Following a few weeks in Dundee, Dwight and Sankey and their families arrived in Glasgow. The people there had made full preparations for the campaign: they had readied massed choirs, covered the meetings with prayer in large prayer meetings, and distributed tickets for people to attend nightly meetings to avoid unsafe overcrowding.
Dwight and his family stayed with Andrew Bonar, who was a well-known Bible teacher. He came into Dwight’s life at just the right time. Dwight had been giving out to the people night after night and was in danger of spiritual drought. Ecstatic over Bonar’s biblical wisdom and insight, Dwight would call to a friend to “come and join us! We are having a dig in the Rock!” He remarked later that Bonar was one of the two men in Britain who helped him most in understanding the depths of the Bible.
DWIGHT WAS IN DANGER OF SPIRITUAL DROUGHT.
The campaign opened at nine on Sunday morning, February 8, in the City Hall with three thousand Sunday school teachers. After Bonar’s opening prayer, Sankey began to sing “I Am So Glad That Jesus Loves Me,” a tune written by Phillip Bliss. Although unknown to most of the audience, the song ministered to people’s hearts. David Russell, one of the teachers present, told how Sankey enraptured him: “I had never heard such magnificent singing. The great consecrated voice, the glad face of a singer, and the almost childish simplicity of the words overcame me, and I found tears streaming down my face. I felt ashamed lest anyone should see my weakness, but before long I noticed tears on other faces.”
Also impressive to Mr. Russell was the way Dwight held his Bible in his right hand, indicative of his hold on it and its hold on him. The American accent and what at first appeared to be a lack of reverence and dignity caused Mr. Russell to think he wouldn’t like Dwight. However, after Dwight told his first story, he endeared himself to his audience.
So powerful was the meeting that morning that Dwight and Sankey were carried along on a revival tide. Week after week through the cheerless, cold winter and on into spring, the meetings continued in churches, the City Hall, and last of all, in the Kibble Palace, an enormous glass exhibition building generally called the Crystal Palace. People came by every means possible: on foot, by horse-tram, by train, in carriages, and in cabs. They came from every walk of life to attend the meetings: from shipyards, mills, tenements, and the surrounding middle-class homes.
Dwight’s amazing energy also impressed people. Dutifully, Sankey managed to keep up with him. A newspaper commented on their daily schedule: “The mind experiences a sense of fatigue in detailing their efforts. On Weekdays, the huge hourly prayer meeting is held at noon; one to two o’clock, they converse with individuals; four to five o’clock, they have a Bible lecture, attended by some twelve or fifteen hundred; seven to eight-thirty, the evangelistic meeting takes place with the inquiry meeting afterward; and nine to ten o’clock, the young men hold a meeting.”
A Scottish friend of Dwight’s observed, “He had strength and used it unsparingly, but people seemed to think it had no limit.” He reserved one day a week for relaxing, usually on Saturday.
DWIGHT RESERVED ONE DAY A WEEK FOR RELAXING, USUALLY ON SATURDAY.
Having already put in a full day, Dwight especially relished the young men’s meetings at day’s end. But the one on Tuesday, February 24, became known across Scotland as the “Hundred and One Night.” While Dwight still preached at City Hall, the Young Men’s Meeting got underway in Ewing Place Church. It was packed from floor to ceiling. Five Edinburgh students led by Henry Drummond gave brief, rousing appeals. Hood Wilson then asked, “Why not tonight?” Dwight came in about this time, and as Wilson finished, he said quietly, “All those who are sure they are Christians, stand up.
“Sit down again, please! The three pews in front here, I want them cleared. Anyone who wants to take Christ as their Savior, you all come forward now, so we can pray for you. Let us bow our heads as they come.”
People began to come forward in utter quietness. A stream of people flowed from every part of the building. Dwight lifted his eyes, prayed along, and to one of the Edinburgh students, James Stalker, “the sense of Divine power became overwhelming, and I remember quite well turning round on the platform and hiding my face in my hands, unable to look on the scene any more.” As the front seats filled, Dwight cleared the next rows, and the next.
An usher counted 101 inquirers who came forward, and Christian counselors stayed until midnight, praying and ministering to the seekers. Near the end, a young man said he had been seeking Christ a long time but was leaving without finding relief. Just then Dwight came over and “took me kindly by the hand. He looked at me—I might say he put his two eyes right through mine—and asked me if I would take Christ now. I could not speak, but my heart said ‘Yes.’”
In the hotel afterward, the five Edinburgh student leaders talked far into the night about the remarkable scene they had just witnessed. They were able to keep in touch with many of the young men who came forward that night and were pleased that most remained active Christians. Many of them continued to help in the Moody campaign until it moved on.
“For the last three months I have had to refuse money all the time!” wrote Dwight to his Chicago friend Whittle on March 7, 1874. “At Edinburgh they wanted to raise me two or three thousand pounds but I would not let them. I told them I would not take it.”
Not only did Dwight refuse personal money, but he also turned down collections for campaign funds. Letters had appeared in the papers asserting the whole campaign to be a glorious hoax organized for gain by Barnum, the American showman. As Dwight explained to Farwell, “Of course I have a good many enemies over here who say I am a speculating Yankee.” He would tell the campaign committee to raise funds privately, and very occasionally he accepted personal gifts “to myself for my own use,” beyond hospitality and expenses.
DWIGHT STAYED ADAMANT ABOUT PREACHING “FOR FILTHY LUCRE.”
But Dwight stayed adamant about preaching “for filthy lucre.” He realized the temptations involved with money, and the Scottish people, despite their renown for thrift, wanted to shower him with finances. Much of what he received he sent on to help another evangelistic team in America, Whittle and Bliss. The money would help them abandon their business and devote themselves full-time to ministry. Dwight told them, “If you have not got faith enough launch out on the strength of my faith.” He stressed, “Has not our God got as much money as the Watch Company & all He wants of us is to trust Him?” Of course, Dwight’s own faith seemed as expansive as his personality.
Wealthy individuals such as chemical manufacturer Campbell White were lavish in extending money to Dwight, and many people thought he was amassing a small fortune. He reached the wealthier classes, but always his heart was turned over the poor. Many of them would not attend the meetings, so Dwight urged wealthy men to reach out to the poor after the campaign was over.
To Dwight’s delight, the United Evangelical Committee reformed to become the Glasgow Evangelistic Association and began a long career in evangelism and philanthropy, spawning agencies such as Poor Children’s Day Refuges, Temperance Work, Fresh Air Fortnights, the Cripple Girls’ League, and the Glasgow Christian Institute. On Sunday mornings on Glasgow Green, young men brought in the homeless and derelicts for a free breakfast.
Sir George Adam Smith, who differed theologically from Dwight, offered a positive testimony following the Moody campaign: “We have forgotten how often Mr. Moody enforced the civic duties of our faith. Yet read again his addresses and articles of the time, and you will believe that in the seventies there was no preacher more practical or civic amongst us.”
Of course there were about to be detractors, and Dwight’s daily mail brought in hundreds of letters, many that were critical. They were everywhere! His host, Hood Wilson, said the library had become “a perfect sea of letters, which were not only an inch deep on the large round table in the middle of the room, but covered chairs and shelves in every corner.”
DWIGHT’S DAILY MAIL BROUGHT IN HUNDREDS OF LETTERS, MANY THAT WERE CRITICAL.
One of the strongest criticisms came in the form of a pamphlet circulated by an influential Highland preacher, John Kennedy. In the pamphlet, entitled, “Hyperevangelism: ‘Another Gospel’ Though a Mighty Power.” Kennedy charged that “the present movement ignores the sovereignty and power of God,” that the emphasis on faith hindered the work of the Holy Spirit and denied “the utter spiritual impotence of souls ‘dead in trespasses and sins.’”
Kennedy blasted the inquiry room, the singing of “human” hymns, the use of organ music (“unscriptural, and therefore all who have subscribed the Confession of Faith are under solemn vow against it”), and alleged that prayer meetings had been turned into “factories of sensation.”
Such attacks from rigid High Calvinism could be expected. Dwight said he could not have pointed out more faults in his work himself! But he sensed criticism must be coming from other sources as well to account for the subtly poisoned atmosphere that was beginning to surround the campaign.
While Dwight pondered how to squelch the vicious attack from someone the simple Highlanders revered, he received a letter from a Chicago acquaintance. John Mackay, a lawyer and recent Scottish immigrant, had circulated a scathing letter denigrating Dwight. He told how “Mr. Moody came to Chicago a poor lad…called at the office of a pious and wealthy city merchant and begged him for a place in his office. Mr. Moody worked himself into the confidence of the house.” The letter went on to say that Dwight got hold of some “secrets” of his employer and passed them on to an opponent in court, causing him to win a pending lawsuit.
The letter stated, “Moody stoutly denied the charge….Undeniable proof…he confessed and was discharged….Soon afterwards publicly declared his determination to devote himself wholly to the Lord’s work….”
Possessed of much common sense, Dwight met this attack head-on. He wrote Farwell on May 7, relating the letter’s charges against him. He then asked Farwell to have Mr. Henderson, a nephew of Dwight’s earlier employer, write a letter “expressing confidence in me.” Dwight asked Henderson’s forgiveness for any unseemly attitude while employed for his uncle, giving his youth as an excuse. Dwight added, “No one knows me here and if my friends in Chicago do not stand by me, who will? For everyone in this country who is opposed to my preaching and revivals are doing all they can to break me down. Please write me at once.”
Soon afterward, Farwell secured the signatures of thirty-five Chicago ministers to an endorsement of Moody’s Christian character, and he cabled the document to Edinburgh. Henderson wrote, “For fifteen years since Mr. Moody left us I have watched him, assisted him, and believed in him.”
FARWELL SECURED THE SIGNATURES OF THIRTY-FIVE CHICAGO MINISTERS TO AN ENDORSEMENT OF MOODY’S CHRISTIAN CHARACTER.
Farwell demanded a retraction, but the Scottish immigrant refused to do so. Then Farwell threatened him with the law, but Dwight would not pursue litigation.
In the final days of the Glasgow campaign, even the invective of Kennedy could not destroy what God had accomplished. On the last Sunday in May, the Great Western Road leading to the campaign site had been black for over three hours with an endless stream of humanity.
That day Dwight preached in the Botanical Gardens from the box of a carriage to a crowd estimated at twenty or thirty thousand.
Afterward, he readied himself to return to English soil.