ALABAMA.
Accessions to the Church.
REV. G. W. ANDREWS, TALLADEGA.
Twenty-three connected themselves with our College Church yesterday March 6th; twenty-two of them by confession, and one by letter: fruits of a revival scarcely yet ended. All but two of them are children or young people; twenty-one are members of the Sabbath-school and of the College. Twelve are children of church members, now a long time with us. Two are wives for whom faithful and godly husbands had hoped and prayed, lo! these many years; there had been the secret hope but never before the open confession. Two were baptized by immersion, the rest followed the better way, choosing less of the outward and formal, and more of the inward and spiritual. Of the thirty girls boarding at Foster Hall, all are Christians, as are the forty boys, with two or three exceptions. Very few of those who come under our Christian influences so far as to be members of our family and Sabbath-school, fail to indulge a hope in Christ.
We had meetings every night for three weeks, Pres. DeForest preaching with great tenderness and power, while all the teachers and workers did faithfully what they could. So far from interfering with regular school duties, these meetings quickened to highest endeavor in study, and led to the most careful and conscientious use of time. Never before have our pupils been so conscientious and so well-behaved. Among the thirty girls at the boarding hall there has been but a single case of discipline since the present school year has begun, and that grew out of a voluntary confession, a sign of a very tender conscience.
All the meetings have been unusually quiet; not a case of noisy demonstration, no great “sights,” no “dreams,” but a thoughtful surrender to Christ, very much, I think, as in the revival meetings I have been accustomed to all my life. In them God has honored preaching, which has been so plain, practical and tender that few could resist it. There were not many hard hearts or dry eyes when the sermon on the “Prodigal Son” was ended and the invitation given to all prodigals to return to an injured Father’s house.
Through all these meetings unusual honor was put upon the Spirit, and on prayer, and there was more than the usual amount of preaching to the church, and with excellent results. God has done great things for us, whereof we are glad.