The Lewis Revival 1949 - Part 2 — Colin Peckham

And eventually it was prepared, the ground was prepared, and God sent Duncan Campbell to Barbos.

But in the meantime, God had been working, and whilst Duncan Campbell was at Barbos, let me say this,

there in Ness, just 15 miles north of Barbos, there they had,

the minister had got two brothers from Broadford, Reverend McSween and his brother was a headmaster,

he got them to hold one, Reverend McSween came and held a campaign for a week, and then his brother came

and held another one, and then the minister came and held another one.

So three campaigns in three weeks.

Now that happened whilst Campbell was in Barbos.

The full churches in Ness, they were, that church was filled again and again, people were waiting,

and waiting for the word.

South of the very north of Ireland,

there, he came to the

mission, and then he left it in the

night of the sky, and then across the

Baltimore on the other side on the east coast,

and then he parted

seriously with every

church.

So now revival was already there, people were already getting saved.

There was the movement here in Barbos, the people were praying and praying and praying.

By the way, that story about Nathan came together

in a barn, was read in Psalm

24, do you remember that story?

Who shall ascend up into the hill of the Lord, and who shall stand in these holy places that have clean hands and a pure heart?

And the man stopped, Kenneth MacDonald, and he stopped and he said,

Now when we told that story, nobody remembered that, because numbers

of men in revival had come.

That's the story that we hear.

But so many more, other meetings were held like that, that that wasn't even an incident.

Nobody remembers that meeting, because there were so many like that.

God was working all over the family, the

minister came, and the movement began in Barbos.

Then he returned back to the mainland and back again, and other ministers took part, and the movement continued.

And the praying men of Barbos and of the other places there around, my word, they were the men

upon whom the burden came.

They would get up and stand and pray.

Prayer was normally about 20 minutes.

I heard Rory Alec play in 1964, I was there in a school hall, and they had it in Barbos, in Barbos

school hall.

The minister, the man who was leading the meeting, asked Rory Alec to play.

Instead of word, he was praying, Alec.

I looked round, and I looked at his

power in this place now.

I don't understand what he's saying, but my word, I sense.

God, again and again, in one meeting after another, the praying men

carried.

So it was a revival of prayer.

Campbell came, and what he said, that when he was described as the man who brought revival to

Lewis, he said, I did not bring revival to Lewis.

The revival was there before I ever went to Lewis.

Now that puts this revival in its perspective.

There were many revivals.

And in 1949, he came to the Church of Scotland.

Now the large church, so that

it was then a smaller

revival than others were in the free church, which is the larger church.

Whilst many of the people joined the church.

So that is the background of the 1949 revival.

And a very important background, because that is not understood by many people.

So now, I want to speak to you just

upon this evening, this morning, on the characteristics of this revival.

The characteristics.

So first of all, the first characteristic is the influence of scripture and the former revivals.

The Sunday schools, the people who went to the Sunday schools.

But they learnt scripture in the schools.

They learnt the Shorter Catechism by heart.

The Westminster Shorter Catechism.

One hundred questions, they knew it.

These children, they would come back and quote repentance and prayer is this and that.

They would know this.

They were taught.

They were theologically educated.

And the

fact that the word of God was held in high regard throughout all the communities.

My wife Mary says, successive revivals in the island since the great revival in the

1820s had brought the scriptures into prominence in the schools.

And there we were taught to honour the word of God and to memorise it.

We all memorised many psalms and whole chapters in both English and Gaelic.

In our home, my unsaved father would conduct worship each night.

And there was a righteousness in the community.

I mean, for the whole of that 2 ,000 or then about 2 ,500, 3 ,000 people in the Ness area

where the 14 villages, there was one policeman.

And he existed to sign forms.

And then going 15 miles south to Barbas, there was another one policeman.

He and he existed to help all the people in the district of Barbas.

So, you know, there was an inherent honesty and righteousness.

The people respected the things of God.

And so when the revival came, they were able to respond to that which they already knew

in their own heart.

And then not only the influence of the scripture, but the use of scripture,

secondly, in the revival.

This revival was Bible sent.

Duncan Campbell preached the word of God.

Again and again he would go.

My wife says that he went from

Genesis to Revelation preaching the word every night, quoting, quoting, quoting scripture.

And so he said, he seemed to go from Genesis to Revelation

preaching the word.

He quoted so much and applied it to our hearts.

We were confronted by what God said.

This was his authority and this was the strength of his preaching.

He, Duncan said, preached the word.

Sing the word.

Live the word.

Anything outside of this has no sanction in heaven.

He was a Bible preacher.

And that was central.

So we have the influence of scripture and the use of scripture.

And then prayer.

This is a marvelous part of the whole movement.

Prayer was absolutely part of the whole.

There seemed to be a compulsion to pray, and we did pray.

Norman Campbell says there had been revival in 1939, a revival in which prayer was a dominant factor.

No preacher led the movement, but people came to the Lord in the prayer meetings in their homes.

Catherine Campbell speaks about the 39th revival.

She says the 39th revival was still fresh in the memories of my parents and their friends.

And they were very burdened for the lost.

Always.

The 39th revival was born in prayer.

And that spirit of prayer continued, eventually increasing, until the 49th revival.