The Blazing Fire Of Charles Finney

Charles Finney

Christian people, are you figuring round and round to get a little property, yet neglecting souls? Beware lest you ruin souls that can never live again!

Charles Finney’s life spanned nearly the entire first century of U.S. presidents - from George Washington to Ulysses S. Grant - and no single individual had more influence in the United States’ coming to be considered “A Christian Nation.” Finney’s revivals sparked the Second Great Awakening and unified the country around the Bible and the power of prayer, while his moral stances for social justice laid the foundations for everything from abolition to temperance to the civil rights movement. His teachings on Christian perfectionism inspired the Holiness Movement of the latter half of the nineteenth century and the Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements in the twentieth century. Finney’s evangelistic style and methods - include prayer meetings before and during the event, nightly meetings for weeks at a time, altar calls, and pushing for decisions before listeners leave the auditorium - influenced everyone from Dwight L. Moody to Billy Graham.

Charles Grandison Finney was born in Warren, Connecticut only a year after the death of John Wesley. He was the seventh child of Sylvester and Rebecca Finney. When Charles was about two years old, the family moved to Oneida County, New York, which, at the time, was a relative wilderness.

Sylvester, Sr. was a farmer who had fought in the Revolutionary War. In all the years Charles lived with his family, he had little religious education. Though Methodist circuit riders would speak in the local one-room schoolhouse from time to time, they were usually uneducated and rarely held their audience’s attention. Western New York at this time had become known as the “Burned-over District,” as it had seen so many preachers that the local population had grown immune to their preaching.

Charles the Lawyer

In 1818, Finney’s parents persuaded him to enter the law office of Judge Benjamin Wright in Adams, New York, not far from their home near Lake Ontario. Though he had never attended law school, young Finney’s mind took to the law profession with a passion.

It was in Adams that Finney met Reverend George W. Gale, the pastor of the town’s Presbyterian church. While Finney was not greatly moved by Gale’s sermons, he spent a good deal of time discussing them. Finney was determined to make sense of what he heard, but the more he talked with Gale, the more questions formed in his mind. Gale found Finney well-informed about religion but hardened to it.

At the same time, as Charles studied the law, he began to notice how writers quoted the Bible as a basis for many of the great principles of common law. This piqued Finney’s curiosity to the point that he went out and purchased his first Bible. Then, when he would come across legal texts that referred to Scripture passages, he would check the references and their biblical context. He soon found himself reading the Bible more and more, and with greater and greater interest.

Is God a Lie?

On Wednesday morning, October 10, 1821, Finney prepared himself for work, still mulling over these questions of God’s existence and the state of his eternal soul. When he set out for the law office that morning as he always did, a voice within confronted him: “What are you waiting for? Did you not promise to give your heart to God? And what are you trying to do? Are you endeavoring to work out a righteousness of your own?”¹ The answer to these questions came just as suddenly:

Just at this point the whole question of Gospel salvation opened to my mind in a manner most marvelous to me at the time. I think I then saw, as clearly as I ever have in my life, the reality and fullness of the atonement of Christ. . . .

Without being distinctly aware of it, I had stopped in the street right where the inward voice seemed to arrest me. How long I remained in that position, I cannot say. But after this distinct revelation had stood for some little time before my mind, the question seemed to be put, “Will you accept it now, to-day?” I replied, “Yes; I will accept it to-day, or I will die in the attempt.” ²

Instead of going to work, he went into the woods and hiked over a small hill - he retreated to a place where some trees had fallen and formed a partially covered enclosure.

As he tried to pray, the words wouldn’t come. He was too concerned that someone would see him. When he realized what was holding him back, he said to himself, “What! . . . such a degraded sinner as I am, on my knees confessing my sins to the great and holy God; and ashamed to have any human being, and sinner like myself, find me on my knees endeavoring to make my peace with my offended God!” ³ A Scripture passage came to his mind: “Then shall ye . . . go and pray unto me, and I will hearken unto you. [Then] ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:12–13). Charles seized this message, crying out, “Lord, I take thee at thy word. Now thou knowest that I do search for thee with all my heart, and that I have come here to pray to thee; and thou hast promised to hear me.” ⁴

Charles’s heart opened, and God filled it with promises from His Word. He accepted each personally, as if it had been made to him alone. Soon, Finney found himself on his way back to town with no idea how long he had been in the woods. He thought, “If I am ever converted, I will preach the Gospel.” He then realized that the despair for his soul was completely gone.

Meeting Jesus Face-to-Face

That afternoon, the law office employees were occupied with moving all of the furniture and books from one office to another. When it was dark and the move was complete, Judge Wright bade Finney good night and went home. Finney described what happened next:

As I went in and shut the door after me, it seemed as if I met the Lord Jesus Christ face to face. . . . I fell down at his feet and poured out my soul to him. I wept aloud like a child, and made such confessions as I could with my choked utterance. It seemed to me that I bathed his feet with my tears. . . .

I received a mighty baptism of the Holy Ghost. . . . The Holy Spirit descended upon me in a manner that seemed to go through me, body and soul. I could feel the impression, like a wave of electricity, going through and through me. Indeed it seemed to come in waves and waves of liquid love; for I could not express it in any other way. It seemed like the very breath of God. . . .

These waves came over me, and over me, and over me, one after the other, until I recollect I cried out, “I shall die if these waves continue to pass over me.” I said, “Lord, I cannot bear any more”; yet I had no fear of death. ⁵

Charles’s Anointing Starts to Spread

In the following months, Charles took it upon himself to undergo training to be a Presbyterian minister. It was suggested that he attend Princeton, but he opted instead to stay in Adams to be tutored by Rev. Gale and to study Gale’s library of religious books. He was ordained as a Presbyterian minister in March of 1824.

Finney did not desire to preach to an established church or regular congregation, so he took a six-month commission with a women’s missionary society in Oneida County in upstate New York, and traveled to the town of Evans Mills to begin his ministry. He traveled back and forth between there and a German settlement in Antwerp, ministering regularly at both.

At the time, Finney was engaged to Lydia Andrews of Whitestown in Oneida County, and they married in October 1824 and traveled to Adams. Two days after the wedding, Finney went back to Evans Mills with the intention of returning about one week later to move the couple’s home there. However, E2revival took off so quickly and the work was so much that Charles wouldn't return until early the spring of 1825 - some six months later.

Meeting the Prayer Warrior

It was in Evans Mills that Charles was reacquainted with Daniel Nash, a minister he had first encountered when he was examined to be ordained. Charles soon learned that since they had last met, Nash had been infected with an eye disease that had left him lying in a dark room, unable to read or write. Because of his ailment, Nash had given himself almost entirely to prayer; eventually, he had emerged from the sickness physically healed and spiritually transformed into a man of intercessory prayer. As Finney and Nash began to pray together in meetings, Charles was deeply moved by the power of Nash’s prayers and the magnitude of his faith.

After meeting again at Evans Mills, Finney and Nash began working together. They determined to make the unchurched their primary focus. As Nash stated in a letter,

When Mr. Finney and I began our race, we had no thought of going amongst ministers. Our highest ambition was to go where there was neither minister or reformation and try to look up the lost sheep, for whom no man cared. We began and the Lord prospered. . . . We go into no man’s parish unless called. . . . We have room enough to work and work enough to do. ⁶

For the next seven years until his death, Nash became a key part of every meeting Charles led. Together, they learned a great deal about “praying down revival.” Nash was not timid in prayer - it was said his prayers could sometimes be heard up to half a mile away. When Father Nash died on December 20, 1831, Charles gave up his itinerant ministry within four months to take a position as a pastor.

100,000 Saved

The greatest outpouring of Charles’s life came in Rochester, New York, starting in September 1830. Lyman Beecher, one of Finney’s harshest critics in his early years, would eventually call the revival in Rochester “the greatest work of God, and the greatest revival of religion, that the world has ever seen, in so short a time. One hundred thousand . . . were reported as having connected themselves with churches.” ⁷ It was recorded that as many as eighty-five percent of those converted remained Christians years later.

It was a revival that touched all social classes - from civic and business leaders to schoolteachers, physicians, shopkeepers, farmers, and migrant workers. Bars closed for lack of patrons. Crime rates dropped dramatically and stayed low for years, even as the population grew. At one point, the teenagers in the local high school were so distraught about the condition of their souls that they paid no attention to their lessons, so the director invited Finney to come and speak. Nearly the entire student body was saved, including the director, who had originally thought it was a ploy by the students to get out of their work. Forty of the students went on to become ministers. One of these later wrote:

The whole community was stirred. Religion was the topic of conversation, in the house, in the shop, in the office and on the street. The only theater in the city was converted into a livery stable; the only circus into a soap and candle factory. Grog shops were closed; the Sabbath was honored; the sanctuaries were thronged with happy worshippers; a new impulse was given to every philanthropic enterprise; the fountains of benevolence where opened, and men lived to good. ⁸

The Rochester revival would prove to be the height of the Second Great Awakening and a spark to light the fuse of a national revival that ran like wildfire throughout the United States in 1831. A host of evangelists, including Beecher himself, took up the torch from Rochester, and the rolls of membership swelled in churches everywhere - Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist, Episcopalian, Congregational, and others alike. New England churches grew by one-third in 1831 alone.

Charles Becomes a Professor

Charles soon took a pastoral position in New York City because of the toll itinerating had taken on his health. Revival continued to flow whenever Finney spoke in New York through the end of 1834 and into the winter of 1835. As a result, he was suddenly faced with a large number of young men who wanted to go into the ministry but had no proper place to be educated and ordained according to the Gospel as Finney preached it. Soon, the requests for Finney to teach theology grew numerous enough that he agreed and began a lecture series.

Around this time, there was a controversy at Lane Seminary in Cincinnati, Ohio, that would soon take Finney’s career as a theology instructor a step further. The seminary was composed largely of converted young people from New York’s “Burned-over District” who firmly believed that owning slaves was a sin. Many of Lane Seminary’s trustees owned slaves themselves, however, and they tried to silence the students. Asa Mahan, a trustee, took up the students’ cause, and when the students left to start a new college in Oberlin, Ohio, Mahan left with them. He became the first president of Oberlin College, and the students requested Finney as their professor of theology. When the Tappan brothers offered to finance the professorship of Finney and seven others, Finney agreed to teach at Oberlin in the summer and return to pastor in New York City in the winter. The Finneys’ first summer in Oberlin was in 1835.

Oberlin College opened its doors to one hundred students when Finney began teaching there, and by 1840, five hundred students were enrolled. By the time Finney became the president of Oberlin in 1851, the college had more than one thousand students. After Finney’s death, U.S. President James Garfield affirmed to the student body of Oberlin “that no college in the land had more effectively touched the nerve centers of the national life and thought and ennobled them than did this institution to which Charles Finney devoted so many years of Christian service.” ⁹

A Deeper Baptism of the Holy Spirit

During his first years in Oberlin, Finney was troubled by the fact that some of those who had been converted during his revivals had since backslidden or fallen away from the faith. He began to think that Christians needed a deeper conversion, or “second blessing” beyond conversion, if they were going to live wholly sanctified lives on this earth. He came to believe that a further work of the Holy Spirit would allow Christians to live in holiness, thereby following Jesus’ exhortation in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5:48 to “be ye perfect.” This belief would bring criticism on Oberlin, an institution that many people came to see as a den of extremists - chief among them, Finney and Mahan. The Second Blessing was a theme that Finney developed in his lectures at Oberlin, which would eventually be published as the two-volume Lectures on Systematic Theology. Finney would not experience anything along these lines in his own life, however, until the winter of 1843–1844.

During this winter, the Lord gave my own soul a very thorough overhauling, and a fresh baptism of his Spirit. . . . My mind was greatly drawn out in prayer, for a long time; as indeed it always has been, when I have labored in Boston. . . . This winter, in particular, my mind was exceedingly exercised on the question of personal holiness; and in respect to the state of the church, their want of power with God; the weakness of the orthodox churches in Boston, the weakness of their faith, and their want of power in the midst of such a community. The fact that they were making little or no progress in overcoming the errors of the city, greatly affected my mind. ¹⁰

Finney’s Deepest Setback

Back in Oberlin, Lydia Finney had grown more and more frail, something that was not helped by the pregnancy and birth of her fifth child, Sarah, in 1841. Sarah fell deathly ill early in 1843 and died on March 9. The Finneys’ sixth and final child, Delia Finney, was born in 1844 but would live only eight years, dying from illness on September 1, 1852. Lydia Finney died when Delia was only three on December 17, 1847.

The burden of work for his revivals and the busyness of his teaching schedule made it difficult - if not impossible - for Finney to remain a single parent. It was a tough decision to remarry, but on November 13, 1848, Asa Mahan, then president of Oberlin College, officiated at the marriage of Finney and Elizabeth Ford Atkinson, a widow from Rochester. Though the marriage of Finney and Elizabeth may have been more of a matter of convenience than of love, Elizabeth proved an able mother to Finney’s children, and Finney came to love and admire her over time as she became a positive influence on his ministry and family throughout their years together.

Charles’s Final Years

After many requests, Charles and Elizabeth traveled to Great Britain in the fall of 1849 to minister there. Finney again found success with the methods he had come to rely on in the United States, and Elizabeth found success holding meetings for women - a greater empowerment of women’s involvement in ministry was started under Finney’s leadership.

In 1851, Finney became the president of Oberlin College, but he continued to travel and lead revivals as his duties would allow him. Between 1851 and 1857, he would travel and preach in Boston, Massachusetts; New York City; Hartford, Connecticut; and again in Rochester. In 1859, he returned to England and pushed north to preach in Scotland. It was this last trip to the British Isles that taxed his health to its limits; after returning to the United States in 1860 at the beginning of the Civil War, Finney would not leave Oberlin again. On November 27, 1863, Elizabeth passed away. The following year, Finney married for the third time. His new wife, Rebecca Allen Rayl, was the assistant principal of Oberlin’s women’s department.

Though he continued to teach and preach in Oberlin for the rest of his days, Finney resigned from his position as college president in 1866. At the request of friends and colleagues, he would finish his Memoirs in 1868, even though they wouldn’t be published until a year after his death. Two weeks short of his eighty-third birthday, Finney passed away of natural causes as the first hints of autumn hung in the morning air of August 16, 1875.

Works Consulted

1. Charles Finney, Memoirs of Charles Finney (New York: A. S. Barnes and Company, 1876), 14.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid., 16.
4. Ibid., 16.
5. Ibid., 19- 21.
6. Paul Reno, Daniel Nash: Prevailing Prince of Prayer (Asheville, NC: Revival Literature, 1989), 7.
7. Finney, Memoirs, 300 - 301.
8. V. Raymond Edman, Finney Lives On (Minneapolis, MN: Bethany House Publishers, 1971), 68, quoted in Eddie L. Hyatt, 2000 Years of Charismatic Christianity: A 20th Century Look at Church History from a Pentecostal/Charismatic Perspective (Chicota, TX and Tulsa, OK: Hyatt International Ministries, Inc., 1996), 137.
9. Basil Miller, Charles Finney: He Prayed Down Revivals (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1951), 96–97.
10. Finney, Memoirs, 373 - 374, 380, 384.

Website: www.godsgenerals.com

Bro. N. Daniel

Another Daniel

(Excerpts from "Another Daniel" by Joshua Daniel, Published by Laymen's Evangelical Fellowship International, 1990)

---

Daniel Meets Sundar Singh

When Daniel first heard of Sadhu Sundar Singh and of the marvellous manner in which God was speaking to him and leading him, he was greatly thrilled in his heart. At a time when he himself was proving the power of our unchangeable God, in his own life, Sundar Singh’s experiences brought new inspiration and encouragement to his heart.

When Christian leaders of both evangelical assemblies and Modernistic circles held, from their different viewpoints, that God will not speak today and that miracles will not happen now, Daniel would not agree with them. He knew, and he had begun to prove for himself that Jesus is the same, 'Yesterday, today, for ever". Heb.13-8. 'Why will not God use us today as He used Peter and Paul?", was a burning question in his heart. With all his heart he maintained, that God will work today as He did in the Bible days.

Sadhu Sundar Singh now appeared on the scene as the answer to Daniel's deep longings. His convictions were greatly confirmed by his hearing, seeing and meeting Sadhu Sundar Singh.

When he heard of this Christ-like man of God he asked God to bring him to the place where he was studying. Daniel was still at Kakinada at that time. When he heard that Sadhu Sundar Singh was going to visit Kakinada, he was so thrilled at all the wonderful possibilities of this visit, that he set out on a cycle with a supply of handbills announcing Sundar Singh’s meetings and distributed thern. to many. Moreover, he contacted every one of his classmates personally and invited them to the meetings of Sundar Singh. After hearing Sundar Singh, one of Daniel's Hindu classmates said to him, "Daniel, I am no longer a Hindu. I am a Christian".

Sadhu Sundar Singh himself had no knowledge at all of the devout young disciple Daniel. There were many big men who wanted to meet Sundar Singh and speak with him. Further, he had a demanding schedule of meetings, besides the long hours that he spent in prayer, which he zealously guarded from all intrusions and interviews.

Thus the chances of Daniel obtaining. an interview with this great man of God, were very slim. Sundar Singh’s interpreter undertook to introduce Daniel to him. At first, Sundar Singh had thought that Daniel was just another of the many curious and enthusiastic people, that clamoured to meet him.. It was not long however, before Sundar Singh sensed and understood that Daniel was quite another person, from what he had supposed him to be and straightway began to treat Daniel with great tenderness and love.

When Sundar Singh moved on to the next place where meetings were scheduled for him, Vizag, he invited Daniel to travel with him and to live with him. Daniel felt that he was totally unworthy to move so closely with this unique man of God, that he only accepted the invitation to Iive in the same house with Sundar Singh and declined to eat with him. This experience of living with Sundar Singh left a deep impression upon Daniel.

Daniel even wanted to go further afield with Sundar Singh but that was not God's will for Daniel. He even said to Sundar Singh, "1 will go with you to Tibet and die as a martyr for Christ." Sundar Singh’s reply was, "It is easy to die as a martyr for Christ but to live for Christ is hard." How resoundingly true are these words!

Sundar Singh further told Daniel that God would use him amongst young people and students. True to what Sundar Singh had said, all through his long ministry of fifty years, God used Daniel to bring many students and young people to Christ.

In parting, Sundar Singh gave Daniel his shawl or blanket as a token of his love. Sundar Singh had few belongings besides the clothes that he had on. He carried nothing but a Bible and a shawl that served to protect him from the severe cold of the remote regions, such as the Himalayan heights, which he used to traverse in his missionary journeys. This shawl he gave to Daniel. People were quick to note the Biblical parallel to this and said half-seriously, "The mantle of Sundar Singh has fallen on Daniel."

When Daniel returned home with the blanket presented to him, after taking his leave of Sundar Singh, he found his brother critically ill, stricken by double Pneumonia. He was practically given up for dead. The doctors had given him up and the relatives had retired from the patient's side and were quietly shedding tears. The pallor of death was clearly upon his brother’s face. Daniel went into the room where his dying brother lay motionless. He knelt down and prayed. After prayer he covered his brother with the blanket which Sundar Singh had given him. A remarkable turn came over the patient almost immediately and the Lord healed him.

The simple and sacrificial life that Sundar Singh led, his self-denial and his complete abandonment to the will of God, were lessons that Daniel absorbed into his life.

Sundar Singh continued to pray for Daniel. Although their paths never crossed again, when Sundar Singh met a mutual friend, years after, he enquired after Daniel and told how he still prayed for him.

---

Revival Fans Out

After the conclusion of the six days of meetings at Repalle, Bro. Daniel returned to Madras. He had the comfort of knowing that at least there was a missionary who co-operated cent percent with him, on the spot, to continue to water the seed which was sown and to encourage the souls that were converted.

From the standpoint of the mission however, now that the meetings had concluded, Bro. Daniel had no further responsibility in that area. It so often happened that the devil managed to so manoeuvre the top committees of the missions, that soon after revival broke out, the missionary who knew well the field and partook in the movement and perhaps himself received a great blessing by obtaining anew a broken and contrite spirit, would be transferred away from the scene of the revival. This naturally was a grievous blow to the work time and again.

This godly missionary Mr. John C. Peery who had co-operated wholeheartedly with Bro. Daniel, did not remain long at Repalle, to follow the progress of the revival and to call for more revival meetings in that area.

Not long after he returned from Repalle to Madras, Bro. Daniel began to receive letters conveying to him the great and mighty things that were being done in the Name of the Lord Jesus by the young converts of the revival. These reports brought news of several happenings that were quite unique and seemed almost unbelievable. The situation called for an unbiased investigation and true appraisal, whether these things were really so.

Bro. Daniel found it necessary to undertake a short tour of some of the spots to which the original revival had fanned out. What he witnessed and saw thrilled his soul and fired his faith to undertake measures, to build up the young converts, so that the revival may not weaken, but spread forth to new areas, winning unreached multitudes for Jesus.

A simple woman, a petty roadside seller of food grains, narrated the following incident to Bro. Daniel. She had been converted, when after the revival meeting at Repalle, the flames of revival spread to this village of Penumudi. She sat by the roadside with a little basket of food grains, making no more than a bare existence through her trade. A stranger approached her and begged her for a handful of grains. Poor as she was, moved by compassion from her newly converted heart, she did what she could hardly afford to do. Filling one of her measures, she poured the grains into his cupped hands. On this, the stranger poured back the grains into her basket, where the level of grains was very low. As the grains poured from his hands, her basket filled rapidly, until it was nearly brimming over. As she lifted up her eyes in wonder and praise, suddenly recognizing her Saviour and Lord, He disappeared.

There were many others who spoke of healing and other miraculous happenings. But the one most significant factor was that there was a mighty Spirit of prayer upon the people. And as they prayed, the blessing multiplied. The atmosphere in that village seemed to be charged with the presence of God.

Little children too came under the power of God and were converted. They too began to exercise faith and the fears that hitherto dominated their little minds, no longer held them in thraldom. While many were being healed of the venomous bites of snakes and the extremely painful stings of scorpions, which. abound in profusion in many Indian villages, the children also began to prove God's power. Bro. Daniel was told that little children were found playing with scorpions and they would not sting them. While we do not advocate our readers experimenting with scorpions, yet it must be remembered, that when God begins to work, several things which are totally contrary to the laws of nature, do happen.

The missions generally had no machinery to deal with a situation like this. It so often happened that the local pastors and sometimes the missionaries too, were themselves converted in the revival. Being babes in Christ, they felt incompetent to feed the other newly converted people with the Word of God. In some cases, their theology of a life-time had to be dumped on the garbage heap. The theology of unbelief had no relevance, in the face of revival, where God Himself was seen at work. The mission authorities in most cases, therefore, exhibited little enthusiasm for follow-up measures of any sort to build the young converts in their new found faith.

An exigency like this called for immediate remedial measures. As the converts of the revival multiplied and cried to be fed with God's Word, Bro. Daniel called for special meetings at Bro. John's village, Penumudi. Penumudi is an insignificant little village of Guntur District, tucked away by the broad banks of the mighty river Kistna.

It being the summer vacation, Bro. Daniel took his children also to the meetings. Young as they were, they were enriched greatly by being eyewitnesses of God's great works.

In two or three days, there was a fresh outbreak of revival at the meetings. Many had gathered from outlying villages and the early converts from a criminal tribe called the Yerukulas, were also present. The scenes of revival were so vivid and awe inspiring that they can never be forgotten by those who witnessed those mighty works of God.

People betook themselves to the sands of the river banks or the shady groves, to give themselves to prayer. The present writer who was deeply involved in personal work, was kept busy through the day and late into the night, with repenting souls, who were under powerful conviction of sin. Some were felled to the ground by the power of God and could not even rise to their knees. And one sturdy man was found to be blinded and could not open his eyes. There were people there from other areas too, from across the river. There was no noise or unnecessary publicity generated by the revival nor were there found any incongruous incidents or events taking place. There was a deep sense of the awfulness and abominableness of sin. God was palpably felt moving and working in the midst.

A widow told of how God had used her late husband who was one of the early converts of revival, before his death. "A little boy was found missing in the village," she said. "A frantic search was made and his body was found to be floating in a canal. My husband began to pray for the boy to be raised to life. The unbelieving relatives of the boy clamoured to take away the body for burial. But my husband would not give up. And as he prayed, the boy sneezed and opened his eyes." Events such as this no doubt produced a profound effect, upon the non-Christian population who have become habituated to the ill-informed view that Christianity is the whiteman's religion.

God began to speak even to some of the Hindu landlords. Their turning to the Lord produced a near sensation in those parts, as the wealthier Hindus of those parts have always shied away from Christianity, as the religion of the lowest rung of society, the untouchables*. The prevailing feeling among the proud rich has therefore been, that to turn to Christ, was to bring an awful reproach upon their families and to debase themselves in the eyes of society. This iron-bound caste exclusiveness began to be breached by the revival.

* Now the laws against the practice of untouchability, are being. half-heartedly enforced and it is against law to treat the poor casteless people, as outcastes.

Bro. Daniel had the special gift of being able to come down to the level of these simple and rustic people and teach them God's Word and the life of Christian discipline. These meetings at Penumudi continued annually for a few years, giving a great fillip to the work.

---

Call my Saints Together

While the revival fires began to burn and many souls were being transformed from their earlier lives of uncleanness, ungodliness and plain indifference towards the Lord Jesus, the question of feeding these young converts came to the fore. The solution to this vital question was not found through deliberations and consultations but through inspiration.

One summer, not long after the early outpouring of God's spirit at Kakinada, Repalle, Vuyyuru and some other centres, God said to Bro. Daniel, "Gather my saints together unto me, those that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice". Psalm 50:5. Through this scripture the Lord indicated to Bro. Daniel that he should gather the converted people from these several areas, and give them an undisturbed season of waiting on God and feeding on His word. Bro. Daniel had never known a retreat on a scale in which God was planning.

Now these people who responded to this invitation and came from various districts, where the revival spirit was active, were to be given free boarding and lodging during their fifteen days of stay at the retreat. Now there was need also for a suitable place where such a large group could be accommodated.

The Lord also wanted the first retreat to be held at Kakinada. There was a large number of people who were converted as the outcome of the revival which had broken out in Kakinada, and they needed to be strengthened with the Word of God. These local people could also return to their own homes at night deriving great profit from the retreat, sharing in the meetings of the day.

Being wholly occupied with fresh outbreaks of revival, Bro. Daniel had written to some of his former colleagues, to attend to the preliminary arrangements which needed to be set in motion in preparation for the retreat. But everything seemed to be so nebulous and the undertaking so vast in scope, without even a clear indication as to how many would be present at the Retreat, or what the whole operation would cost, that these old friends of Bro. Daniel scarcely had the requisite courage and faith to execute his wishes. Deep in their thinking no doubt could have been the ever present human reasoning, "Who will supply the money for so vast undertaking" If it were a wedding, the reception and the related events would be over in a day, but this gathering had to be fed and taken care of for fifteen days. Nor could Bro. Daniel send the whole sum of money that was required for the foodstuff to be purchased and all the other expenses involved in advance. The money required had to be prayed in and sometimes the Lord sent the money in, for just one day at a time.

The Canadian Mission authorities very kindly put their training school building and the attached boarding school at the disposal of Bro. Daniel. There were several school-rooms and ample accommodation for people. Moreover this was the training school where Bro. Daniel had once been the Headmaster for a short time and Mrs. Daniel a teacher for many years. So the place had many hallowed memories. Within the compound walls of this institution, was also situated the tiny cottage, where Bro. Daniel and his family had first lived and from where also he had set out, obeying God’s call, without any human guarantee or security that his needs and those of his family would be met.

Thus, when Mr. Daniel arrived, a little before the retreat was due to commence, there was little evidence of any necessary preparations having been made. He prayerfully went to work and in a short time everything was ready, to receive the incoming people.

Almost the first to arrive at the retreat were two farm labourers, both of whom were named Isaac. They appeared to be great in brawn but their education was minimal, scarcely having been to school. But they were both men of faith and prayer, having been wholly transformed by the power of God. The 250 kilometres which they covered by train, was such a phenomenal distance to them, who were so poor, that it must have appeared almost like a trans-continental journey to them.

Then came others, some who were teachers and others who could scarcely speak their mother-tongue aright, but with the pronounced rustic accents of remote regions. Quite a number of them seemed to be simple and untutored villagers, but oh how these men could pray. Soon the place was alive with people.

The present writer's share in the work, before the retreat commenced, was principally to receive the people, help them with their luggage, take down their names and guide them to their rooms.

Those who were resident in the first retreat were no more than 120 people. During the first retreat, we could do therefore with the small tile-roofed entrance hall of this boarding school for our meeting place. No special pandals were put up, nor any elaborate arrangements made.

Great power from God accompanied the preaching of His Word. Much of the preaching responsibility fell upon Bro. Daniel. Teaching the Word of God was interspersed with seasons of prayer. The seasons of prayer were electric, free, spontaneous and spirit-led.

Child-like simplicity and an unfaltering trust in God's Word, scintillated from the lives and even the faces of the people and when they stood up to testify to what God had done for them, people were simply spellbound by the naked power that God had released in these early converts of the revival. These untutored men had met God and the narration of God's work in their places and surroundings sounded like the incidents from the Book of Acts. Although some spoke in the broad dialect of those regions touched by the revival, this did not distract from the thrill and challenge which their testimony brought to the whole audience. There were accounts of miraculous healings, conversion of derelicts and drunkards and even the dead being raised to life again, in answer to prayer, was witnessed too. One could not sit in the meetings without one's spirit being stirred and their faith being strengthened. In the face of these testimonies, the present writer even wondered whether he had a testimony at all: so small did he feel and so deeply humbled.

After the meetings, people could be heard scattered over a wide area, singly or in small groups, pouring out their hearts to God. God was speaking and working, new promises were being received. God was preparing men and women for new spiritual advances in their areas and for fresh out-pourings of revival. It was as if the whole company was closeted with God.

There was no evidence of superficial excitement, enervating emotionalism or any craving for display or publicity. Everything was perfectly controlled and synchronized smoothly with the principal object of the retreat, namely, to see His glory and be renewed in the spirit.

Mrs. Daniel and some of the local ladies supervised the kitchen and adequate food was provided, without cost, at the three meals that were served each day.

A handful of men who had come to the retreat without true conversion that is they had come out of religious enthusiasm, than with the experience of spiritual birth, were dealt with powerfully by the spirit of God. It was the duty of the present writer to take them apart to the room where he spent the greater part of the day in prayer and to lead them to true repentance and forgiveness of sins. So freely was God's spirit at work, that these men would make full confession of their sins, without any pressure being applied, repent and receive a very definite assurance from the Lord. All this would not take time either, it was all so spontaneous. God would speak to them so clearly too, so that from that point several of them went to become soul-winners.

The heat of the summer in Kakinada is well-known for its severity. But the Lord controlled the heat from getting to extreme levels, such that the retreat was not disrupted by the sheer exhaustion brought on by unbearable heat. Thus on all hands God was in the midst and guided the retreat.

Further Blessings at the Retreats

Revival continued to spread. As revival meetings continued to take place in new areas, more and more souls were getting converted. Moreover, some of these newly converted men were receiving great power from God and doing mighty works under the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Bro. Daniel saw a great danger in young converts, with hardly any knowledge of God's Word, launching into intense healing ministry and the casting out of devils. He kept warning them they must watch against pride and walk humbly with God.

In India, when a man begins to be used mightily in healing, the people almost ascribe divinity to him. Mr. Daniel never favoured exposing the young men to too much publicity, before they were well grounded in the word of God, lest Satan should overthrow them to the detriment of the whole work of God.

All these added up to the need for more retreats where men and women could be corrected, taught and fed with God's Word and thus trained to serve Him.

The next two retreats also were held at Kakinada in the same boarding school. The number of people present at the retreats kept steadily increasing from year to year, with no decline in the intensity of prayer and the great yearnings for the deeper things of God, which were generated at the retreats. Many people too were very regular from year to year and they would not miss the retreat at any cost.

A few young students too, who were on the threshold of entering the University, were being prepared by God at these retreats to be soul-winners at their respective colleges; so that God was laying the groundwork for revival outpourings amongst University and High school students also. God kept anointing and fashioning people to be instruments of His power and grace, at the retreats. Thus each retreat was followed by a new upsurge of blessing and fresh outbreaks of revival.

Saturday nights were always the nights of fasting and prayer. One Saturday night we gathered for prayer in and around a medium-sized tent without side walls and there was a tremendous flow of prayer. The Hand of God was upon the people. Prayer on such occasions often took the form of prophesying. Men and women were deeply humbled before the Lord, for very awe and the reality of His presence which was palpable. In their own native tongues, men and women prayed with amazing authority and unction and before they rose from prayer, the dawn had broken.

The last meeting of the day at the retreats would be the family prayer. The people would gather in an informal group and were relaxed and happy. Bro. Daniel always enjoyed himself immensely at the family prayers. He would call on people to sing in their own languages. The hour would be getting late, but the clock never seemed to bother Bro. Daniel. He exuded a deep spirit of love and joy and the contagion caught on and there would be joy and love and praise to God.

In closing, a few instructions would be given to facilitate the smooth running of the retreat campus and the family prayer would be dismissed after a short prayer.

The ingredient of faith and the exercise of faith, which is so pleasing to God was an ever present factor at the retreats. When the first retreat was called for by God, the little store of money which Bro. Daniel had kept for the college studies of his first two children, was gladly put at the disposal of God and it was exhausted by the time the retreat closed. Thus when his first two children were to be admitted in two colleges, Bro. Daniel had to exercise faith afresh for their fees.

In the retreats immediately following the first, the small gifts which came in from the people augmented the sums realised by the sale of Bro. Daniel’s properties and the retreats were paid for.

After the first three annual retreats at Kakinada, the Lord had Bro. Daniel move the retreat to another place, a hundred miles north of Kakinada, a port city by the name of Visakhapatnam.

At Visakhapatnam it was as if the angels of God had measured out the long verandahs of the high school which was used for the retreat. The people who came in greater numbers to the two retreats at Vizag, just filled the place to capacity. When they sat down to eat their meals in long lines on the verandahs, there was just enough room for all of them.

The evening meetings were open to all and at the evening meetings many people of various persuasions began to be blessed. As the word spread of the reality and power of God at the meetings, the people kept coming in ever-increasing numbers.

A deep spirit of prayer and a mighty spirit of revelation was a mark of all the annual retreats. It was the Lord working and speaking and men could not help but be searched, cleansed and filled with new power.

The sixth retreat was at Samalkot If anything, Samalkot was even a hotter place than Kakinada but a pillar of cloud stood over the camp during that retreat. It was so noticeable and amazing. The clouds stood until the people left the retreat to return to their own places. The very next day the weather turned to a furnace-like heat.

At all these retreats, people would go out into the wide open spaces and give themselves to prayer, until late in the night. Some of these grounds, however, were infested by exceedingly venomous creatures such as cobras and scorpions. Yet all through those early years and after too, the Lord never permitted any venomous creature, to sting or bite His children, who had come to the retreat.

At a later retreat a fair-sized cobra even crept into the lap of a woman who was lost in prayer. When she opened her eyes, here was this unwelcome creature snugly curled in the folds of her sari. The Lord kept that praying woman from panicking and the cobra slithered away without hurting her.

Then came the time when the revival blessing began to spread in several directions, so that the retreat had to be moved to a central location, like Madras, which is easily accessible to people from all regions. Thereafter, Madras became the venue of the annual retreat. It was at one of the early retreats that Bro. Daniel preached through the whole retreat at the morning sessions, on that verse of scripture, so important for spiritual growth, namely, Romans 12:2 "And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God."

The teaching of doing the will of God, which Bro. Daniel had learnt from a whole lifetime of discipleship, was very precious and necessary for the young disciples, to save them from the danger of settling down to selfish, carnal and self-chosen paths of ease. Bro. Daniel would literally be caught up into a halo of heavenly atmosphere as he expounded how the Spirit of the Lord taught him to seek and do God's will at all costs. The oft times ununderstood distinction between the permissive will of God, which is all that a man does, when he has set his heart on a particular course of action, and the perfect will of God, which is the course most pleasing to God, was explained clearly to the people. Hence many in the Fellowship, from the start, learnt the secret of doing God's will. They would not rush head-long, choose a pleasing and reasonable course of action, meet with failure and then repine over the years that so much well-meaning labour was lost. The people were taught to stand still and let God speak to them first, before setting out on any venture or project. Hence seeking God's will earnestly, waiting patiently for the revelation and doing the perfect will of God, however costly and inconvenient it may be, became the chief rule of life, to most people in the Fellowship. This naturally eliminated much wastage, heart-ache, loss of time and money. Thus treading in the will of God, even greater victories began to be won. Thus, wherever the work spread, there were the elements of steady growth, unswerving trust in the promises of God and steadfastness to the cause set before them.

The first of the retreats at Madras was held at Gurukul Theological College in Kilpauk. While the permission to hand the buildings over for the retreat was granted to us on paper, Bro. Daniel's faith was tried until the last moment, for the keys of the place were not handed over to him, until the day before the retreat commenced. Thus the time at disposal of the small team of young students, to clean and prepare the place for the retreat was very short.

It was with hearts of thanksgiving that the young people went to work and quickly readied the place for the large number of people who were expected. The only vehicle of the Fellowship at that time, was a hand-drawn rickshaw which had been presented to the Fellowship, which had painted on its body, the Scripture "Every good gift and perfect gift is from above". James 1:1 7. The big vessels that were used for cooking rice etc., were piled on this rickshaw and one of the young, recently converted college boys drew the rickshaw* triumphantly, to the venue of the retreat. In a country where the social distance between the poor rickshaw-puller and the well-to-do college student is very great, this surely presented a pretty sight !

* Hand-drawn rickshaw can hardly be seen anymore, in India.

When the retreat in Madras in the month of May, became a well established annual feature of the work, then came the unprecedented drought year of 1952. The reservoirs that supplied the city's water were partly drying up and the Corporation of Madras was frantically trying to dig wells. The schools and colleges were advised to close early for the Summer vacation and people were leaving the city of Madras.

At that retreat, a little over three hundred people were expected. The Meston College, Royapettah, Madras, was chosen as the venue of the retreat that year. Knowledgeable people were not a little amazed that Bro. Daniel should choose to call for such a large number of people to the city at a time when the scarcity of water was so acute. In the height of the Indian summer or in mid-May, two baths a day is almost a minimal requirement, if one should choose not to be malodorous. But where was the water to be found?

Soon after the retreat commenced, at the very first fasting prayer session, the much-needed rain was made a subject of prayer. The Seasonal rains or the Monsoon rains are only to be expected in Madras, at the end of October. Thus there was simply no prospect of any real precipitation. "Prayer changes things", was not just a nice sounding motto on the wall for those present at the retreat. Practically all of them had made the transition from the dull "saying of prayers" to real and robust praying. The prayer season closed in the middle of the night and the ground sheets on which the people had been kneeling in prayer, were being folded and removed from the open, where they had met, when the first drops of rainfall began to fall. When the morning broke, the thought foremost on the mind was, "The raindrops of the night, were they just a passing shower?" One did not have to think long. The downpour was strong and incessant and the skies were very dark. It rained and it rained, until it was becoming difficult to wade through the rain water even to the meeting hall in the campus. The improvised kitchen too was having many problems to keep the firewood dry and the fires burning. Thus Bro. Daniel was told, "You prayed for cats and dogs to be rained down. Now there is too much rain. Won’t you please pray that it should stop?" The rain gauges recorded a phenomenal 18 inches* rain -- a record rainfall for the month of May, for all-time, city streets were flooded and the water shortage was instantly solved.

*46 centimetres

The last retreats of Bro. Daniel's lifetime, were held in the campus of the Fellowship itself. Adequate booths were put up for the continually increasing number of people and the blessing too at the retreats kept mounting.

It was at one of the last few retreat meetings that one morning, Bro. Daniel who was normally not given to emotional appeals or display of over-much emotion, on the platform, broke down in the midst of his message and wept saying, "Where is glory for the Lord Jesus in this land?" There were not many in the congregation who could contain themselves at this point in the meeting and nearly everyone broke down with this heart-cry uppermost in their minds, "Lord, manifest forth your glory: be Thou glorified".

Website: www.lefi.org