful and we were lost without God and without hope in the world.

Conviction of Sin and the Call to Mercy

There was a man who was an alcoholic sitting one night up in the Coast Guard station, watching in the Coast Guard station, and there was a lamp, a paraffin lamp, kerosene you call it, kerosene lamp in front of him, and there was a fly going round the kerosene lamp.

And he began in his drunken stupor to talk to the fly and to say, If you go a little bit closer, you'll get burnt. If you go a little bit closer, you'll get burnt. And suddenly it came back like a boomerang to his soul, and if you get a little bit closer, you'll be burnt in hell.

And he fled from his Coast Guard station. And in the small hours of the morning, he went to the manse. My cousin was the minister there. Knocked on the door, the minister came to the door, and the man in distress cried, the grass under my feet and the rocks around me, cry to me to flee to God for refuge.

Will God have mercy on me? It was like that. Everything spoke of God. And I in my ungodly state would walk the village street, and in my inner consciousness the words that I memorized at school came into my mind.

It was like a record play. Oh, everyone that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money, come ye buy and eat, come buy wine and milk without money and without price. Wherefore do you spend money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which satisfies not?

Hearken diligently unto me and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness. Incline your ear and come unto me. Hear, and your soul shall live, and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David.

And so it would go on to the end of the chapter. And then would come who hath believed our report. Remember, I was only a teenager at the time. Who hath believed our report, and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?

For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground. He hath no form nor comeliness, and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. He is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.

And we hid as it were our faces from him. He is despised and we esteemed him not. And so it would go on to the end of the chapter. And I would walk the village street, totally unaware of the world around me, but taken up with the fact that God, oh, God was speaking to me.

Suddenly came the words, Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. But Isaiah said, The whole earth is full of his glory. The whole earth is full of his glory.

And I tell you, sinners like myself, all over the island of Lewis knew that. They knelt behind their peat stacks, that's their fuel for the winter, and they cried to God for mercy. I listened at the door of my father's bedroom.

He was a hardened seaman who had spent his life in the merchant navy. Forty-nine times in Australia and New Zealand. Went through the Panama, through the Suez, all over the world. And what did I hear from behind the closed door?

My father sobbing his heart out and crying the cry of the penitent, Oh, God, be merciful to me, the sinner. He would leave the house and go down into the harbor and behind the boats, and he would kneel there and cry in agony to God that he would have mercy upon him.

Strong young men in these days would sit in the meetings condemned, oh, condemned, and they were being, as the old Puritans used to say, they were being wrought upon by the Spirit of God through the Word of God.

We cannot separate the Spirit of God from the Word of God, otherwise we are in danger of heresy. This is the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God, and it is a sharp two-edged sword piercing to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit joint and marrow, and it is a discerner of the thoughts and the intents of the heart.

We see so little conviction these days in the church, so little of that agony of soul that cries out to God for mercy. We make our decisions as if we were doing the Almighty a favor, and we go away smiling and laughing.

We've joined the club. Now, let me give you the secret of this revival. In the island of Lewis, the whole membership of the church is at the prayer meeting. All of them, and if they're not, the ungodly will be saying, so-and-so wasn't at the prayer meeting, they must be backsliding.

Prayer, the Still Small Voice, and Spiritual Awakening

Godly people, praying people, concerned people. When last did you see one of your elders standing in the prayer meeting, hands uplifted and the tears coursing down his cheeks as he wept for the ungodly out there in the world?

I remember one of our elders praying like that, and I sat and I held onto my seat because I was afraid I was slipping into hell. As he described the youth of the community on, as he said, the slippery paths of darkness, I'll never forget that night.

Out into the night we went, beautiful starry sky, and it seemed as if the hush of eternity was over the whole community. God had come. God had come to his people. God had come to the ungodly. Not a word was spoken between us.

We were afraid to speak, lest we break that awesome silence of the presence of God. Oh, sometimes we think that God is in the wind, that God is in the noise, but God is in the still, small voice that churns you inside and calls you to repentance.

One night my mother said to me, Mary, would you like to buy a Bible? Go to the vestry of the church with the others. There are Bibles there. Go and buy one. I had a Bible, but she wanted me to have one of my own.

She had just come to the Lord herself. She had found peace. I can never forget that Sunday when she did find peace. Oh, what a silence was over the dinner table that Sunday afternoon. Mother had come to the Lord, and she described at the table how the minister was speaking about Mary at the cross, and she was there because she loved the Lord.

And she said she was at that moment identified with Mary because she said there the love of God was poured into her heart as she met with Christ. So I went to church that evening, and after the service was over, I slipped into the vestry with others who were going to the bookstall, and I bought a Bible.

And I noticed that they were going to Duncan Campbell to ask him to put a verse in the flyleaf of their Bible. And so I thought, well, he doesn't know me, doesn't know I'm not converted like the rest of these.

I'll ask him to put it in mine. And I gave him my Bible, and he wrote his name in it, and he wrote a text in it. And I thought, I'll go and hear him in the cottage meeting tonight because I hadn't been to the cottage meetings up till then.

Because the people were dissatisfied, they came to the church, the sermon was preached, conviction of sin, God was in the midst, and then an announcement would be made, Mrs. So-and-so is opening her house tonight for a cottage meeting.

And there they would congregate at 10 o 'clock at night. And it wasn't unusual for the meeting to go on until 2 o 'clock in the morning, and I found myself in such a meeting. And that night he announced another meeting.

And I was so ignorant, I didn't know that there were meetings for those who were concerned. And I found myself there, and there were two girls from the village with girls with whom I had grown up. They were my friends, and they were there, and they were weeping.

I wasn't weeping. Oh, I was interested, and I was subdued, and I was solemnized with all that was happening, and all that was coming into my own mind of the Word of God. But I wasn't weeping. And then Duncan Campbell came in and closed the door, and I was horrified.

But I couldn't open my mouth to say to him, I shouldn't really be here, because I'm not, well, I'm not like these people. I couldn't say that. And so he came, and he sat down, and he turned to the one, and he said, well, he said, are you really in earnest about seeking Christ as your Savior?

And I thought, he's going to ask me that? What am I going to say? And he asked the other girl, and she said, yes, it was broken. And you know what it's like in your teenage years. You follow the crowd.

So when he asked me, I said, yes, but oh, I felt such a hypocrite. I felt such a hypocrite, because I said, no, I'm not, I'm not like these people. But the very fact that I did that brought concern into my own heart about my condition.

I knew now that as I went out of that meeting, the whole community would be alive with the story on the morrow that Mary was converted, Sandy's Mary, as I was known. My father was Sandy. And that's how we were known.

Of course, we all knew each other. We were a community of 13 villages, and we'd grown up together. We were on an island and were one big family. And there I was. I was in a corner, as it were. And when I came out of the house, there were the people outside singing.

They were in a circle. The young people were there. Those who had now found peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. And they were singing. They knew a few English hymns, not many, but they were singing an English hymn.

They were singing Gaelic ones, too. But they were singing this English hymn, and it gripped me. But what gripped me more was the face of a young girl who stood opposite me in the circle. And what I saw in her face I could not describe to this day.

But Jesus said, ye are the salt of the earth, and salt makes thirsty. And as I looked at her, there was a thirst created within me. And they were singing, take the world, but give me Jesus. All its joys are but a name.

But His love abideth ever through eternal years the same. Oh, the height and depth of mercy. Oh, the length and breadth of love. Oh, the fullness of redemption. Pledge of endless life above. You know, I was spooked to sing in Gaelic at a large concert.

The Loss of Worldly Desire and the Search for Assurance

My first engagement with a Gaelic society known as the Comann Gaeilge. And I was spooked to sing. My kilt was in the making. I still remember it was a dress McLeod tartan. And all this was so attractive to me.

Before then, I used to sing at the Gaelic festivals and be among the prize winners and so on. But that night, it seemed as if that concert didn't mean anything. And my desires for the pleasures of the world were gone.

And I found myself empty and yearning and longing and yet wondering if ever there was mercy for me, I hadn't lived in immorality. Had not the Ten Commandments checked me again and again? Had I not the spook as a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path?

But moral and upright, when you come into the presence in the awesome, as we were singing, presence of God, all our own righteousness are as filthy rags in His sight. And when you come there, you don't compare yourself with Mr. Black or Mrs. Brown or Mrs. Grey or anybody else.

God is targeting you. And the light from the throne is shining into your heart. But I got down on my knees beside the old black stove in the kitchen. I remember it well at three o 'clock that morning.

What will I say? Mother had taught me in her unconverted state, taught me to pray as a child. Oh God, be merciful to me, the sinner. Went to bed, I didn't feel any different, but oh, the next night I was at church long before I was required to be there.

I walked that two and a half miles and I didn't know what to expect at the other end. And all I got was condemnation, condemnation, condemnation. Seemed as if God was, through His Word, lifting up a mirror before me and I was gazing into it and I stood as it were at the judgment bar in time.

I was without God. I was without hope in the world. I remember one night the pillow wet with my tears as I wept myself to sleep. There is no hope. I am lost. I am going to hell. I don't think I have any merit at all to plead before God.

There is no reason in this world or in the next for God to have mercy on me. I had left Him out of my life. I came in rebellion to the island of Luz. Against my will I had become involved in these meetings.

And why should I expect that God, that God would look down on me and that God would give to me as it were a ticket for heaven? I went on like that for three months. I left the island. I went to church on the mainland.

It was as dead as a cemetery. I came back to the island again and followed the meetings all around the island and further afield in the little islands off the coast. Oh, I was in some tremendous meetings.

But then one unforgettable night I prayed a strange prayer. I had come to that place. I loved the people of God. I wanted to be in their companionship. But I was conscious that I was as the foolish virgins in the companionship of the wise.

I had no oil in my vessel with my love. Oh yes, Duncan Campbell had given me a text. But I didn't believe that it was Duncan Campbell who had to give me a text. I believed that God Himself must give it to me.

I wanted that assurance within my heart from God. I wanted to have an encounter with God Himself. And there I was. And I prayed, O God, allow me the privilege of spending my life in the companionship of Thy people, for I love them.

I don't want my old ways. I don't want my old life. And then in the end God sent me to hell because that's what I deserve. God didn't answer that prayer. I'm not in hell. And I'm not going to hell. 24th of August, 1950.

Conversion Through Christ's Substitutionary Atonement

I sat in the prayer meeting, midweek prayer meeting. The elders prayed. Presence of God was there, as had been the case down through these years. The minister was closing in prayer. He wasn't directing his prayer at anybody but God Himself.

And in his prayer he quoted Isaiah chapter 53, verse 5. I knew it in Gaelic and I knew it in English. All the services were Gaelic. And suddenly it seemed as if the congregation faded from my vision. And I wasn't there anymore.

I was at the place called Calvary. I was there alone. And the word came, He was wounded for your transgressions. He was bruised for your iniquities. The chastisement of your peace was upon Him. And with His stripes you are healed.

And I knew it. Nobody needed to tell me. I didn't exactly know what had happened. I didn't have words to express what had happened. But there was peace in my heart. And I knew beyond the shadow of a doubt, I knew I am the Lord's.

When later on an elder stood up to pray and he quoted that verse, His Spirit beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. I thought that's it. It's the Spirit of God witnessing with my spirit through the Word of God that I am a child of God.

My joy knew no bounds. Oh, the joy that filled my heart as I left that meeting. And we went 12 miles to the next meeting which was held in a dance hall which was never used to my knowledge as a dance hall after that.

And it felt as if I was going to heaven and I was going to heaven very soon. And after that meeting was over, we said to each other, a crowd of teenagers, we said, It's a waste of time to go to bed. Let's go walk on the shore.

Two o 'clock in the morning found us walking on the shore, singing above the noise of the waves. Now none but Christ can satisfy. None other name for me. There's love, there's life, there's lasting joy.

Lord Jesus, found in thee. And as we gathered in a little nest as it were, a little circle on the sands, and as we prayed together, the presence of God was as real there as it was in the sanctuary or as it was in the dance hall that night or as it was in the cottage meetings.

God was everywhere. And this God is my God. And my joy knew no bounds. The following day, I went back to my loom. You don't know what a loom is, do you? You've heard of harris tweed? I wove thousands of yards of the stuff.

And I was clattering away at my loom, weaving harris tweed, singing above the noise of the clatter of the loom. And conscious of this fact, you are not your own. You are bought with a price. And what a price.

The blood of the Son of God. You are bought with a price. You are not your own. And as I watched the pattern unfolding on the loom, I knew that God had a pattern for my life. Go to the services, and oh, so often they sang the 45th Psalm to close the service.

Hearken, O daughter, and consider and incline thine ear. Forget thine own people and thy father's house. So shall the king greatly desire thy beauty, for he is thy God, and worship thou him. Instead of the father shall be the children, whom thou mayest make princes in the earth.

And my soul went out after him. And my soul went out after those who were lost without God and without hope in the world. I can't understand the conversion that doesn't result in the man or woman or young person becoming a missionary.

Whether in your own home, whether in your own community, whether in your own workplace. We are not our own. Bought with such a price. Five bleeding wounds he bore, received on Calvary. The poor effectual prayers they strongly plead for me.

Forgive them all, forgive they cry, nor let that ransomed sinner die. Save them from going down to the pit. God says in triumph, I have found a ransom. And I saw the ransom. And I was ransomed. And I didn't belong to myself.

Answering the Call to Proclaim Christ

The enemy is never too far away when God is speaking to you. And the enemy said to me, no, no, no, no, no, I just told it. Hold it. You come from a Calvinistic background and you come from a church where women must be quiet and they mustn't say a word.

I was burning with it. I used to weep and think. I stood on that platform in the town hall in Stornoway from the time I was so high in my little kilt right through my years, every year, onto that mud, that festival, that competition.

And I would sing under the footlights for the prize givers in the evening. And I used to tremble. But I used to sing these old secular songs to them. And now I used to weep. Oh God, I had nothing to give them.

I had nothing to say to them. I want to tell them about Jesus and that what happened to the woman of Samaria. She went to the men and she said, Come, see a man who has told me all things that ever I did.

Is not this the Christ? And I said to the Lord, But Lord, there are so many young men. And thank God they went. Then one unforgettable night, sitting on a polished table, the only place left in the cottage to sit on, the preacher was in a faraway room.

I could only hear his voice, but he had actually lost his voice at the end of the sermon in church. We did not know how he could preach in the cottage meeting. And all he gave was his text and he lost his voice.

And it came booming through the house and targeted on my heart. And it broke my heart. And it was, Mary, the Master has come. And he called us for these. And I cried in my heart, not aloud. I cried in my heart, Oh God, you don't need to call me from the housetops.

I'll go. I'll go. Now I'm going to end on this note. And on the other evenings, I will give you a little cameos here and there. Because a testimony to be a testimony must be up to date. I left the island of Lewis with four pounds in my pocket and one case with all my possessions.

Faithful Provision for a Life of Ministry

And I went to Edinburgh. And I still recall coming up to the Bible College, seeing this austere looking frontage to the building, lovely old building of stone. And I thought, No, I'm not going in that front door.