Three Hundred Years Ago This Month (January 2014)

         Howell Harris, one of the greatest Welshmen ever to have lived, one of the great preachers of the eighteenth century revival in the Principality, and a man who had a formative influence on the fellowship here at New Inn, was born on January 24^th 1714.  Along with men such as Daniel Rowland and William Williams in Wales, and the Wesley brothers and George Whitfield in England, Harris was mightily used by God to call the nation back to himself.

         Harris was born in Talgarth, Breconshire, the son of a farmer.  Though he had little education he grew up to become a schoolmaster.  The great change in his life began to take place on Palm Sunday, March 30th, 1735, when Harris attended the Parish Church at Talgarth. During the service the Vicar, Pryce Davies, announced that there would be a Communion Service the following Sunday, and said that he knew there were many people who did not come to the Communion because they felt they were not fit to partake of it. He went on to say, 'If you are not fit to take Communion you are not fit to pray, if you are not fit to pray you are not fit to live, and if you are not fit to live you are not fit to die'. These words hit this thoughtless schoolmaster with great force. He had never been a riotous person but he had lived a loose life; so these extraordinary words of the Vicar announcing a Communion Service began a process of conviction of sin which from then on led to an agony of repentance. 

He continued in an agony of repentance - trying to find peace and unable to find it - until Whit Sunday, which was May 25th, when he went again to a Communion Service in the same church. He describes how during a part of the service he had a tremendous fight with the devil. He had found a certain amount of peace in a neighbouring church, where he had given himself to God as best he could in his ignorance. That gave him a measure of peace, but the devil came and attacked him in this Communion on Whit Sunday, violently trying to shake his faith in everything. However, before the service was over he had found peace. Here are his own words describing this: 'At the table, Christ bleeding on the Cross was kept before my eyes constantly; and strength was given to me to believe that I was receiving pardon on account of that blood. I lost my burden; I went home leaping for joy, and I said to my neighbour who was sad, Why are you sad? I know my sins have been forgiven. Oh blessed day! Would that I might remember it gratefully evermore'!   

He immediately began to tell others about this and to hold meetings in his own home encouraging others to seek the same assurance that he had of Christ's forgiveness.  Harris was refused ordination in the Anglican Church on four occasions, because of his “Methodist” tendencies, but remained a lay preacher throughout his life, both in North and South Wales, tireless in his determination to bring the good news to the lost of the Principality.  His home in Trevecca became a centre for mission work and the training of preachers.  This was in part due to his association with the Countess of Huntingdon, who helped finance students to train and go out with the gospel.  He might not have been an accomplished theologian, but he was a zealous evangelist, whose preaching was powerfully accompanied by the Holy Spirit.  Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones says of him, “I have scarcely ever read of any man who has worked as hard as Howell Harris did. He would preach many times during the day, and after that would hold private societies with the converts, and after that would write his diaries. Very often he had no sleep at all, and would go back to his school the next day; or he would have a couple of hours' sleep and then travel and preach somewhere else. On and on he went, working in an almost superhuman manner. His voice became permanently husky quite early on in his preaching career, but he still continued.”  Harris has been described by one historian as ‘the most successful preacher that ever ascended a platform or pulpit in Wales.’  He died on July 21^st 1773, and over twenty thousand people were reported to have attended his funeral, when nine sermons were preached!

         His preaching often led him into personal danger, and he endured considerable persecution.   People formed into mobs that reviled and opposed him, while magistrates threatened him and imposed fines upon those who met for worship in their homes. Even the clergy were opposed to Harris and preached against him, branding him a false prophet and deceiver. 
Mobs often attacked Harris in all kinds of ways. He was shot at with pistols and pelted with apples and pears, dung and dirt, eggs and stones, and even a dead dog. In 1740, while ministering with William Seward in Caerleon, the two preachers were attacked so severely that that Seward eventually went blind in both eyes. 

         Although the exact details of the link between Howell Harris and the congregation here at New Inn are lost in the mists of time, there is good evidence that he preached here on numerous occasions.  Harry Lewis’s fine history of our fellowship records that Daniel James, minister at New Inn during the late eighteenth century, stated that ‘The Gospel was first introduced into this place by a Society of Methodists, many of whom had been awakened under the preaching of the eminent Mr Howell Harris who, finding the Established Church in those parts filled with carnal ministry, formed themselves into an independent church’.  We know that New Inn was a convenient meeting place for the Methodist Society Association meetings between 1744 and 1750, when Harris and Daniel Rowland often preached.

         The tercentenary of the birth of Howell Harris reminds us that God can suddenly break into the life of Wales, like He did again in 1859 and 1904, raising up ordinary men and using them to turn the nation to Himself. Our need of spiritual revival today is, if anything, greater than it was three hundred years ago.  But our God is the same God.  We need to pray urgently that He will visit us again. 

A True Messiah

The death early last month of Nelson Mandela, the first democratically elected President of South Africa, and one of the icons of the twentieth century, was perhaps the most widely reported event of the whole of 2013.  Even in the UK, thousands of miles away, hour after hour of television and radio time were given over to coverage of his death, state memorial service and burial.  Many people here, though they might have had no connection with South Africa, and had never seen Mandela, let alone known him, seemed to share in what seemed like a worldwide sense of loss.  It was interesting to compare the reaction to his death with that of Margaret Thatcher earlier in the year.

         Watching the coverage as a Christian believer greatly interested me, particularly in the way that he was pictured almost as some sort of Messianic figure who had led the country out of the dark ages of apartheid into the light of a fully-fledged democracy.  Though one would have to recognise that the impact of Mandela’s life was truly remarkable, it would have been good for somebody to point out some of the other facts: that Mandela never renounced violence, or as far as we know, repented of the deaths of many, Christian missionaries included, for which as head of the ANC he was responsible.  The gap between the rich and poor in South Africa is greater now than ever.  We remember present day missionaries visiting us who spoke of the dangers of life there.  Perhaps it will be many years before his impact can be truly measured.

         What was, perhaps, even more interesting was the way in which he was set up as a great example of forgiveness.  Much was made of the way in which he had shown great kindness towards those who had been his captors on Robben Island, insisting they have the best seats at his inauguration as President, never forgetting their children’s birthdays etc.  We saw again, as we have when victims of IRA terrorism have been interviewed, how human beings are fascinated by forgiveness and envious of those who find it within themselves to act in such a way.

         Which brings us surely to Jesus!  He is the true Messiah, and the greatest example of forgiveness.  His ‘long walk’ was to a cross, rather than to freedom. Even as he hung there, numbered with terrorists but innocent of every charge laid against him, he prayed for his executioners and their forgiveness.  The kingdom that He brought in is an everlasting one, marked by universal peace and freedom.  The life of Jesus Christ not only means that you and I can have a better life here and now, but an eternity in heaven.

         Though many were happy to state that Mandela was now in heaven, making such statements is wrong, though I hope that he is.  The way to heaven for Mandela was the same as it is for you and me.  We must trust in the Lord Jesus Christ with all our heart.  Only by his perfect sacrifice being applied to our sin laden hearts can any of us be saved.  Is that true of you?