You can now imagine how year after year the work of the Methodist preachers was carried on. In the dark dens of the great cities, and in little villages far away on the moors and in the fens, there was now heard the blessed call of God to the weary and the thirsty, and the sinful. Such words were heard as had not been spoken there for many, many long and dreary years perhaps never before. The people who had been used to go to sleep through long, weary, Christless sermons ever since they could remember, now heard plain and loving words which they could understand, and which told them of Jesus the Saviour of sinners. It was a wonderful day in many a little village when there came some poor, simple man, who stood on a hillock and preached Jesus Christ. Now and then it was a clergyman who did so, now and then an old soldier, or a working man, but all came with the same blessed message—often learned, not from having themselves heard the Methodists, but, like John Berridge, from having read the Word of God with prayer for light and teaching. “How could they be kept from making mistakes?” you may ask. They did make many mistakes; but we may safely say that the worst mistakes they made were as nothing in comparison with the continual and the awful mistakes by which thousands of souls were in those dark days preached into everlasting destruction from hundreds, perhaps thousands, of the pulpits in the cathedrals and churches of England. We have but to read the sermons then preached, and admired and believed; preached by men who had been taught at public schools and colleges, but who had never been taught by God the Holy Ghost. We see that these teachers, owned by man, were, alas, far oftener than not, the blind leaders of the blind, whose preaching cannot be described by saying they made many mistakes—rather, that it was one great and fatal mistake, darkness, with no light in it. There were some who preached Christ, but they were few and far between. The Methodists had at least a message from God Himself, often delivered very imperfectly, but it was God’s message all the same. We may at least say of those who preached, like Whitefield and Berridge, that they did not tell people to do their best, and then hope to get to heaven; they did not tell them that when they repented enough, and prayed enough, God would forgive them; they did tell them that Christ had done all, and that He gives repentance and forgiveness of sins to all who come unto God by Him; they did tell them that the precious blood of Christ, and that alone, puts away sin from the sight of God; they did tell them that a man must be born again, and that it is by faith in Christ he is thus made a new creature and a child of God; they did tell them that God saves the lost, and vile, and wretched; not that He loves good people, and is angry with bad ones. No; they told them that God loves sinners, and finds no good people to love. There was much, much more, which the Methodists might have preached had they known it. But they did know how Christ hung upon the cross, and bore the wrath of God for our sins; they did know how He rose again, having put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself; they did know how He went back to Heaven having finished the work the Father gave Him to do; they did know how the Shepherd sought and found His sheep; they did know how the father loved and kissed the son who came back from the far country. Wesley and those taught by him preached the gospel less clearly, but still, more or less, they did point to Christ as the Saviour, and found blessing as they did so.
Perhaps there are many now who could tell more of what is in the Father’s house, and what it is to be an heir of God, and joint heir with Christ. Let us pray that those who do know more of these things may be as faithful in making them known far and wide, as the Methodists were in telling forth the message God had given to them.
Years passed on, one after another of these dear servants of God were called away from their labors. Four years after Thomas Walsh went to be with Christ good Mr. Grimshaw passed away, saying: “I am as happy as I can be on earth, and as sure of glory as if I were in it. Here goes an unprofitable servant!” He was carried to his grave amidst the songs and tears of many thousands of the Yorkshire dales men. You may wonder when I tell you, that his only son, John, had never believed the gospel his father preached. He had been sent when a boy to Wesley’s school at Kingswood, with his only sister. The little girl died, believing in Jesus, at twelve years old, but John grew up a scoffer and a drunkard. He went to see his dying father, who said, “Take care, John, you are not fit to die.” John thought afterward of his old father’s words. “Ah,” he said one day to the old horse which had carried his father about to preach, “once thou didst carry a saint, but now thou carriest a devil!” But God had mercy on poor John Grimshaw. Soon after his father’s death, he, too, was saved, and his repentance was very deep and true. “What will my old father say,” he called out as he was dying, “when he sees I have got to heaven!” John died three years after his father. And five years later, the greatest, the best, and the most faithful of the Methodist preachers was suddenly called home. George Whitefield died in America, September 30th, 1770. He had preached unceasingly over England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, and North America for thirty-four years. He had crossed the Atlantic thirteen times. It seems impossible to speak of the work that God had done by him. When we hear how thousands upon thousands on both sides of the Atlantic were through him alone brought to Christ, we may well thank God for sending him in those dark days, and making him so faithful to his trust. His last sermon, September 29th, was two hours long. He preached in the open-air. We are told it was wonderful beyond measure. He went on that evening to a place called Newburyport, where he was to preach next day (Sunday); but on the Saturday evening, as he sat at supper, a crowd came together around the house, and pressed into the hall and passages to hear more. Whitefield was very tired. He said to a friend. “Brother, you must speak to these dear people, I cannot say a word.” He took his candle to go up to bed; but he stopped on the stairs. He felt as though he could not send these hungry souls empty away. He began to speak over the banisters—he could not cease—the candle burned down in its socket, and went out before he had said his last word. At six the next morning, as the sun was rising over the sea, Whitefield lay dead. He had been taken ill at two o’clock. He could not speak afterward, except to say “I am dying.” He had said not long before, “God will give me nothing to say when I am dying. He will have given me all the messages He has for me to give during my life.”
And so it was. There was great mourning for George Whitefield; and none mourned more truly than his old friend John Wesley. Though they had differed, as I told you before, and George Whitefield had faithfully reproved Wesley for his errors, Wesley did not love him the less. I wish I could tell you that Whitefield’s reproofs had shown him where he was himself wrong. But it was not so. All the Methodists had not learned, like John Wesley, to love those who believed them to be wrong. Some it would seem, both amongst those taught by Wesley, and those taught by Whitefield, spoke against one another in a manner which must have been displeasing to God, and which must have hindered His work. Thus Satan makes use even of God’s people to bring a reproach upon Christ. Let us take warning for ourselves. We are not to say that wrong is right, but when we have to own that another of God’s people is wrong in belief, or in practice, it should be owned with much love, with much humility, and with much sorrow. And if we have the mind of Christ towards the most mistaken of His people, it will be so.