The evening that John Wesley returned from Germany he went to Charles’s house. They had a great deal to tell one another. John gave an account of his travels, and of the help and encouragement he had had from being amongst the Moravians. Charles had to tell of the great work the Lord was now doing in England, of sinners converted in great numbers in many places, and of the great desire to hear the gospel which was now preached by Charles and a few others. There were at that time, and there had been for about seventy years, little companies of believers who met together, a few at a time, to read the word of God, and to pray. These little companies had been first formed by two London clergymen, just after the Fire of London, in the reign of Charles II. They met at one another’s houses once a week. Their meetings were no doubt often rather stiff and lifeless, as they had a printed paper from which to read their prayers, and they had bound themselves to keep various rules, such as praying a certain number of times every day. But it is hard to meet over the Word of God without finding some blessing. It was at one of the meetings of these “societies,” as they were called that John had heard the reading from Luther that had at first brought peace to his soul. These little meetings were now to be of great use, for, as John and Charles were so often forbidden to preach in the churches of London, they would often have been at a loss to know where to preach had it not been for the meeting rooms of these little “societies,” which were in the houses of those belonging to them.
The day after John came home (on Sunday) he spoke to a large company in one of these rooms in the City of London. He continued to do this daily in one room or another—sometimes two or three times a day—and found many glad to listen. He and Charles also went often to Newgate Gaol to visit the prisoners condemned to death. You must remember that at that time people were hanged not only for murder, but for stealing, so that there were generally people to be found under sentence of death—often a considerable number. The brothers still preached in churches when they were allowed; but it generally happened that after the first sermon they were forbidden to preach in that church any more. John now began to preach in other places besides London, at Windsor, Oxford, and so many other places, that it seems wonderful how, in those days, when there were no railroads, he could be so constantly moving about, and so constantly preaching, as though his journeys took but a small part of his time. He either walked or went on horseback.
At the end of this year, on December 8th, John and Charles heard the good news that their old friend George Whitefield had arrived in London from America. John went at once to see him. George Whitefield began preaching immediately, but after three days he was forbidden to preach in no less than five London churches. He, too, was very glad of the rooms of the “societies.” He not only preached there, but he and his friends had prayer meetings, which lasted sometimes all night. They felt sure that God had a great work for them to do in this poor, benighted country, and they began the New Year with much prayer, and with meetings to consult together as to the best way of carrying on the preaching of the gospel.
George Whitefield left London early in that year (1739) and went to Bristol, where he had leave to preach in the churches. In a fortnight, however, his preaching had given such offense that he was forbidden to do so again in any church in the town. In fact, the only place left where he was allowed to speak a word was in the gaol, and very soon the Mayor of Bristol forbad this also. What was now to be done? Perhaps you think it was a pity he did not take more care about offending people. But if it is the gospel that offends them, it would not be right to hold it back on that account. Do you know that one of the titles of the Lord Jesus Christ is a very sad and strange one? He is called (Rom. 9:32-3332Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumblingstone; 33As it is written, Behold, I lay in Sion a stumblingstone and rock of offence: and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. (Romans 9:32‑33)) the Stumbling Stone! That is to say, there is something in the thought of being saved by Him alone, without any doings or feelings of our own to help in the work, that is very displeasing to the proud heart of man. We would like to have some share in saving ourselves.
The people of Bristol had stumbled at the Stumbling Stone, and God would now send out His servant into the highways and hedges, that His house might be filled. Three or four miles from Bristol is a place called Kingswood. It was once a royal forest, but coal having been found there, the trees were mostly cut down, and the whole country round filled with coal-mines, and inhabited by miners. These miners were a very rough, brutal set of people, almost savages in their manners. There was no church or chapel anywhere near them; nobody cared for their souls or bodies, and they lived and died as heathens.
Whitefield thought much of these poor people, and for the second time in his life the thought came to him whether he might do such an extraordinary thing as preach out of doors in a case like this. When he had thought of it before, was just before he left London. Such crowds of people had come to hear him preach in Bermondsey Church, that one thousand remained standing outside the door unable to get in. Whitefield then thought of going out and preaching on a tombstone, but he did not dare; and when he had afterward consulted John and Charles, they said it was a most mad thought. Now, however, Whitefield had no one to consult, which was a good thing. He saw that if he did not go and preach to the colliers out of doors, they must remain heathens.
On Saturday, February 7th, 1739, he set the first example in England of what then seemed so extraordinary, but it is now so common that we think nothing of it. He stood on a hillock and began to preach. He remembered Christ had done the same. A number of colliers came to listen. Next time two thousand; the third time from four to five thousand, and soon twenty thousand. The trees and hedges were filled with black men and boys. He says the scene was very strange: the sun shining brightly—the people standing still “in an awful manner.” All could hear, which was wonderful, considering the numbers. As he preached, he saw white lines on many of the black faces, which were made by the tears running down their sooty cheeks. Numbers of them appear to have been truly converted. In time, others came besides the colliers—ladies and gentlemen, on horseback or in carriages, so that as far as he could see were crowds eager to listen. God had at last begun to awaken England. Whitefield then thought it well to preach on a large bowling-green, in Bristol itself, and as the crowds increased, he sent for John Wesley to come and help him. John hardly knew what to make of it when he arrived. He says he had been used to think that “the saving of souls was almost a sin if it had not been done in a church.” I suppose he thought the rooms of the “societies” almost as good as churches. He let Sunday pass without daring to preach out of doors; but next day, on Monday, April 2nd, he took what he thought the desperate step of preaching on a hill near the town. Three thousand people came to listen. He now had no more fears about it. He preached day by day, and always to crowds.
Whitefield said that as John now found open-air preaching was not a sin, he would leave the Kingswood Collieries to him, and go himself into Wales. The poor colliers took a most affectionate leave of him. They made a sort of farewell feast in their simple way, and brought their pence to be saved up to build a school for their children, asking him to lay the first stone before he left. So, with much prayer, this was done, and Whitefield rode away into Wales.
Wesley went on preaching to great multitudes of people when Whitefield was gone. Now and then he was allowed to preach in a church. He went to the towns round Bristol as far as Bath. There was a man called Mr. Nash living at Bath at that time. He was the leader in all the fashionable amusements of the place, and was known by the name of the King of Bath. A report was spread that if Wesley dared to preach at Bath, Mr. Nash meant to take some violent measures to stop it. Many people begged him, therefore, to give up the thought of preaching there. John Wesley, however, was not easily frightened, and was glad the report had been spread, because great numbers of people, especially of the higher classes, came to the preaching in order to see what Mr. Nash meant to do.
He had just begun to explain his text when Mr. Nash appeared, and asked, as the chief priests and elders once did on a former occasion, by what authority he did these things? Wesley replied that it was by the authority of Jesus Christ. Mr. Nash then told him that such preachings were contrary to the Conventicle Act, “and besides,” he added, “your preaching frightens people out of their wits.” “Sir,” said Wesley, “did you ever hear me preach?” “No.” “How, then, can you judge of what you never heard?” “Sir, by common report.” “Common report is not enough. Give me leave, sir, to ask is not your name Nash?” “My name is Nash.” “Sir, I dare not judge of you by common report; I think it not enough to judge by.” (I should tell you that common report said of Mr. Nash that he was a very bad character.) Here Mr. Nash paused awhile to recover himself, and then said, “I desire to know what these people come here for?” upon which an old dame stepped forward, and said to Mr. Wesley, “Sir, leave him to me; let an old woman answer him. You, Mr. Nash, take care of your body, we take care of our souls, and for the food of our souls we come here.” Mr. Nash replied not a word, but walked away, and we hear no more of him.
Many of Wesley’s friends were somewhat shocked and astonished when they heard of all that was going on. One of them wrote to advise him to leave off his strange practices. He wrote in reply that God had commanded him to preach the gospel. “Man,” he said, “forbids me to do this in another’s parish, that is, to do it at all, seeing I have now no parish of my own, nor probably ever shall. Whom, then, shall I hear, God or man? If it be just to obey man rather than God, judge you. You ask, ‘how can one do good of whom men say all manner of evil?’ I will put you in mind, the more evil men say of me for my Lord’s sake, the more good will He do by me. How could you ever think of ‘saving yourself and them that hear you’ without being ‘the filth and off-scouring of the world?’ To this hour is this scripture true, and I therein rejoice, yea, and will rejoice. Blessed be God! I enjoy the reproach of Christ! Oh may you also be vile, exceeding vile, for His sake! God forbid that you should ever be other than generally scandalous—I had almost said universally. If any man tell you there is a new way of following Christ, he is a liar, and the truth is not in him.” I do not know whether Wesley’s friend was convinced by this letter. Perhaps he thought it very foolish, as many would think now. In any case, whilst he was thinking about it, lost souls were being saved, and brutal, drunken colliers were becoming as lights shining in a dark place, for which John Wesley thanked God, and we can thank Him too.
John spent about ten weeks in and near Bristol. He then heard that he was wanted in London, and on June 13th he returned there. In London he found his mother, who had come to live there. He had not seen her since he went to say “good-bye” before going to Germany. He now found her very unhappy about his “strange way of thinking.” She said she had read a paper he had written, which proved he had greatly wandered from the faith. This was the very same paper which John had read to her at Salisbury, and which she then said she approved. But it was Samuel’s doing that she now thought it so wrong. John preached next day out of doors at Blackheath to 12,000 or 14,000 people. This was not the first open-air preaching in the neighborhood of London. Whitefield had arrived from Wales a few weeks before; he had preached on a tombstone in Islington churchyard, and, being forbidden to preach in churches any more, he went the next Sunday to Moorfields. Moorfields is now a busy part of London, but was once really a moor, and later, in the time of James I, had been made into a sort of public park for the people of London. Thus it was in the year 1739. There were rows of trees, straight gravel walks, and large spaces where crowds might assemble. Whitefield had preached there from the top of a wall, as the table which he had at first used for a pulpit was broken in pieces by the mob. There was now constant preaching in and near London, as the Wesleys and Whitefield were all there together. John, too, preached in Moorfields and on Kennington Common.
I must now tell you a story about John’s first preaching in Moorfields. But to begin this story at the beginning we must go back a good many years. One Sunday night in the year 1717, whilst John Wesley was a schoolboy at the Charterhouse, another little John sat listening to his father reading the Bible. This other little John, who was then nine years old, was the son of a stonemason of the name of Nelson, at Birstal, in Yorkshire. On that Sunday evening the stonemason was reading aloud the 20th chapter of the Revelation. His little boy sat on the ground by the side of his chair. But as the father read on, little John fell with his face on the ground. He did not like it to be seen that he was crying bitterly. The solemn words made him tremble with fear. He tells us.
“As my father proceeded I thought I saw everything he read about, though my eyes were shut, and the sight was so terrible I was about to stop my ears, that I might not hear; but I durst not. As soon as I put my fingers in my ears I pulled them back again. When he came to the 11th and 12th verses the words made me cringe, and my flesh seemed to creep on my bones while he read, And I saw a great white throne, and Him that sat thereon, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away, and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened, and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.”
Little John felt as though he were one of those guilty sinners, standing there before God. He says, “Oh, what a scene was opened to my mind! It was as if I had seen the Lord Jesus Christ sitting on His throne, with the twelve apostles below Him, and a large book open at His left hand, and, as it were, a bar fixed about ten paces from the throne, to which the children of Adam came up. On one leaf of the book was written the character of the children of God, and on the other the character of those that should not enter into the kingdom of heaven. I thought neither the Lord nor the apostles said anything, but every soul, as he came up to the bar, compared his conscience with the book, and went away to his own place.” The stonemason never knew whilst he was here on earth what was the consequence of his reading that chapter that Sunday evening. What a blessing would it be if the fathers who now spend their Sundays at the public-house, or in reading Sunday newspapers, were to follow the example of the Yorkshire stonemason. From that time John had no more peace or rest in his soul. He became so frightened when he knew he had done wrong that he would hide himself somewhere and cry bitterly. But when he was with his boy companions he would pretend to be merry and happy. “But, oh,” he says, “the hell I found in my mind when I came to be alone again! And what resolutions I made! Nevertheless, when temptations came, my resolutions were as a thread of tow that had touched the fire.”
Once, when he was sixteen, he heard a sermon which kept him from sleeping all night, but after trying a few days to do right he began again to follow the example of older boys, and fell back into all sorts of sin. Just after this his good father died. He said when dying, “I know that my peace is made with God, and He will provide for my wife and children.” John was greatly surprised at his words, wondering how he could know his peace was made with God. But the death of his father had no other effect upon him. He still lived, as he says, in sin and folly, and tried to make himself happy with any pleasure or amusement he could find. Perhaps there are other boys like John, who give themselves up to pleasure, and seem to their companions to be jolly, merry fellows, when at the bottom of their hearts they are utterly miserable. No one knew but John himself that the reason he was so eager for amusement was that he wanted to get rid of the thought of the great white throne, and of Him who sat thereon. Ungodly as he was, he still prayed from time to time, and when he was nineteen he asked the Lord to give him a suitable wife, and “then,” he said, “I will live to Thy glory.”
Soon after he met with a young woman, who was, he thought, the wife God intended for him. They were married, and she proved a good, affectionate wife. But neither one nor the other loved God, and all John’s promises and resolutions were again broken. He gave himself up to pleasure as before. “Yet,” he says, “many times, when I had been shooting a whole day, and had killed a good many creatures, I was quite unhappy, and ready to break my gun in pieces, resolving never to shoot nor hunt any more.” John at last became so restless and miserable, he thought he would go away to a distance, and see if he could turn over a new leaf when he was away from his old companions. He did not at first take his wife with him, because he wanted to go from place to place to see where he could get work enough to make it worthwhile to settle there. He found he could get plenty of work in London, and there he tried to live a steady life, and began to read the Bible and pray. But his fellow-workmen cursed and abused him because he would not drink with them nor spend his money as they did. He bore a good deal very patiently; but at last they took away his tools, and said, if he did not drink with them, he should not work whilst they were drinking. This was too much for poor John. He forgot all his good resolutions to be patient and meek, and gave them a good thrashing. It was sad that all his “best endeavors” should thus have ended with black eyes and bruises. But so it was.
John Nelson, like John Wesley, had been trying what he could make out of the dry stick, and those who do so are doomed to disappointment. John knew that he had thoroughly broken down in his attempts to be good, and he left off reading and prayer almost entirely. He had by this time saved up £12 15s, and with this large sum he returned to his wife in Yorkshire. But he still felt so restless and unhappy, he could not settle down there. He told his wife that he would go back to London, and that she must follow him in the stage-wagon. This she did, and they lived in London some years. But poor Martha Nelson missed the fresh air of the Yorkshire moors, and became at last so weak and ill that John told her to take the two children and go back to her friends in the country, and he said he would follow her soon. This he did. But he again felt as though he could not stay in Yorkshire. He could not rest night or day. At last he said, “Martha, I must go back to London, for I have something to learn I have not yet learned.” What this was he scarcely knew, but he thought if he could but find out what it was that would make him happy, his troubles would be over. He says, “I was as a man in a barren wilderness that could find no way out. I said to myself, ‘What can I desire that I have not? I enjoy as good health as any man can do; I have as agreeable a wife as I can wish for; I am clothed as well as I can desire; I have at present more gold and silver than I have need of: yet still I keep wandering from one part of the kingdom to another seeking rest, and cannot find it. Oh! that I had been a cow or a sheep!’ I looked back to see how I had spent above thirty years, and thought rather than live thirty years more so, I would choose strangling. But when I considered that, after such a troublesome life, I must give an account before God of the deeds done in the body, I cried out, ‘Oh, that I had never been born!’ for I feared my day of grace was over, because I had made so many resolutions and broken them all.”
Poor John had no one to help him. He went back alone to London for the third time. Sometimes he wandered out in the fields when his work was done, thinking whether there were any way by which he could possibly be saved. Sometimes he went from church to church in the hope of learning it there. At St. Paul’s Cathedral he heard a sermon about people doing their duty to God and their neighbor. The preacher said, “What joy will such people have on their death-bed by looking back to their well-spent life!”
Poor John then looked back at his life to see if he could get any comfort out of that. “But, alas!” he said, “I could not see one day in all my life wherein I had not left undone something which I ought to have done, and done many wrong things besides, and I saw that I was so far from having a well-spent life to reflect upon, that even if one day well spent would save my soul, I must be damned forever.”
This sermon, as you may think, made him far more miserable than he was before. Then in another church he heard the preacher say that man could not keep God’s law perfectly, but God required him to do all he could, and Christ would make out the rest. But unless man did all he could he must perish, for he had no right to expect salvation from Christ unless he had done his part. “Then,” thought John, “it is quite clear that not only I, but everyone, must be damned, for I am quite sure no one has ever done all he could.” He now thought he would try no more churches, but would go to dissenting chapels. But there he got no help either. Then he tried Roman Catholic churches, still to no purpose. Then he went to the Quakers. But all was in vain! Nothing remained but to try the Jews; but this he thought would be quite hopeless, and so he began again with going to church, and continued to do so till the spring, when George Whitefield came from Wales, and began to preach in Moorfields.
Nelson hoped that this preaching of Whitefield’s might at last be the message from God to his soul. He went to hear him. I will tell you what he says of it: “Mr. Whitefield was to me as a man who could play well on an instrument, for his preaching was pleasant to me, and I loved the man, so that if anyone offered to disturb him, I was ready to fight for him. But I did not understand him, though I might hear him twenty times, for aught I know. Yet I got some hope of mercy, so that I was encouraged to pray on, and spend my leisure hours in reading the Bible. Sometimes as I was reading, I thought, ‘If what I read is true, and if none are Christians but such as St. John and St. Paul describe to be God’s people, I don’t know any person that is a Christian, either in town or country, and as for myself, I am no more a Christian than the devil,’ and my hope of ever being one was very small.”
So poor John went on, spending sad days and sleepless nights, till the morning came when John Wesley preached his first sermon in Moorfields. You shall hear John Nelson’s account of it—“Oh!” he says, “that was a blessed morning to my soul. As soon as Mr. Wesley got upon the stand, he stroked back his hair, and turned his face towards where I stood, and, I thought, fixed his eyes upon me. His countenance struck such an awful dread upon me, before I heard him speak, that it made my heart beat like the pendulum of a clock, and when he did speak, I thought his whole discourse was aimed at me. When he had done, I said, ‘This man can tell the secrets of my heart. He hath not left me there, for he hath showed the remedy, even the blood of Jesus.’ Then was my soul filled with consolation, through hope that God, for Christ’s sake, would save me.” It was still only a hope, but till now poor John Nelson had not had even that. So he took courage, and he says—“I continued to hear Mr. Wesley as often as I could, without neglecting my work.” It was right of him not to neglect his work. People whose consciences are really awakened, will be careful about such a thing as that. But, in spite of this, his fellow-workmen told him that Mr. Wesley’s preaching would make him quite unfit for his business. They said, “We wish you had never heard him, for it will be the ruin of you.” John told them he had reason to bless God that ever Mr. Wesley was born, to which they replied, in their rough way, that they were very sorry for him, and should be glad to knock Mr. Wesley’s brains out, for he would be the ruin of many families. Some of them said they would not hear him preach for £50. It would be well if all such men would be equally determined not to go to public-houses, which really are the ruin of many families, but it is one of the proofs how utterly foolish, as well as sinful, the heart of man is, that they thus call darkness light, and light darkness.
John bore all their abuse for a time, but at last his temper gave way. “Everyone tries to provoke me,” he thought, “and I can’t bear it. Perhaps I had better give it all up and go back to my old ways.” But God saw the trials and difficulties of the poor stonemason, and sent him a word in season. As he came one day out of St. James’s Park into Westminster, there walked before him a party of soldiers and some Welshwomen, who were talking earnestly. One soldier spoke so loud, that John, as he followed, could hear all he said. “None of you,” said the soldier to his companions, “pitied me some months ago, though I was going headlong to the devil. I was a drunkard and swearer, a fighter, a Sabbath-breaker, and a gamester, and I don’t know any sin that I was not guilty of, either in word or deed, so that it is a miracle that my neck was not brought to the gallows, and my soul sent to hell long ago.” Then the soldier went on to tell how he had heard Mr. John Wesley preach on Kennington Common, and how he had tried to turn from his sins, but his old companions had dragged him off to an ale-house, and he had given way, and got tipsy, and left off praying. But he had determined to go once more to hear Mr. Charles Wesley, and there and then the grace of God had reached his heart: he had believed in the precious blood of Christ, and was saved. These words encouraged John Nelson, and though soon after he again lost his temper and went into a passion, he still felt the hope that there was mercy in Christ even for him. So instead of going to his dinner, he went up to his room, shut the door, and knelt down to pray. But the more he prayed, the more he felt that his case was hopeless. Twice he knelt down and prayed earnestly. The third time, in utter despair, he knelt down, and, to his great dismay, he found he could not pray any more. “I could not,” he says, “say a word if it would have saved my soul. I was dumb as a beast.” Poor man, God was taking away the last prop on which he had been leaning. And now when he could not even ask for mercy, the Holy Ghost brought brightly and clearly before his mind the blessed truth that Christ had borne his punishment, and that his sins were all put away. “Christ,” he says, “was as plainly set before the eye of my mind, as crucified for me, as, if I had seen Him with my bodily eyes.” From this happy day John Nelson was a new creature. He had to suffer for it very soon, for his landlady turned him out of doors because, she said, she “could not have such a fuss made about religion in her house.” But when John went back to fetch something he had left behind, he found that the woman’s husband was filled with sorrow for having turned him out, and said, “If God has done anything more for you than he has for us, tell us how we may find the same mercy.”
So John sat down and told them of Christ, and persuaded them to go to the preaching. They both went, and were saved. Next came a complaint from John’s master, because John had refused to work on Sunday. The master said he would employ him no more, and that his wife and children would then have to suffer for his folly. John said, “I would rather see them beg their bread bare-footed to heaven than drive in a coach to hell.” The master swore at him, and said, “I have a worse opinion of you now than ever,” to which John replied, “Master, I have the odds of you, for I have a much worse opinion of myself than you can have.” He was surprised after this that his master sent for him again and gave him employment as before. “When a man’s ways please the Lord, He maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.”
After a while John set off to return to his wife in Yorkshire. He had only once seen John Wesley to speak to, but they were to meet again, as you will hear by-and-bye. At present I will only tell you that when John got back to Yorkshire he had anything but a warm welcome from his family. They said they would be ashamed to show their faces in the street if he persisted in telling people his sins were forgiven. They had never heard of such a thing in their lives. John’s old mother said, “Why, lad, your head is turned.” “Yes, mother,” he said, “and my heart, too, thank the Lord.” His wife said she wished he had stayed in London, for she couldn’t live with him if he went on saying people needed to be converted. John said he was sorry for it, for he loved her better than ever, and would always do all he could to provide for her. “If thou wilt not go to heaven with me, Martha,” he said, “I will still do the best I can for thee, only I will not go to hell with thee for company. But I believe God will hear my prayer, and convert thy soul, and make thee a blessed companion for me in the way to heaven.” You will be glad to hear John’s prayer was answered, and Martha became a bright, happy Christian.
We will now leave John doing the best he could to make known the gospel in Yorkshire, and go back to London, where we left John Wesley preaching in Moor-fields.
In the afternoon of the day when John Nelson first heard him, he preached to 15,000 people on Kennington Common. This was on Sunday. The next day he returned to Bristol, having only spent five days in London. Charles and Mr. Whitefield went on preaching whilst he was away. At Bristol, and in the country round, and at the large towns of Gloucestershire and Somersetshire, the multitudes continued to come, and numbers, it would appear, believed the gospel. Wesley returned to London in August, having been absent about two months. Again the crowds gathered on Kennington Common and in Moorfields, sometimes to the number of 20,000.