While their music was not classical, it seldom failed to strike fire. The people liked it, and were charmed, encouraged, and, in a thousand instances, saved by it. Mr. Alexander, the great revival singer, has the right view of things. He writes: “Musicians often say to me, ‘Why do you not use classical music, above the style of gospel songs?’ I reply, ‘When you can show me similar effects following such high-class music in moving the hearts of men and women, I will use it fast enough. Until then I shall keep to gospel songs, which have a wonderful way of reaching everybody, because they touch the soul.”
Volume, fervor, soul, enthusiasm, is what we want in all our church music. Away, forever, with that operatic nonsense which the artistic would introduce into our present-day religious services.
What glorious revivals were promoted. Like cyclones they seemed, at times, to lay everything low in their course. How sinners wept and repented! How saints shouted aloud for joy! “Wild fire!” does some one suggest? May be it was; but it achieved wonderful results. The present ministry of the conference, with a great majority of the true and tried laymen who constitute the very backbone of the church, were converted in just such meetings; and it is quite likely that the leading ministers and laymen of every other conference in our Zion were converted under like circumstances. Call it “wild fire” if you will, but I would like to see a good deal more of it.
A revival that arouses a whole community and brings fifty or a hundred, or perhaps two hundred into the kingdom, some of whom become prominent preachers of the word, while others become very pillars in the church, is not to be ignored or decried by those who are too slow and formal and dull to create a stir. Better have a little “wild fire” than no fire at all.
Personally, I believe in excitement. Nothing worth thinking about is ever accomplished in its absence. We cannot relish food, or enjoy sleep, until first excited by hunger or fatigue. Why should not the church manifest as much zeal and enthusiasm in her work as political parties or commercial clubs do in theirs? I am tired of that contemptible sentiment which stands ready, everywhere, and all the time, to denounce everything that has to do with the emotions. Religion, I readily grant, does not consist of noise and bluster. It means vastly more than that. Nor does it consist in sitting around like so many lifeless knots on a log.
We are told that it is the lightning and not thunder that kills. True enough, but lightning in the absence of thunder is harmless. Lightning makes the thunder.
In our work but little was said about the new theology, or higher criticism. Watson and Ralston in their theologies, and Smith and Clark and Lange and Barnes in their expositions, seldom referred to the new-fangled theories which confuse and chill and curse some of the churches to-day. We all believed that Moses wrote the Pentateuch, and Paul the Epistle to the Hebrews; and personally I have never had any reason for changing my views. It had never occurred to us to put Job and Jonah on the fictitious list. We actually believed and preached that they lived and wrought, one in the land of Uz, and the other in Nineveh, after escaping from the whale’s belly. We tried to tell of the awfulness of sin, as well as the joys of religion. We believed in a heaven, and would often talk and sing and preach about it until we felt ourselves within its very suburbs. When Jesus said, “And these shall go away into everlasting punishment,” we supposed he meant it, and no one attempted to put an artificial bottom in the “bottomless pit.” We divided our time pretty well between Sinai and Zion. The decalogue and beatitudes were included, ofttimes, in the framework of the same sermon. We knew there were some inaccuracies in the authorized version, but nothing sufficiently serious to affect the fundamentals of Christianity. We were justified, as we thought, in preaching the whole Bible, as it was commonly understood and interpreted, because in doing so we were blessed and sinners were saved.
The “mourners’ bench” was always a part of the program in our revival work. While no one insisted that a man must be saved at the bench, if saved at all, we believed, nevertheless, that coming forward and bowing at the altar was a good way of confessing sin, and of plighting fidelity to Jesus Christ. I would not serve as pastor of a people who objected to the use of an altar. If some of the unsaved wanted to seek their Lord elsewhere, and in some other way, I should not object; but I should insist upon it that those who wanted to come forward for prayers should have the privilege of doing so. It is refreshing to see how simple and direct Dr. Torry, “Billy” Sunday, and “Gipsey” Smith are in their methods, and the wonderful results that follow. They do not mince matters. They go to the people with a burning message from the Throne, and deliver it, no matter what anybody may think or say about it. With sledge-hammer blows they drive it home to the hearts of their hearers, that no man can be saved until he confesses his sins and his Savior. They follow, largely, the old line of revival work—and succeed.
The preacher who cannot build a fire in his church is a failure. In no other way can he attract attention. The church of God has been used to fire from the beginning. Moses got a good warming-up before the burning bush on Horeb; so did Elijah, and others, on Carmel. The disciples were not ready to preach or the church to work until a burning Pentecost came, and fire-flakes fell from heaven upon them. We need great revivals, and can have them, if we are willing to pay the price.
One serious hindrance to the work is the fact that too many profess to have found a “new way.” They council moderation, and would have us go about the business with that cold, mathematical precision which the astronomer employs in measuring the heavens. As the result, many of our revival efforts turn out to be very moderate affairs. They are self-constituted appointees to shut off steam and put down the breaks, and they succeed. What we need is more steam; that is, purpose, push, and power. And I rejoice in the thought that the thing for which we have waited and prayed is at hand. The semi-skepticism and indifference which have so handicapped the work of evangelism in the last twenty-five years, are giving place to larger activities and simpler methods. We are facing the morning light. The reaction and readjustment will bring in a new era of moral and spiritual triumphs in soul-winning.