There is still power in the gospel and its message in Wales in 2024. As recently as a couple of months ago I was one of many blessed attendees at the baptism of two teenage girls. There are many Christians around Wales today who are receiving much needed edification, comfort, conviction and more from sitting under the regular preaching of the gospel. There are still new converts being saved by the gospel’s preaching too. As Paul once wrote to the flailing church in Corinth:
“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” 1 Corinthians 1:18
This is one of the reasons why I become so exasperated by churches who downgrade a preaching service to something else because “preaching doesn’t seem to attract non-Christians”. We are told that yes, of course, non-Christians are going to find the preaching of Christ to be both foolishness and a stumbling block, but as Christians, we know it to be the power of God – in saving us, as all Christians once experienced, and in the building up of our faith. William Cowper was able to write during a time of great revival:
“Dear dying Lamb, Thy precious blood shall never lose its power”
Thank God that this is still true for us today!
The country of Wales has had a great history of Christianity and revivals. Some of the most famous include the 18th century Great Awakening revivals, with preachers such as Daniel Rowlands, Howell Harris, William Williams, and even the English George Whitefield being greatly used, the revival of 1859 of Humphrey Jones and David Morgan, and the widespread revivals of 1904-5.
Although, thankfully, there are a good number of churches around Wales that are bucking the current general trend of Christianity today, there are also many churches that are dwindling in number at a startling rate, many churches are closing or are recently closed, and many churches of all types and denominations are feeling a great sense of powerlessness in the taking of the gospel to the lost.
One of the most wonderful stories I have come across from reading of the Welsh revivals of the past – this account coming from the 1904-5 revival – concerns a man named Levi Jarvis:
Levi Jarvis was a man who loved to drink, who loved to fight, and who was feared throughout the whole community. This fearsome man, however, became very scared of the revival that was now spreading throughout his locality… so much so that his wife thought he was going mad! He would even leave his house for work an hour earlier than usual, so as to avoid the conversations concerning the revival from his fellow workers as they walked together to the coal mining pit.
Well, one day, when Levi Jarvis returned home from work, his wife said to him, “Levi, you’ll never believe it! R.B. Jones (the preacher of that revival) has called round, asking to speak to you!” Levi Jarvis responded by taking a big drink of water, picking up the loaf of bread from the table and running off into the mountain to hide himself away!
A mere hour or two later, Levi Jarvis was found stepping into the entrance of the packed-out church, and as the preacher stopped speaking to look at Levi Jarvis, and all the congregation turning to look upon him also, Levi Jarvis asked in a trembling voice, “Can the Lord Jesus save such a sinner as me?”
40 years or so later, this same Levi Jarvis was known to gather the young people of the church to himself, and say, “Come, and let’s talk about that time when the Lord saved me!”[1]
Whilst this story continues to thrill me to the core, I also can’t help but ask the questions, “Where has this power gone – where even the worst of men are unable to flee from the gospel’s saving power?” and, “Will I ever know or see this power myself?”
1904-05 was the time of the last revival of great significance within the country of Wales. Since the time of the Reformation, Wales has never had to wait 119 years for its next revival… until now.
Where has this gospel power gone?
Back at the beginning of the 1859 revival, on New Year’s Day, at Devil’s Bridge, an old minister wrote of a certain service:
“The evening service was terrible. So near was the revivalist [David Morgan] to his God, that his face shone like that of an angel, so that none could gaze steadfastly at him. Many of the hearers swooned. On the way home I dared not break the silence for miles. Towards midnight I ventured to say, ‘Didn’t we have blessed meetings, Mr Morgan?’
‘Yes,’ he replied; and after a pause, added, ‘The Lord would give us great things, if He could only trust us’. ‘What do you mean?’ I asked. ‘If He could trust us not to steal the glory for ourselves.’
Then the midnight air rang with his cry, at the top of his voice, ‘Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy name give glory.’”[2]
What was it that David Morgan meant when he said, “If [God] could trust us not to steal the glory for ourselves”? Without having the opportunity of actually asking him, I suspect he is referring to the pride within us; the pride that leads to such things as the selfish desire to lead and be at the heart of everything important, of giving the glory and credit to man rather than God, or the selfish, self-exalting inward revelling in the success of God’s work through you.
David Morgan’s answer to a specific question asked in a specific situation, actually goes further than even he had initially intended, as it also hints at the answer as to why such great workings of God may be withdrawn from us: which is that anything we do that takes away from the glory of God may be the reason for God’s not trusting us with such powerful working. This goes beyond only those things relating to human-centred pride, to also include all aspects of gospel ministry, corporate church life and the personal individual lives of Christians…
This could take the form of a gospel ministry that seeks to exalt Christ but also desires a little bit of personal honour for themselves too; it could be the increasing worldly-conformity that many churches may (sometimes even subconsciously) be undergoing; it could be the unwillingness of giving over our whole hearts to the Lordship of Christ, choosing rather to continue embracing some of what is sinful and opposed to Christ, as well as to seeking to follow Christ.
There are, of course, many other possible ways for God’s people to take away from the glory of God and His Christ. The Colossian church was perhaps well-meaning in intention, yet still needed to be reminded that it is God’s will, and has always been His plan, for His own beloved Son Jesus Christ to have the pre-eminence in all things (Col. 1:18). In fact, Paul had made a point of showing how this was also the purpose of God’s initial creation of humankind, which had subsequently failed, thus finding itself having been separated from its God completely. Can the church, therefore, (whom God has so graciously called out of that sinful world for the express purpose of succeeding where the world had initially failed) really also fail to esteem and exalt its precious Lord so miserably – and yet expect great blessing?
It is necessary for the point to be made, making clear that revival – like individual salvation – is something that can never be earned. It is an act of the grace of God from beginning to end. But… we can forfeit God’s blessing, as David reminds us in Psalm 66:18, using the example there of heard prayer.
Peter makes perfectly clear that we have been given all things that we need that “pertain to life and godliness” (2 Pet. 1:3); Paul agrees, telling us that “God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that, always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed”, further adding in writing to Timothy, “For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power, and love, and discipline” (2 Tim. 1:7).
God has given us all the things we need to give Jesus Christ the pre-eminence in all aspects of our lives – both as churches and individuals – “for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13). God’s “pleasure” first and foremost is the honouring and exaltation of His own beloved Son, Jesus Christ. With God, through the Holy Spirit, bringing these things to us and with His working within us, we must commit to honouring and exalting our Lord Jesus with everything we have and in everything we do. It is our duty, our privilege, and our joy.
“That in all things Jesus may have the pre-eminence”…
This is the gospel we preach. This is the prayer that we pray. This is the life that we live. May God enable us to do this to our fullest. May God cause within us a zeal that burns for Christ and His glory, and maybe then, by the grace of God, “[He] will cause showers to come down in their season; there shall be showers of blessing” (Ezek. 34:26) in our country once again.
[1] Brynmor P. Jones, Voices From The Welsh Revival 1904-1905, (Bridgend: Evangelical Press of Wales, 1995) p.240.
[2] Eifion Evans, Revival Comes To Wales: The story of the 1859 revival in Wales, (Bridgend: Evangelical Press of Wales, 1982) p.69.
