Three days later a woman called at the vicarage and told him that she had for some time been greatly concerned about her soul through attending his services Her husband noticed her habits of private prayer, and in a violent rage threatened her with frightful consequences if she did not refrain from her church-going She told him her conscience would not allow that, and with terrible oaths he cried, “I’ll cut your throat as soon as you come back, if you go!”
The poor woman only prayed the harder, and when Sunday morning came she dressed herself for church as usual As she passed through the kitchen her husband bellowed out, “I shall not cut your throat as I said, I shall heat the big oven and throw you into it the minute you get back.” To the accompaniment of savage swearing she closed the door and made her way to the church, praying all the time that God would strengthen her to suffer whatever might befall her.
In grateful amaze she drank in every word of Fletcher’s impromptu talk upon the three martyrs in the fiery furnace, and to herself she cried softly, “If I had a thousand lives I’d lay them all down for Jesus!”
Knowing the brutal nature of her husband—a butcher by trade—she was quite prepared for the worst that might happen to her, but God kept her in utter and perfect peace when she actually saw flames issuing from the oven She was even joyful as she opened the door to death.
Then, to her unspeakable astonishment, she saw her husband upon his knees, beseeching God to pardon his sins He caught her in his arms, crying, “Forgive me, wife; oh, forgive me if you can!” turning from her only to cry yet more earnestly to God for the mercy he had been led by the Spirit Himself to seek.
With here and there such incidents to cheer him, Fletcher found, after two years of rough work and numberless hindrances, that public respect was taking the place of open opposition, and the word of truth, sown in difficulty and hardness, was beginning to bring forth fruit in many hearts Wesley says of him:—
“Having chosen this narrow field of action, he was more and more abundant in his ministerial labours, both in public and in private, not contenting himself with preaching, but visiting his flock in every corner of his parish And this work he attended to, early and late, whether the weather was fair or foul, regarding neither heat nor cold, rain nor snow, whether he was on horseback or on foot But this farther weakened his constitution, which was still more effectively done by his intense and uninterrupted studies, in which he frequently continued with scarce any intermission fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen hours a day But still he did not allow himself such food as was necessary to sustain nature He seldom took any regular meals, except he had company; otherwise, twice or thrice in four and twenty hours he ate some bread and cheese or fruit Instead of this, he sometimes took a draught of milk, and then wrote on again When one reproved him for not affording himself a sufficiency of necessary food, he replied, ’Not allow myself food? Why, our food seldom costs my housekeeper and me together less than two shillings a week!’”