"Billy" Sunday, the Man and His Message / With his own words which have won thousands for Christ

by William T. Ellis

The oldest problem of the Christian Church, and the latest problem of democracy, is how to reach the great mass of the people. Frequently the charge is made that the Church merely skims the surface of society, and that the great uncaring masses of the people lie untouched beneath it. Commonly, a revival reaches only a short distance outside the circumference of church circles. The wonder and greatness of the Billy Sunday campaigns consist in the fact that they reach to the uttermost rim of a community, to its greatest height and its lowest depth. There can be no question that he stirs a city as not even the fiercest political campaign stirs it. Sunday touches life on all levels, bringing his message to bear upon the society woman in her parlor and the humblest day laborer in the trench.

This does not come to pass by any mere chance. Organized activity achieves it. The method which produces the greatest results is what is called the Delegation Idea, whereby detachments of persons from various trades, callings and organizations and communities attend in a body upon the services of the Sunday Tabernacle.

By pre-arrangement, seats are reserved every night for these visiting delegations. Sometimes there will be as many as a dozen delegations present in one evening. As the campaign progresses towards its conclusion real difficulty is experienced in finding open dates for all the delegations that apply. At the outset, Mr. Sunday's assistants have to "work up" these delegations. Later, the delegations themselves besiege the workers.

In variety the delegations range from a regiment of Boy Scouts to a post of old soldiers; from the miners of a specified colliery to the bankers of the city; from the telephone girls to the members of a woman's club; from an athletic club to a Bible class.

Not only the community in which the meetings are being held furnish these delegations, but the surrounding territory is drawn upon. It is by no means an unknown thing for a single delegation, numbering a thousand or fifteen hundred men, to come a distance of fifteen or twenty-five miles to attend a Sunday Tabernacle service. Almost every evening there are lines of special cars waiting for these deputations who have come from afar, with their banners and their badges and their bands, all bent upon hearing and being heard at the Tabernacle.

The crowd spirit is appealed to by this method. The every-day instinct of loyalty to one's craft or crowd is aroused. Each delegation feels its own identity and solidarity, and wants to make as good a showing as possible. There is considerable wholesome emulation among the delegations representing the same craft or community. Of course, the work of making ready the delegation furnishes a topic for what is literally "shop talk" among working men; and naturally each group zealously watches the effect of its appearance upon the great congregation. Delegations get a very good idea of what their neighbors think of them by the amount of applause with which they are greeted. Thus when the whole force of a daily newspaper appears in the Tabernacle its readers cheer vociferously. Every delegation goes equipped with its own battle cry, and prepared to make as favorable a showing as possible.

All this is wholesome for the community life. It fosters loyalty in the varied groups that go to make up our society. Any shop is the better for its workers, led by their heads of departments and by their employers, having gone in a solid phalanx to a Tabernacle meeting. Every incident of that experience becomes an unfailing source of conversation for long days and weeks to follow.

The Tabernacle at Scranton, Pennsylvania, Typical of the Auditoriums That Are Erected Wherever Campaigns are Conducted. To Deaden Sound the Floor is Covered with Sawdust, whence the Name "Sawdust Trail." To Prevent the Possibility of a Panic, No Board is Fastened with More than Two Nails, and There is a Door at the End of Every Aisle.

Naturally, too, each delegation, delighted with the showing it has made at the Tabernacle, and with the part it has borne in the meeting, becomes one more group of partisans for the Billy Sunday campaign. Men who would not go alone to the Tabernacle, cannot in loyalty well refuse to stand by their own crowd. So it comes to pass that the delegation idea penetrates every level and every section of the community. A shrewder scheme for reaching the last man could scarcely be devised. Thousands who are impervious to religious appeals quickly respond to the request that they stand by their shop-mates and associates.