Farewell to England
Farewell to England
Cornelius could not keep the good news any longer. “Richard Smith and I are to accompany Mr. Whitefield to the colonies,” he told anyone who would listen. “We sail, September 4, to America! We’ll go with Mr. Whitefield Wednesday night, and Sunday morning and evening to the Moorefields Tabernacle and then to the Tottenham Court Road Chapel for farewell services.”
The newspapers announced that the Reverend Whitefield would be returning to America, and gave the times and places where his last meetings in England would be held. Huge crowds gathered to hear George bid them farewell. An old baker who had heard George preach as a young preacher, could not hold back his tears as George came to the pulpit. “There is a man of God we will not see the likes of again,” the baker said to those next to him. “Thirty-two years ago I heard him preach his first sermon, and now I fear we will not see him again in England.” Crowds came to say farewell, and weeping many said the same thing: Mr. Whitefield, now aged by illness, surely would not return again to them.
On board The Friendship bound for America, George wrote a letter to John Wesley.
Pray for this willing pilgrim, going across the Atlantic for the thirteenth time. I am persuaded that this voyage will be for Jesus’ glory, and the welfare of precious souls.
George did not know that already John had answered his earlier letter and was sending two itinerant preachers on their way to the colonies.
Rough Atlantic weather soon made Cornelius and young Richard seasick. George, who had crossed the Atlantic many times, was not. When the ship arrived in Charleston, South Carolina, George felt rested, and more like his old self. “I must preach while I can,” he said as crowds gathered to welcome him to Charleston. George preached so often that it was ten days before they were able to begin the journey to Bethesda.
The first sight of Bethesda with its two new wings brought tears to George’s face. The first stage of his planning stood on what was now a 5,000 acre plot of land given to him in trust for the new school and the orphanage. “We must invite the governor, the council, and the Trustees to see this,” he said to Cornelius and Richard.
A dinner for the invited guests was spread on long tables in the wing that was to be the library of the new school. Hams and breads and fruits and a bounty of all sorts of good things covered the tables. For once George did not miss his simple pig knuckles. The guests were truly impressed, and as willing as George to see a fine school in Georgia. Thanks to the great sum still left from his legacy, George had money to see to the work. The Georgia newspaper wrote of the plans for “The New Academy” at Bethesda. George was confident that soon he would see the school open. The orphanage would remain, and shortly after his guests had left, James came to say, “ We have just received six new orphans, all of them quite young and ready for good food and clean clothes.” George smiled.
“We must be off on our next venture,” George said to Cornelius and Richard as they walked in the cool air of the evening. “I love it here,” George continued, “it feels like home to me, but I am longing to be off to the North, to the frontiers, to preach the gospel. The college will be fully built by the time we return.”
George stood for a minute looking at the building work and nodded. “Cornelius, you have your work ready for you here.” George put his hand on Cornelius’s shoulder. “You are as fine a young man as I know, and I could not leave a better man for the work. Richard and I will miss you on our travels, and pray for you as often as we think of this place.”
“Until you come back we will pray for you every day,” Cornelius promised.
Richard, who handled the dozens of invitations that came daily asking George to preach throughout the colonies, said “Sir, where do you wish to begin?”
“We must visit first those places in Savannah, and then to Philadelphia. I feel such a fire of joy inside that it blazes up, and I am ready to preach the love of our Lord Jesus wherever he leads,” George said.
George finished preaching in Savannah, and on an early morning in April he and Richard boarded a boat to Philadelphia. Here he was so known and loved by the people that the numbers who thronged to hear him were enormous. His welcome was so large that George had to preach twice on Sundays and three to four times a week. He had grown portly, and illness had aged him, but he preached with the same powerful voice as before. Many Philadelphians thought this might be the last time they would hear him in their city. Richard saw the tears he had seen back in England as people listened to the voice they might not hear again in this life. Churches and chapels were no longer closed to George. “Though I have loved my outdoor pulpits,” George said, “I am most at home within the church.”
His days and nights were full and George should have been worn out. Instead he felt strong again and eager to go on with his preaching. “We will need horses,” he said to Richard, “for I am ready to ride and take the gospel to those who need to hear. We will head for New York in the morning.” They left on horseback an hour after dawn.
It was July and by the time they reached New York, George had preached to many along the way. He wrote to an old friend:
We have ridden above a five-hundred mile circuit. Thanks to the strength the Lord gave me, I have been enabled to preach and travel through the heat of every day. The congregations have been very large and much moved. In two or three days I hope to set out for Boston. But, dear friend, I must tell you about an event that happened recently.
“A condemned horse thief wrote to me, and I wrote back. On the day of his execution I was to preach at that same place. Thousands attended and the sheriff allowed the man to come and hear my sermon. The man came to Christ and went to his death trusting him. He asked me to speak at the gallows before he was hung, and I did, standing on his coffin as preachers do at a gallows. Afterward many wept and came to seek the Lord. The day was far gone before we could leave, but what a day of sadness and joy. Well, my brother, pray for me, as I shall do for you.”
In Connecticut George was invited to speak in the church of a descendant of the great Puritan preacher Cotton Mather. George stepped forward slowly and stood in the pulpit. “I feel as I did when I stood in the pulpit of that giant of faith, John Bunyan,” he said. “Here is another pulpit that I stand in humbly, remembering the mighty servants of God who preached here. It is a great privilege.”
Richard forgot himself as he listened to George preach that special day. George preached the message God had flooded his own heart with, in such power and joy that it filled the church and Richard’s heart to overflowing. The enormous congregation listened without a sound, to what for the rest of their lives would be called “the day of wonder.”
Afterwards George and Richard rode on to Boston where George was to speak. His sermon that night was on the greatness of God in creation and redemption. He was preaching when a sudden storm unleashed thunder and lightning overhead. George knelt by the pulpit, and began to say the words of an old hymn:
Hark the Eternal rends the Sky,
A mighty voice before him goes—
A voice of music to his friends,
But threatening thunder to his foes.
Come, children, to your Father’s arms;
Hide in the chambers of my grace
Till my revenging fury cease.
George stood and said, “Now, let us sing that hymn, a hymn you are all familiar with.” With his great voice George led them in song. The storm passed soon, and George returned to his sermon.
Throughout the journey George had felt his old energy and strength as he rode and preached. Like the blazing up of a fire that burns brightly before it begins to fall, little by little his strength now began to fail. His old sickness returned. Richard saw him growing weaker, and urged him to rest. “All is in His hands,” George said. “We’ll press on.”
When his breathing became too labored and he had to rest, they would stop for a day, sometimes two until he could go on to the next town. The crowds who knew he was coming still came in such large numbers to hear him, that George was forced to preach outdoors.
A minister in the town of Newbury Port had invited George to preach and to stay at his home. On the way George preached for two hours standing in a large field before a crowd. George was tired, but decided they should press on. It was late in the evening when they arrived at the minister’s home in Newbury Port.
“I am weary tonight, friends,” he said, “and must retire early.” His host asked if he would first say some few words to those who had come to the house to greet him. George was already on his way to bed with a candle in his hand and about to climb the stairs, but he agreed. Standing on the stairs with the candle still in his hand, he spoke to those gathered below, words of great tenderness. He spoke until his candle finally sputtered out.
Richard slept that night in the same room as George as he sometimes did, ready to help if George’s breathing became too labored. George had fallen asleep quickly, and Richard went to his own bed. Not many hours later, he heard George praying for the work, some of it here, and some back in England. The next time Richard woke it was to sounds of choking.
“I cannot breathe,” George tried to say. “Help me to the window.”
Richard had already opened the window wide. “It is your old sickness that’s come back,” Richard said. “We have seen it too many times lately. It will pass; it must.” This time it did not pass, and George struggled desperately to breathe while Richard did all he knew how to help. When the doctor came, George had breathed his last in Richard’s arms. “Surely we can wake him,” Richard begged. The doctor shook his head. “He has already left us,” he said. It was September 30th, 1770 and not yet dawn.
In England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales and in every colony of America, black draping signaled the death of the man who had said, “The world is now my parish.” The mighty voice that had awakened a generation and preached the “new birth” to all who would listen was now praising his beloved Lord, and would never cease.