Welcome to the 2006 Shepherds
Conference. On the Shoulders of Giants. Snapshots
from Church History. George Whitfield. Steve Lawson. Well, is this going to work?
Is this loud enough for this to work? All right, good. Well, you know, Whitfield did
not have a microphone. All right. In fact, you know
the story, the account with Whitfield coming to Philadelphia. Benjamin
Franklin did the calculation. There were 12 city blocks of
downtown Philadelphia that were packed with people. And he did
the math, Benjamin Franklin, that Whitfield could project
to 30,000 people at one time. It's an extraordinary story. And that's really where the University
of Pennsylvania was founded. Benjamin Franklin raised the
money to build a wooden tabernacle in downtown Philadelphia for
Whitefield to preach in, and he preached in the tabernacle
and then left town. A thousand men got on horses
and followed Whitefield to the next venue wherever he was going
to preach in New Jersey, and they were left with the wooden
tabernacle, and that became the first building for the University
of Pennsylvania. So that's how the University
of Penn was started. All right, we'll have a quiz
on this next Thursday. See how you're doing. Well, let's
begin in a word of prayer. Our Father, as we begin this time
together, we desire to emulate men in the faith who are spiritual
leaders to us. And each one of us want to be
discipling other men behind us. And we need pacesetters in front
of us who will challenge us and stretch us. And so we thank you
for our brother, George Whitefield. And we ask that as we look at
his life today, that there would be an inspiration and a motivation
that would come upon our hearts that would be very real. Lord,
I pray for these brothers here today who serve you so faithfully
in their local churches, and I ask God that you encourage
them in this session. We pray this in Christ's name.
Amen. Well, as others of you are coming
in, come on in, find a seat. I'm so grateful for this opportunity
to be with you here today as we're going to look at the life
of George Whitefield, and not only his life, but I want to
answer the question, why Whitefield? Why did God bless George Whitefield
so abundantly? And obviously, the answer, first
of all, is the sovereignty of God. God uses whom He will, how
He will, and where He will. But ultimately, there were some
qualities about George Whitefield's life that I think made him such
a candidate for the Lord to use. So, as we begin, I want to just
show you a picture of Mr. Whitefield, and I love this quote.
The whole world is now my parish. Wherever my master calls me,
I'm ready to go and preach the everlasting gospel. Now, there
are some great men down through the centuries who have spoken
to Whitefield. George, excuse me, Charles Spurgeon,
no less than Spurgeon, said, my example in the ministry is
George Whitefield. Spurgeon said, there is no end
to the interest which attaches to such a man as George Whitefield.
Often, as I have read his life, I am conscious of distinct quickening
whenever I turn to it. And I'll have to tell you, as
I reread my notes in the hotel restaurant the last couple of
mornings, unashamedly, I'll tell you this, I have wept. I have
cried in my booth as I have re-read these notes on Whitefield, and
I can understand what Spurgeon is saying when he says this. He says, he lived. Other men
seemed to be only half alive, but Whitefield was all life,
fire, wind, force. My own model, if I have such
a thing, induced subordination to my master is George Whitefield. with unequaled footsteps must
I follow his glorious track." The evangelistic preaching of
Charles Haddon Spurgeon was really forged upon the anvil of George
Whitefield. No less than J.C. Ryle, we have
all been blessed by Ryle, has said, no Englishman I believe
dead or alive has ever equaled him. Now stop right there. That
takes in a lot of English preachers. That takes in John Owen. Charles
Haddon Spurgeon, the Puritan divines, the Westminster divines. And J.C. Ryle said, there is
no Englishman dead or alive. And when he said alive, that
included Charles Haddon Spurgeon, who can equal the public ministry
of George Whitefield. He went on to say, no preacher
has ever been so universally popular in every country that
he visited in England, Scotland, and America. John Wesley, A contemporary
of Whitefield said, have we ever heard of any person since the
apostles who testified the gospel of the grace of God through so
widely extended a place, through so large a part of the inhabited
earth? And the answer to that is, no,
we have not. George Whitefield towers in many
ways above church history. Martin Lloyd-Jones, the doctor,
had this to say about George Whitefield. George Whitefield
is beyond any question the greatest English preacher of all time.
Lloyd-Jones was not one who tossed bouquets of praise around. He said, the greatest English
preacher of all time. His influence in England, his
influence in Wales, his influence in Scotland, and his influence
in America in particular is beyond calculation. We cannot even comprehend
the magnitude of the influence of the preaching of George Whitefield. He said, there is no man who
has labored with greater zeal in God's kingdom than George
Whitefield. Lord Jones once said, other men
merely existed, Whitefield lived. John Newton, as you know, writer
of Amazing Grace, as a preacher, if any man were to ask me who
was second best I had ever heard, I should be at some loss." Meaning,
if I had to tell you who's the second greatest preacher I've
ever heard in my life, I don't know. There's maybe ten men who
could be second best. He goes on to say in this quote,
there's only one man who is the greatest preacher I ever heard
in my life. His name is George Whitefield. Newton said, it seemed as if
he never preached in vain. Perhaps there is hardly a place
in all the extensive compass of his labors where some may
not yet be found who thankfully acknowledge him. as their spiritual
father. Wherever he went to preach the
gospel of Christ, the hand of God was upon him for good and
there were souls that were saved. Sarah Edwards, who sat under
some pretty good preaching week by week herself, and the Edwards were never really
ones to be swept away with emotional comments, Sarah Edwards said,
It is wonderful to see what a spell he casts over an audience by
proclaiming the simplest truths of the Bible. I have seen upwards
of a thousand people hang on his words with breathless silence,
broken only by an occasional half-suppressed sob. She goes on to say in this quote
that his preaching is almost irresistible. William Cooper has said the apostolic
times seem to have returned upon us. And when he came to America,
Whitefield, he influenced the men who became the founders of
Princeton University, which was the bastion of evangelical Christianity
in America in the 19th century. The tenants, as you recall, William
and Gilbert Tennant, they were the first to acknowledge that
Whitefield, we need to hear his preaching. And it was through
Whitefield's influence that the log college flourished. I love this last quote by Robert
Murray McShane, oh, for but one week of Whitefield's life in
London. If I could just live Whitefield's
life for but one week, I would know what it is to be a preacher
of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Robert Murray McShane, as you
know, burned out for the Lord at age 29. gave himself so completely
to the gospel work that he did not even reach his thirties.
And he said, oh, if I could live just one life of Whitefield's,
one week of Whitefield's life. Some amazing facts about Whitefield. These are staggering. About 80%
of all the American colonists heard him preach at least one
time. Face to face. More colonists
recognized George Whitefield than would recognize George Washington. He preached in Boston. In the
mornings, there would be 8,000 that would gather at 6 a.m. in
the morning to hear Whitefield preach. And then in the evenings,
there were 15,000 a night. His farewell sermon on the Boston
Commons drew 23,000 people at a time when Boston's population
was less than 20,000. There were more people in Boston
to hear Whitefield preach than even lived in Boston. It was
the largest gathering in the history of the colonies, the
early colonies. More people came to hear him
preach than would gather at any other political function. Whitefield's preaching in Philadelphia,
He spoke to 6,000 in the mornings, 8,000 in the evenings. The following
Sunday, the crowds were 10,000 in the morning on Sunday and
25,000 for the evening service. In his farewell address to Philadelphia,
there were 35,000 people that gathered. When he left town,
1,000 men jumped on horses and followed him across the river
into New Jersey, having no idea where he was even going to preach
next. And when he arrived at the next
destination, there were 3,000 men from Philadelphia that were
already there waiting for him to preach the gospel in the next
town. In New York City, when Whitefield
preached there, there were 8,000 in the field. Sunday morning,
15,000. Sunday afternoon, 20,000. In Scotland, In Cambustlan, Scotland, near
Glasgow, he preached to an estimated 100,000 people. Whitefield's numbers, which were
not kept by him, are on the conservative side. There were some 10,000
people, they believe, who came to Christ through that sermon.
There was no altar call. There was no coming forward,
raising a hand, signing a card, or anything like that. It was
just the power of the preaching of the Word of God and the power
of the Spirit of God. In Scotland, he preached to 30,000.
In Edinburgh, 20,000. And as he would preach in these
shops, in these towns, the commerce would literally come to a standstill.
The marketplaces would be empty. Shops would cease. Farmers would
leave their plows in the middle of the field and they would hear
the the shouting from across the field, Whitfield is coming,
Whitfield is coming. And they would just drop their
equipment and they would run to the house, gather up the family,
put them on the horse. And the farmer would run alongside
the horse and they would run as fast as they could to a country,
to a country road. And it was like getting onto
the interstate, onto 405, if you will. And there's an account
of one man that I have here that I don't think I'll have time
to even read where he speaks of, there was a furlong, a horse's
furlong opening for me to enter onto the country road and the
dust was so in the air that it looked like the evening had come. It's extraordinary what God did
through this man in Savannah, Georgia, which was not a large
city. It was the largest gathering
in all of the colonies to hear Whitefield preach there. In his
34 years of public ministry, George Whitefield preached more
than 18,000 formal sermons. You know, this ought to be a
rebuke to any preacher who says, I just don't know if I can preach
on Sunday night. Are you kidding me? Do you not
live to preach the Word of God? Whitefield would say the way
he got ready to preach on Sunday was to preach every day through
the week. That's what made him strong for Sunday. Not resting
up, ramping it up. So who was Whitefield? Let me
just give you a very quick overview of his life. Just this one page,
just to re-familiarize yourself. Was born in Chester, England,
1714. Went to Oxford and was educated there. He had a command
of the English language that was extraordinary. You know there
at At Oxford, he joined the Holy Club, which was a group of students
who gave themselves in a pietistic way to seek the face of God and
to pray. And John and Charles Wesley were
a part of the Holy Club, and for five years, he sought the
Lord, yet he was personally unconverted. At age 21, reading Henry Scougal's
The Life of God in the Soul of a Man, He was converted at age
21, and he was immediately called to preach. Now, listen to this.
He was converted at age 21, immediately called to preach. Within two
years, he electrified all of England with his preaching. He made his first trip to America
in 1734. You need to know he made... He crossed the Atlantic 13 times
in his ministry. He spent three years of his life
on a boat crossing the Atlantic. He made his first trip across
the Atlantic in 1735, or excuse me, 1738. Was here for several
months. When he returned back to England,
the churches of England were closed to him because he preached
regeneration. He preached, you must be born
again. And it was a threat to the ecclesiastical leadership
and they would not give him entrance into the pulpits of England where
he had previously electrified England with his preaching. And
it was at that point he said, I will then go into the open
fields and preach the gospel of my master and my savior, Jesus
Christ. And so it was into the open fields
that he went to preach because every church was closed to him.
and the thousands came into the open fields to hear Whitefield
preach. He then returned for his second
trip to America in 1740, and you need to know that there has
never been a preaching tour like this preaching tour of 1740 since
the days of the Apostle Paul. He literally took New England
by storm. It was on this preaching trip
that he went to Philadelphia and to Boston and to New York,
and more people turned out to hear Whitefield preach the gospel
than even lived in New York or Boston or Philadelphia. And there
was no advance notice. No one knew where he was going
next. And there was no television. It was simply a word of mouth
that Whitefield is coming to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. It was on this preaching trip
that the great awakening broke out and Jonathan Edwards, as
he was at North Hampton, Massachusetts, they're pastoring the one church.
He became the theologian of the great awakening. And the next
year, 1741, he preached that great sermon centers in the hand
of an angry God. But it was Whitfield who was
going up and down the Atlantic coast, preaching from town to
town to town. It was the gas that was being
poured onto the fire of the great awakening. In all, there would
be seven trips to America to preach the gospel here, and he
also, of course, preached throughout England as well as the surrounding
places. In all, he made seven trips to
America, 15 journeys to Scotland, two to Ireland, one to Gibraltar,
and one to Bermuda and Holland. He died in 1770 in Newburyport,
Massachusetts. And he asked that wherever he
died, he wanted to die in the pulpit, preaching the Word of
God. And he said he wanted to be buried
beneath the pulpit where he preached his last sermon. This was his
last sermon. His text was 2 Corinthians 13,
verse 5, examine yourselves whether you be in the faith. That night,
after preaching that, he would return to where he was staying
at an inn, and there were some 6,000 that followed him back
to the inn. He went up to the second floor
and preached a second sermon. And at 10 o'clock, he retired,
and he died in the middle of the night of what he called a
gospel sweat. He literally preached himself
to death. They had the funeral there and
buried him there and 6,000 people came to Whitefield's funeral. Edwin Dargan in his A History
of Preaching said, the history of preaching since the apostles
does not contain a greater or worthier name than that of George
Whitefield. Well, if he was Spurgeon's model,
if Lloyd-Jones said, We have not seen as equal. What was it
about George Whitefield that made him so great? So, I want
to ask the question, why Whitefield? One, sovereignty of God. God
uses whom He will. But second, there are some character
qualities about George Whitefield that I believe ought to impact
every one of us in this room today. I want to walk through
these as I've studied George Whitefield and poured over the
life of George Whitefield. I have to say he's the only historical
figure that when I read him, I cry as I read his life. I love Calvin, but he doesn't
really move me to tears. I love John Owen and he puts
me to sleep. I love Spurgeon and he fires
me up. I love Edwards, he makes me more
theologically precise. But what Twitchfield makes me
want to do is just be on the back of a horse and ride from
town to town and just preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. There
needs to be something of that in all of our hearts here today.
There needs to be that fire in our bones. to preach the glories
of Jesus Christ. Well, let me give you five, or
excuse me, eight qualities. Number one, I think this is really
where it begins. Whitefield possessed a singular
devotion to Christ. It begins with his own personal
piety, his own personal heart for the Lord. He had a burning
fervent passionate love for the glory of God's holiness and for
the majesty of His only begotten Son. Arnold Dallimore, as you
know, has written the two-volume biography on Whitefield, says
this, quote, We can visualize Whitefield at five in the morning
in his room over Harris' bookstore. This is after he was converted.
He is on his knees with his Bible, his Greek New Testament. and
a volume of Matthew Henry spread before him. With intense concentration,
he reads a portion in English, studies its words and tenses
in the Greek, and then considers Matthew Henry's exposition of
the whole. Finally, comes his unique practice
of, quote, praying over every line and every word, unquote,
in both the Greek and the English, feasting his mind and his heart
upon it till its essential meaning has become a part of his very
person. See, Whitefield's practice was
to study the Word of God on his knees, to bring himself in submission
to the authority of the Lordship of Christ and His written Word,
but also to devotionally put himself even in a posture of desiring to love God with all
of his heart, soul, mind, and strength. I said, my mind being
now open and large, I began to read the Holy Scriptures upon
my knees. This proved meat indeed and drink
indeed to my soul. Whitefield went on to say, we
can preach the gospel of Christ no further than we have experienced
the power of it in our own hearts. Listen, you can't take anyone
where you haven't already been. You cannot share what you do
not already possess. And the depth The breadth of
your ministry will be determined by the depth of your heart for
the Lord." Whitefield went on to say, "'Go to bed seasonably
and rise early. Redeem your precious time. Pick
up the fragments of it, that not one moment of it may be lost.
Be much in secret prayer. Converse less with man and more
with God.'" That'd be an important thing for us to learn from Whitefield.
Talk less to man, talk more to God. He says, I have been wearied
almost to death in preaching and writing and conversation
and going from place to place. God imparted new life to my soul
and enabled me to intercede with him for an hour and a half and
two hours longer. He said it was upon my knees
that I felt the supernatural power of God. enabling me in
ministry. So this is where it begins. It
begins with a singular devotion for the Lord. And by way of application
for all of us here today, men, we must be men who know what
it is to love the Lord with all of our heart, all of our soul,
our mind and strength, and to have a fervent, passionate love
for Him. Second, the second mark of Whitfield. Whitefield preached an uncompromising
gospel. He preached Christ and Christ
crucified. The cross was the centrality
of his message. It was the sum and substance
of his theology. J.C. Ryle once said of Whitefield,
few men perhaps ever gave their hearers, listen to this, so much
wheat and so little chaff. When you listen to Whitefield
preach, There was no stuff. It was all substance because
he preached the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. He did not
get up to talk about his party, his cause, his interests, or
his office. He was perpetually telling you
about your sins, your heart, Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost,
the absolute need of repentance and faith and holiness. One of
the most repeated phrases in his sermons, when you read his
sermons, is this little phrase over and over, Oh, the righteousness
of Jesus Christ. Ryle said Whitfield's preaching
was singularly lucid and simple. His hearers, whatever they might
think of his doctrine, could not fail to understand what he
meant. His style of speaking was easy, plain, and conversational. Ryle said he never shot over
their heads. Whitfield is known for this account,
a woman came up to him and said, why do you keep telling us we
must be born again? He said, dear woman, because
you must be born again. We need more preachers like that.
We need more gospel preaching preachers. Ryle said Whitfield met men face
to face like one who had a message from God to them. Whitfield would
often say this, I have come here today to talk to you about your
soul. He was the hound of heaven after
the souls of men. The result was that many of us
here used to think that his sermons were specifically meant for them. Read his sermons and see how
many times the word you is mentioned. You must come to Christ. You
must repent. You must look to the Lord. You
must believe upon Christ. Real preaching gets to the you. Whitfield said, there are many
who go on in a round of duties, a model of performances that
think they shall go to heaven. The truth is they have a Christ
in their heads but they have no Christ in their heart. Whitfield
understood how many people were religious but lost. Whitfield
understood how many people were members of churches but whose
names were not written in the Lamb's Book of Life. He was a
gospel preacher. Third, the third mark, Whitfield
preached with a passionate fervor. Whitfield lived in a day when
preaching had degenerated into a dry ritual of merely reading
one's notes in the pulpit. Let me give you a historical
footnote. Whitfield, born 1714, he bursts onto the scene in the
1730s. I would remind you in 1662 was
the saddest day in church history. It was the year of the Great
Ejection. Charles II had been in reinstalled as the monarch
over England and in one day on St. Bartholomew's Day in 1662,
2,000 Puritan preachers were put out
of their pulpits. The crown jewels of England were put out of their pulpits. And it was a day in which now
the preachers in the Church of England were unconverted and
unregenerated men. And Whitefield now historically
steps into this scene. Whitefield came onto the scene
not just dryly reading his homily, He came exhorting and pleading
and wooing and calling and begging and even weeping for souls in
the pulpit. This was no stoic, cold reading
of his sermon notes. Ryle said he preached like a
lion. Whitfield said the church is
asleep and only a loud voice will awaken it from its slumber.
Where are the loud voices today? Where are the men who preach
like lions in their pulpits? Ryle said, his soul is all passion. His heart was all fire. Repression
for him would have meant extinction. Meaning, if he could not have
released the truth that was a fire in his bones, he would have died.
It was said that Wesley was the
head of this Methodist movement, but Whitefield was the heart
and the soul. Lloyd-Jones said that when he
preached, he preached with zeal, with fire, with passion, and
with flame. Whitefield on occasions would
say, as he would in the pulpit be overcome with emotion, you
blame me for weeping? But how can I help it when you
will not even weep for your own souls, though your immortal souls
are on the verge of destruction?" Ryle said at this time in church
history, the sermon had become an entombed relic, a religious
art form, when Whitefield arrived on the scene and he rescued the
sermon. And he made it what it ought
to have been all along, a desperate plea to a perishing people to
come to faith in Jesus Christ. When Whitefield came to Northampton,
Jonathan Edwards sat on the front row, and by Edwards' own admission,
he wept at the hearing of Whitefield preach the Word of God. We are familiar with the account
of David Hume, the Scottish philosopher and skeptic who was challenged
as he was going to hear Whitefield preach. And someone said, I thought
you did not believe in the gospel. And Hume said, I don't, but he
does. Even unbelievers were drawn,
skeptics were drawn to hear Whitefield preach because of the depth of
the conviction within his heart and his soul as he preached. His preaching involved melting
charity. Dalamore, his biographer, said,
Whitfield taught the evangelical world a new method of preaching. In a day when ministers in general
were lacking in zeal and were apologetic in preaching, he preached
the gospel, listen to this, with aggressive zeal. He got in your
kitchen with the gospel. In undaunted courage, he set
mankind on fire. It's passionate zeal. He was
the epitome of Richard Baxter's great quote, always preach as
a dying man to dying men, as never to preach again. Whitfield was the personification
of that. He was blood earnest when he
preached. Mark 4, Whitfield possessed a
transcendent theology, which is code phrase for biblical Calvinism. He preached the sovereignty of
God and the salvation of men, and salvation is of the Lord. He stood in the long line of
godly men, George Whitefield, Martin Luther, John Calvin, John
Knox, John Owen, the Westminster Divines, Matthew Henry, John
Bunyan, John Newton, Jonathan Edwards, and countless others
who believed in the godness of God. Whitfield saw God in everything. He saw God in nature, God in
history, God in salvation, God in judgment, God in damnation.
He saw God governing all things and directing them to His own
appointed end. Whitfield said, every doctrine
that comes from God leads back to God. He was once questioned by Mr.
Harvey about his doctrine. Whitfield said, let me advise
dear Mr. Harvey, laying aside all of his
prejudice, to read and pray over Paul's epistle to the Romans
and then let him tell me what he thinks of my doctrine. Whitfield said, the doctrines
of our election and free justification in Christ Jesus fill my soul
with a holy fire and afford me great confidence in God my Savior. I hope we shall catch some fire
together," he said to another believer. Nothing but the doctrines
of the Reformation can do this. My soul, come thou not near the
secret of those who teach such things. He said, man is nothing. He has a free will to go to hell,
but none to go to heaven, till God works in him to will and
to do of his good pleasure. Whitfield said, Jesus Christ
saw me from eternity past. He gave me being, he called me
in time, and he has freely justified me through his blood. Oh, the
blessedness of these evangelical truths, they are indeed the gospel. Whitfield said, I embrace the
Calvinistic scheme, not because of Calvin, but Jesus Christ has
taught it to me. I tell you what a bold confidence
that is to know that you've been taught by God the truth of His
Word. J.C. Ryle, speaking of his transcendent
theology, says, quote, strengthened by his reading of the scriptures,
the Reformers and the Puritans, Whitefield grasped the great
related chain of truths revealed in the New Testament, the Father's
electing love. Christ's substitutionary death
on behalf of those whom the Father had given Him, and the Spirit's
infallible work in bringing to salvation those for whom it was
appointed. These doctrines of free grace
were the essential theology of Whitefield's ministry from the
very first until the end, and consequently, it was the theology
of the movement which began under his preaching in 1737. Whitfield said, I must preach
the gospel of Christ and that I cannot now do without speaking
of the doctrine of election. Mark Knoll, the church historian
at Wheaton, has said, quote, although he preached on the bound
will, the electing power of God and the definite atonement, he
confessed in a letter to John Wesley early in his career that,
I never read anything Calvin wrote. My doctrines I had from
Christ and his apostles, I have been taught them of God." Whitfield said, we're all born
Armenians and we mature into Calvinists. Thank you for that. As Whitfield said, all doctrines
that come from God lead us back to God and there is no truth
that brings greater glory to God than that salvation is of
the Lord. Whitfield preached, number five,
Whitfield preached with an evangelistic thrust. He was a harvester of
souls. He was a fisher of men. And whether
he was in a church or in an open field, a city square, on a ship,
in a house, he was continually preaching and proclaiming and
announcing the good news of Jesus Christ. Whitefield said, O Lord,
give me souls or take my soul. George Whitefield said, I believe
I was never more acceptable to my master than when I was standing
to teach those hearers in the open field. We can understand
something of that as preachers, can we not? Spurgeon said, I
never feel closer to Christ than when I am preaching the cross
upon which he died. Whitefield said, there are always
two men standing in the pulpit when I preach the cross. Christ
never stands any closer to me than when I'm announcing the
person and work of Christ." Ryle said, the modern revivalist
may be surprised to hear that Whitefield called no one to the
altar, did nothing to encourage emotional excitement, and preached
that true revival could be measured only by whether people grew increasingly
into the likeness of Jesus. He would simply say that Brother
So-and-so or Mr. So-and-so was hopefully converted. Lloyd-Jones says of Whitefield,
he was the first to see that Christ's ministers must do the
work of fishermen. They must not wait for souls
to come to them. They must go after souls and
compel them to come in. He did not sit lamely by His
fireside like a cat on a rainy day, mourning over the wickedness
of the land. He dived into holes and corners
after sinners. He hunted out ignorance and vice
wherever it could be found." I'll never forget the first Whitefield
sermon I read, entitled, The Conversion of Zacchaeus. I picked
it up and reread it the other night. I don't think I've ever
preached a day in my life, not after reading Whitefield, preaching
the conversion of Zacchaeus. Listen to this little excerpt.
I offer you salvation this day. The door of mercy is not yet
shut. There does yet remain a sacrifice
for sin. For all that will accept of the
Lord Jesus Christ, He will embrace you in the arms of His love.
Oh, turn to Him. Turn in a sense of your own worthiness. Tell Him how polluted you are,
how vile, and be not faithless, but believing. Why fear that
the Lord Jesus will not accept you? Your sins will be of no
hindrance. Your unworthiness will be of
no hindrance. If your own corrupt parts do
not keep you back, nothing will hinder Christ from receiving
you. He loves to see poor sinners coming to Him. He is pleased
to see them lie at His feet, pleading His promises. And if
you thus come to Christ, He will not send you away. Let me beseech
you to come to Jesus Christ. I invite all of you to come to
Him and receive Him as your Lord and Savior. He is ready to receive
you. I invite you to come to Him that
you might find rest for your souls. He will rejoice and be
glad. He calls you by His ministers.
Oh, come unto Him. He is laboring to bring you back
from sin and from Satan. My soul is full. It is quite
full." And he goes on and on. He then comes to this dramatic
moment in the sermon. as it escalates to the end. And
he says, make haste then, O sinners, make haste and come by faith
to Christ. Then this day, even this hour,
nay, this moment, if you believe Jesus Christ shall come and make
his abode in your hearts, he will. Which of you is made willing
to receive the King of glory? Which of you obeys his call as
Zacchaeus did? Alas, why do you stand still? How know you whether Jesus Christ
may ever call you again? Come then, poor, guilty sinners! Come away, lost, poor, undone
publicans! Make haste, I say, and come away
to Jesus Christ." The Lord condescends to invite Himself to come under
the filthy roosts of the houses of your souls. Do not be afraid
of entertaining Him. He will fill you with all peace
and joy. Do not be ashamed to run before
the multitude, as did Zacchaeus, and to have all manner of evil
spoken against you. One side of Christ will make
all amends for this. Do not therefore put me off with
your frivolous excuses. There is no excuse can be given
for your not coming to Christ. You are lost, undone without
him. And if he is not glorified in
your salvation, he will be glorified in your damnation. If he does
not come and make his bode in your hearts, then you will make
your eternal abode in hell forever. Oh, that the Lord would be pleased. to call you to Himself this day.
Oh, that He may call you by His Spirit and make you a willing
people in this, the day of His power. For I know my calling
will not do unless He, by His efficacious grace, compel you
to come to the Savior. Oh, that you once felt what it
was to receive Jesus Christ into your hearts. You do not love
Christ because you do not know Him. You do not come to Him because
you do not feel your want of Him. You are not brokenhearted as
you should be. You are not yet sick of your
sin as you should be. Oh, that God would wound you
with the sword of His Spirit and cause His arrows of conviction
to stick deep into your hearts. Oh, that I would see some of
you sensible of this and hear you cried out Lord, break this
hard heart of mine. Lord, deliver me from the body
of this death. Oh, Lord, draw me near to you.
Make me willing to come to you. Lord, I am lost. Oh, save me,
Lord, or I perish." The pleading of Whitefield. And we who are so compelled,
rightly so, to preach exegetical exposition Verse by verse by
verse by verse, I stand on that solid rock. Let us never lose
the evangelistic passion to do what Paul told Timothy, to do
the work of an evangelist in the preaching of the gospel of
Jesus Christ. Number six. Mark number 6, Whitefield possessed an indomitable
spirit. George Whitefield was a driven
man. It is difficult to find any figure
in church history who can match the industry and the energy of
this man. who so threw himself into God's
work. I would urge you to read Whitefield's
two-volume by Dallimore. It will just make you want to
preach. It will make you want to get
on the back of a horse and just ride through the mall and preach the gospel of Jesus
Christ. Whitfield said, I'm never better
than when I am on the full stretch for God. He said, I scarcely
have time to eat. Some men live to eat. Other men
eat to live. Whitfield ate merely to live. He lived to preach. Whitfield said, we are immortal
until our work for God is done. Christ's labors must live by
miracle. If not, I must not live at all. My continual vomitings almost
kill me, and the pulpit is my only cure. Whitfield said, the more we preach,
the better we preach. Every act strengthens the habit. He said, the best preparation
for preaching on Sundays is to preach every day of the week.
I would remind you, he made seven
visits to America, crossed the Atlantic 13 times, two tours
of Ireland, 15 trips to Scotland, to England, to Wales. Hardly
a town where he did not lift up his voice. There are times when Whitefield
would go in Scotland or England to the fair, which is like going to Mardi
Gras or something. And there would be all of the
booths set up by the merchants as they were selling their wares. And Whitefield had a portable
pulpit, and he would set it up in the open field next to the
booths at the fair, and he would stand on his platform, and he
would preach the gospel of Jesus Christ, and the people would
be drawn from the booth to come over to listen to him preach,
and it would hurt the business of the merchants so bad that
they would then begin to gather things to throw at Whitefield
and try to knock him off of his platform. I mean, we get upset
if a beeper goes off in the service. I mean, get tough. You don't
even know what it is to preach with distractions. They would
gather up dog dung and they would gather up the blood of cats and
they would put them in sacks and hurl them at Whitfield as
he would be preached. There was one time he was attacked
en route going to another city and almost had the very life
beaten out of him. And he continued to go and went
there and preached. It's like Paul at Lystra. They beat him so bad, they ran
him out of town, they thought he was dead. Paul got up and
went back in and finished the sermon. That was Whitefield. He had an
indomitable spirit. He said, I am weary in the work,
but never weary of the work. Told you he preached in his life,
they have estimated 18,000 formal sermons. And that doesn't encount
the follow-up sermon after the sermon. And times he preached
the gospel in homes and some of them were to royalty. They
estimated some 30,000 sermons in the 34 years of his ministry. You can do the math on that. He said, I would sooner wear
out than rust out. The church leaders have thrust
me out. He said, I now go out to the highways and the hedges
and compel harlots and publicans and sinners to come into the
master's house. Arnold Allemore said, writing
in his biography, it's hard to single out really any one year
because virtually every year of his life looks the same on constant go for God. He literally died preaching,
as I told you earlier. He said, may I die preaching.
I hope yet to die in the pulpit or soon after I come out of it."
Number seven, Mark number seven, Whitfield possessed a supernatural
empowering. No man can live like this in
his own strength. No man can live like this in
his own ability. The only way a man can live like
this and preach like this and write like this, and by the way,
Whitfield is one of the greatest writers I've ever read. You ought
to get his book, By Banner of Truth, on his letters. They have
compiled his letters. These are the most beautifully
written letters you could possibly read. He was a man who was filled with
the Spirit of God. Lloyd-Jones, commenting on Whitefield's
empowering, said there's a tremendous difference between uttering truths
and preaching. He said, you may have a correct
and an orthodox message, but it does not necessarily follow
that you are preaching. The effect of such preaching,
of course, was simply overwhelming. Of Whitefield's preaching, he
tells us himself about what he observed in the past of the poor
coal miners in Kingswood. This is an incredible account.
These poor men had just come out of their mines. They were
underground working in the coal mines. Whitefield comes through
Scotland and they begin flooding out of the coal mines to hear
Whitefield preach in the open field. And Whitefield said, as
I was preaching to them, I suddenly began to observe white furrows
in their black faces. It was the tears that were streaming
down their faces as these rugged, sinful men were coming under
the conviction of the Holy Spirit of God as the gospel was being
preached. This goes way beyond the giftedness
of the man. This now is a work that only
God can do. An interesting account that I came
across, Samuel Davies, who Lloyd-Jones said was the greatest preacher
in America next to Jonathan Edwards. He followed Edwards as president
of Princeton. Samuel Davies was raising money
for Princeton, for the founding of Princeton or the expansion
of Princeton in the early years, got on a ship and crossed the
Atlantic to come to London to raise money in London for Princeton. And when he arrived to London,
he asked this question, is Mr. Whitfield in town? He was, and
Samuel Davies went to hear Whitefield preach, and he talks about that
particular message, how Whitefield, from a natural perspective, was
off his game that day, but how the power of God so rested upon
his life. He said it was worth getting
on a ship and crossing for those many weeks the dangers of the
Atlantic just to hear Whitfield preach with the power of the
Holy Spirit of God upon him." A last mark of Whitfield. He possessed a self-effacing
humility. He was like Calvin. He would
never talk about himself. And whenever he did, it was self-effacing. Whitefield would never allow
any school to be named after him, any movement, any institution. Whitefield said again and again,
let the name of Whitefield perish, but Christ be glorified. He cared little for money. He
had opportunities to amass a fortune. And with the money that he received
for preaching, he founded an orphanage in Georgia. Ryle said he was a man of remarkable
disinterestedness. He was marked by a man with a
singleness of eye. He seemed to live only for two
objects, the glory of God and the salvation of souls. Whitefield suffered the death
of his four-month-old son who died in the very home in which
he was born and was buried in the very church in which he was
ordained to the ministry. It was like a dagger into his
heart. And God used that to cripple
him and to humble him as he preached. We need to recapture the spirit
of Whitefield, which is really the spirit of the Holy Spirit
of God upon the preacher. Martin Lloyd-Jones, in conclusion,
writes, Whitefield, I believe, is calling us back to preaching.
When the Spirit comes, the programs will be forgotten,
time will be forgotten, everything will be forgotten except God
and His glory in my soul and this blessed Savior. May God
give us back to preaching, not a mere mechanical statement of
correct views, but let us pray God so to grant us His Spirit
that though we may never become and shall never become, it is
certain, preachers in the sense of George in the sense of George
Whitefield was. Ryle said Whitefield wrote no
book for the million of worldwide fame like Bunyan's Pilgrim's
Progress. He headed no crusade against
an apostate church with a nation at his back, as did Luther. He
founded no religious denomination which penned its faith on its
writings like John Wesley. There are Lutherans, there are
Wesleyans in the present day, but there are no Whitefieldites,
no. The great evangelist of the 18th
century was simply a guileless man who lived for one thing only,
and that was to preach Christ. If he did that, he cared not
for anything else. In volume 1, and I close with
this, of Dallimore's biography, I remember reading this when
I was a seminary student in the summer of 1978, and I've never
forgotten this. Please let me read this, come
to the end of this book. It says, yes, yea, this book
is written in the desire, perhaps in a measure of inner certainty,
that we shall see the great head of the church once more bring
into being his special instruments of revival, that he will again
raise up unto himself certain young men whom he may use in
his glorious employ And what manner of men will they be? And
all of this flowing out of this book with the biography of Whitefield
as the backdrop. Men mighty in the scriptures,
their lives dominated by a sense of the greatness, the majesty
and holiness of God. And their minds and hearts aglow
with the great truths of the doctrines of grace. They will
be men who have learned what it is to die to self, to human
aims and personal ambitions. Men who are willing to be fools
for Christ's sake. who will bear reproach and falsehood,
who will labor and suffer, and whose supreme desire will be
not to gain earth's accolades, but to win the Master's approbation. When they appear before His awesome
judgment seat, they will be men who will preach with broken hearts
and tear-filled eyes, and upon whose ministries God will grant
extraordinary power." And he goes on to say, Oh, may God raise
up such George Whitefields again in this generation. May there be men here today who
will rise up in this hour and in this generation and who will
be heralds of the gospel of Jesus Christ and who will have an indomitable
spirit and will be driven for the cause of Christ and be men
upon whose hand the Spirit of God rests in extraordinary power,
men who know their God and who know their Christ and who have
evangelistic zeal to reach this world for the kingdom of God. May we all be such men and may
it break loose here at this Shepherd's Conference. And may we storm
the beaches wherever it is that God has placed us to serve Him. And may we hold high the banner
of truth in the gospel of Jesus Christ.