CHAPTER 1
FROM THE TAVERN TO THE COLLEGE
“He, like His Master, was by some despised,
Like Him by many others lov'd and priz'd,
But theirs shall be the everlasting crown
Whom not the world but Jeans Christ shall own.”
WHY George, is it really you? We did not expect to see you in Bristol; have you given up the tavern business? Are you tired of waiting upon customers and running errands at the Bell Inn, eh?”
“No, it is not exactly that," George Whitefield replied to his brother;" but the fact is that ever since the time that mother retired from the tavern I have been very uncomfortable. As long as our brother who carried on the business remained single it was all very well, but ever since he has been married it has been most uncomfortable for me.”
“You did not quarrel, I trust; of course now and then things will go awry even in the best of houses, but no ill will, no quarreling, I say. It seems a terrible thing to think that some very good people are shocking companions to live or to work with. If you must differ, differ as good people should do, but don't bear malice or spite.”
“I am sure that I did not mean to do any harm, but for nearly a month together my sister-in-law and I have been without speaking to each other. I did not feel happy at the estrangement, and many a time I have gone up to my room and wept for hours together before the Lord, but I would not make the first advance towards reconciliation. I think it will be far better for us to part, and so I have come to stay with you for a time in Bristol.”
“And glad, indeed, we are to see you," replied his brother. "Bristol is a splendid place for a holiday, and you may be able to find something to do here.”
“I should like to be a clergyman; I really believe that I shall be one someday or other.”
“Well, if it is to be it will be, brother George; but I must say that I do not see how your wishes are to be accomplished.”
After two months' stay in Bristol George Whitefield went back to Gloucester. For a considerable time he lived at home with his mother, and all desire to become a clergyman quite passed away from his mind. But one day a youth who had been one of George's schoolfellows called upon them in Gloucester.
“I wish that my George could go to college," said Mrs. Whitefield to him. "We might have afforded it if his father had but lived, but now it is quite out of the question. His great-grandfather was a clergyman, and I have often thought that my dear husband would have preferred being one to learning the wine merchant's business. He meant George to be one, but he died in 1716, when George was only two years old, and now college is out of the question.”
“I have a servitor's place myself at Pembroke College, Oxford, and do you know, Mrs. Whitefield, that I paid all my expenses last quarter, and even saved a penny out of my earnings!" said the visitor.
“That kind of thing will do for my George," exclaimed Mrs. Whitefield, and turning to her son she asked him, "Will you go to Oxford, George!”
“With all my heart, mother," he answered. "I have three sermons ready and I should like to go, indeed I should.”
Mrs. Whitefield succeeded in borrowing ten pounds from a friend, and, as she also succeeded in obtaining a servitorship for him in Oxford, George started at once for that city in order to prepare for a ministerial life. But as yet he had no saving knowledge of the Gospel; religion to him was at that time only a monotonous succession of dreary duties by performing which he hoped to obtain heaven. One night, however, he had a dreadful dream in which he imagined that he saw Mount-Sinai and God there enthroned as his judge, and he was terrified at the awful doom to which, as an unpardoned sinner, he was exposed. "This is a call from God," said he, but it was a call that, alas! he did not heed. Nor when at the age of eighteen years he entered the University of Oxford, did he find much to help him even amongst those who professed to be the ministers of Christ. Indeed it seemed to be regarded by them as a thing proved beyond doubt that the Gospel was fable. Hence George Whitefield, because he would not join in the riotous excesses which skepticism almost invariably produces, became a common object of ridicule and scorn. He, however, was so diligent In the discharge of his duties as a servitor that a great many of the students employed him to wait upon them, by which means he earned so much money that during the three years of his college course he did not cost his friends more than twenty pounds.
But as God never leaves Himself without witnesses even in the worst times and places, there were then in Oxford a number of godly men who were called in derision the Holy club. Mr. John Wesley, who was the ruling spirit in this new society, had noticed George Whitefield, and, although the latter did his utmost to keep himself in the background, John Wesley invited him to his rooms to breakfast. The two earnest seekers after truth talked together chiefly upon the solemn concerns of the soul, and Mr. Wesley endeavored to discover what were the difficulties of his younger friend.
“I have lain awake whole nights groaning under the weight of sorrow that I felt for sin. I have spent whole days and weeks lying upon the ground begging for deliverance from the evil thoughts that crowded upon me," said Whitefield.
“And yet you did not obtain deliverance?”
“By no means, and I supposed therefore that my mortification were not severe enough. So I began to fast twice a week; I wore dirty shoes, a patched gown, and woolen gloves, because it seemed to me to be unbecoming in a penitent to be otherwise clad; but, alas! I have not been able to find the peace that I so much want. Oh, Mr. Wesley, I do so much long to feel safe and to know that all my sins are forgiven. I don't feel as I desire.”
“I hear that you have been ill in body owing to the sorrow through which you have passed," observed Wesley.
“Yes, indeed, I have," replied Whitefield, "but by God's grace I have been restored to health once more. But I long to be useful; and how can I do anything that is worth doing in life unless God saves my soul!”
“That is true," said Mr. Wesley.
After nearly twelve months of darkness, Whitefield, by the advice of his friends, left Oxford for a time, and paid a visit to his relations who were much surprised to find him so cheerful and happy; judging, from their point of view, that his religion would be tinctured with that moroseness which is usually considered an accompaniment. The society he now met with was not such as he sought for or desired, being of a very different character from that of those dear friends he had left behind at the university. To live without spiritual companions he found impossible. "I will endeavor either to find or make a friend," he said: "so one day I went to Mrs. W—, to whom I formerly read plays, hoping the alteration she would see in me might, under God, influence her soul. God was pleased to bless the visit." Not long after he was again made instrumental in awakening several young persons, and a little society was formed after the model of the one in Oxford, "where," said he, "we soon had the honor of being as despised at Gloucester as we had been before at Oxford.”
During this period of retirement he commenced a diligent study of the Scriptures, and he devoted to them all his powers. He laid aside every other book and gave himself to a regular and minute study of the Bible. Only thus can the hidden beauties of the sacred page be detected, and only so can the heart hope to find peace and satisfaction in Christ.
‘I get more true knowledge and solid satisfaction from reading the Book of God," he said to his mother," than ever I had from all the works that ever I read. Oh, mother, this book is well worthy of your study; do read it for yourself.”
“I don't find time for all that I have to do as it is, and then I'm not going to die yet awhile," replied Mrs. Whitefield "Bless the boy, we can't be reading the Bible and saying prayers all the day long.”
But, mother, do reflect—that you are not too busy to die, and surely you wish to be saved.”
“Of course, child, of course, we all hope to get to heaven at last. You have your way, and I have my way, but we shall all get to the same place at last.”
“But, mother dear, suppose that we don't all get to the same place at last? What if we should some of us find that we have been wrong and are then shut out? There is only one way by which we can enter heaven, and that is through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, our only Savior and Redeemer.”
“Ah, child, to hear you talk one would fancy that I was a sinner. Thy people have always been decent, well-to-pass folk, that paid their rent and what not! No, I'm not a sinner; why, when I kept the Bell Inn in Gloucester, I never allowed a drunken man to have more than was good for him, and I'm sure I've done my duty to my husband and children as well as I could.”
“All that is true, mother, but for all that God regards you as a sinner. Even those of us who have done no very great crimes are sinners in His sight. When I was a boy—”
“Don't talk like that, for you were no worse than any other boy.”
“I was accustomed to lie and curse and swear, and many foolish and filthy things came out of my mouth. And I did not love God nor strive to serve Him, and my not doing so was sin in His sight, and all sin deserves the just punishment of God.”
“But all these things are trifles. God is not hard nor stern.”
“He is just, and He will not pass by iniquity. Mother, we must be lost forever unless we are pardoned by the free mercy of God. These shall go away into everlasting punishment," the Bible says.”
“Well, I can't compass all these things; I only hope God will he kind to me.”
“He is indeed kind to us, mother dear, and so He has provided a Savior for us—even Jesus. Jesus died for our sins, and if we accept Him for our Savior, and put all our trust in Him, we shall be saved.”