“The world has yet to see what God will do with a man fully consecrated to Him,” the English butcher and lay preacher Henry Varley observed to D. L. Moody as they left an all-night prayer meeting. His words stuck with Moody. Having traveled to Britain that summer of 1872, Moody was seeking rest and renewal. Varley’s words gave him a new goal.
“THE WORLD HAS YET TO SEE WHAT GOD WILL DO WITH A MAN FULLY CONSECRATED TO HIM.”
“A man!” Moody wrote. “Varley meant any man. Varley didn’t say he had to be educated or brilliant, or anything else. Just a man. Well, by the Holy Spirit in me, I’ll be that man.”
Soon after Moody made that vow, a Congregational minister in London invited him to preach at Arundel Square in a lower-middle-class district. Visiting during the Sunday morning sermon, Moody was irritated at the congregation’s indifference. The people seemed to be lifeless and disinterested in anything the minister had to say. Moody was tempted not to preach that night and wondered what message he could possibly bring that would have meaning for such downcast people. What could he say that would have an impact on their lives?
But that evening as Moody brought the message, the entire atmosphere seemed charged with electricity, and the congregation listened attentively and in quietness. In closing, he urged any who wanted “to have your lives changed by the power of God through faith in Jesus Christ as a personal Savior,” who wanted “to become Christians,” to stand, so he could pray for them. People stood all over the chapel.
Astonished, Moody thought they had not understood and asked them to sit down. He stated again what becoming a Christian meant and then invited those who wished to do so to depart to an adjoining hall. He watched in amazement as scores of men, women, and older children made their way quietly to the connecting door. A schoolroom had been prepared for use as an inquiry room by setting out one or two dozen chairs. More chairs had to be added to seat the overflow crowd of people.
Addressing the crowd, Moody enlarged on repentance and faith, and again asked the people about becoming Christians. Once more, the whole room stood. In shock, Moody told them to meet with their minister the following night.
That Monday morning he left London for another part of England, but on Tuesday he received a telegram urging him to come back to the London church. More people had come to the minister’s meeting on Monday night than had been in the room on Sunday!
Returning to London, Moody spoke at the Arundel Square Church each night for two weeks. Some fifty-three years later, Baptist minister James Sprunt recalled that the results were staggering: “Four hundred were taken into membership of that church, and by the grace of God I was one of that number.”
Who was this rough, blustery, uneducated American? What brought him to London at such a time? What credentials did he possess that qualified him to preach to the dignified, reserved English? What message could he bring that they had not already heard?
Dwight Lyman Ryther Moody, born February 5, 1837, grew up in the gentle hill country of Northfield, Massachusetts. From birth, Dwight possessed a rugged constitution and determination to match. His happy-go-lucky father, Edwin, celebrated his son’s birth with friends at the local pub.
A stonemason by trade, Edwin enjoyed drinking as well as the social life at the pub.
HE INVITED EVERYONE TO CELEBRATE DWIGHT’S BIRTH WITH HIM: “C’MON, EVERYONE. HAVE A GLASS OF ALE ON ME!”
He invited everyone to celebrate Dwight’s birth with him: “C’mon, everyone. Have a glass of ale on me!” he bellowed. Of course, the pub patrons were only too happy to oblige. The people of Northfield liked Edwin: he was pleasant, hardworking, and easy to get along with. Because he disliked offending people, however, he often shrank from collecting debts owed to him. This trait made paying his own bills more difficult. One more mouth to feed scarcely bothered Edwin. He enjoyed life and his family too much to give it a second thought.
The Ryther part of Dwight’s name was dropped when the village doctor, Gideon Ryther, for whom he was named, failed to give the Moodys the expected sheep—the acceptable offering for being someone’s namesake. The little boy became known simply as Dwight Lyman Moody.
The small town of Northfield, Massachusetts, was located on both sides of the Connecticut River near the New Hampshire and Vermont borders and had a population of nearly seventeen hundred. During its early years, Northfield was known as Squakeag, an Indian name meaning “salmon.” The settlement’s strategic location provided a primitive outpost to ward off French and Indian attacks.
The Moodys and Holtons, Dwight’s ancestors, appear in Northfield’s records nearly from the beginning. The Holtons settled in Northfield by 1672. Isaiah Moody, Dwight’s grandfather, moved to Northfield in 1796 in order to practice his brick masonry trade; and Edwin, his first son, was born in 1800.
The two families were united when Dwight’s parents were married on January 3, 1828; Betsey Holton was twenty-three, Edwin Moody, twenty-eight. The wedding had been scheduled for New Year’s Day, but the Connecticut River unexpectedly thawed and overflowed its banks, so Edwin could not get to the wedding that day. But Edwin, despite this turn of events, detoured many miles, and two days later, married Betsey.
The young couple moved into an unpainted colonial house built by Edwin’s cousin, Simeon Moody. Built at the north edge of town, the house lay at the base of a small, bald knoll in a treeless pasture and looked out over the Connecticut River.
The Moodys shared with their Northfield neighbors a quiet trust in God. After all, Northfield Unitarian Church, even though cold and austere, was considered the center of the community, and membership was assumed for all proper citizens.
But Dwight’s mother, Betsey, tall and stately, was really the strong spiritual force in the family’s life. As her family began to grow, she taught her children a little Bible lesson every day, and on Sundays she accompanied them to the Unitarian Sunday school. Betsey made all her boys swear vengeance on whiskey and everything that was an enemy to the family.
Like many other newlyweds of the time, the Moodys started married life fairly well off. Their relative prosperity continued during the early 1830s, but by 1836, the country found itself in a financial depression. Banks failed and a fourth of all businesses went bankrupt.
Northfield’s local economy suffered, and Betsey and Edwin were forced to mortgage their home. They were unable to pay even the small annual $11.70 rent on pew thirteen in the Northfield Church. However, they did not despair. Betsey, an expert weaver, reassured Edwin, “We will manage somehow. The children can help out at some neighboring farms, and perhaps I can weave more items to sell.”
“That’s good,” Edwin responded, “and my work looks promising. The Smiths told me they need a foundation for a new house they want to build. And there’s some other projects coming along. Thank God we have such good health—and our children, too.”
That winter, finances still tight, Dwight was born. With four brothers and one sister, he had plenty of playmates. But he also learned from an early age to work hard on his parents’ small farm. Sturdy and head-strong, dark-haired, brown-eyed Dwight always managed to be the person who took control of most situations. In fact, from the time he was little, Dwight had a bad temper when he didn’t get his own way, and sometimes he got in trouble because of it. He even used a good bit of profanity in his early years, although his mother tried to cure him of it.
DWIGHT HAD A BAD TEMPER AND EVEN USED A GOOD BIT OF PROFANITY IN HIS EARLY YEARS.
The Moodys’ financial situation continued to be precarious during the first four years of Dwight’s life, and it seemed things couldn’t get much worse. But when Dwight was just four years old, tragedy struck the family. Edwin had gone to work as usual and was laying brick when he was suddenly seized with an intense pain in his side. Staggering home, he groaned, “Oh, oh, my side hurts so much! Oh, Betsey, get the doctor, quick!” By one o’clock, Edwin’s pain was much worse.
He stumbled toward his bed, fell on his knees, and died. Betsey, unaware of the seriousness of his illness, discovered his body, and as the realization of her terrible situation broke in upon her, she also became ill.
Everything changed for the Moody family following Edwin’s death, and little Dwight sobbed as he thought, “What a pretty, sunshiny day for my father to fall suddenly dead!”