Sunday morning I preached to the white people of Sumas from the text, “Thy word is truth.” At the close of the service I asked all who wished to talk about religion to stay behind. Several remained, who showed by their conduct and conversation that the Lord was at work upon their hearts.
During the afternoon I went on to Chilliwack, and at night preached to a crowd which filled to overflowing the two rooms in the private house where we held our service. The Spirit of God was present in mighty, awakening power, and the whole neighborhood was moved. Not an unkind word was said to me, in spite of all the threats I had heard of. For six weeks the work of grace continued, until nearly all the people were converted.
The interest awakened led to a desire to improve the means of communication between the two settlements. Early the following week “a bee” was called to make a road, with pole bridges over the sloughs, between Sumas and Chilliwack, which was really the first road in the settlement.
In the midst of all this I was taken with congestion of my left lung, and had to be kept in the house and treated with a steam bath of hot water and cedar boughs and mustard plasters for several days. However, the next Sabbath I took four services, and for weeks following preached night after night, and have never had anything the matter with my lungs since.
The awakening was so general that, far and near, nearly everyone was affected. A man came four miles one morning, while I was ill, to tell me that though he had taken his horses out that morning to work, he was so troubled in his soul that he couldn’t work, and then and there gave his heart to God. At once he became so happy that, as he said, “the mountains looked brighter, the birds sang sweeter, and all nature seemed to be praising the Lord,” and he thought he must come and let me know of his new-found joy. On the way he called at the cabin of a neighbor and found him on his knees praying.
Another man came several miles after midnight to beg me to get up and go home with him, for, as he said, he could neither sleep nor eat, and he feared that he would die if a change did not soon come.
“Praise the Lord!” I shouted.
“Man, don’t talk to me like that; I shall die.”
“There is no use in my going with you all that distance,” I replied. “I have heavy work to do. But I am glad the Lord is troubling you.” (He had a native woman and several children. I was not ordained at the time, and could not legally marry him.)