Dear Sir,-It is now four months and better since the Lord was pleased to visit this locality, and still He remains amongst us, favouring us with manifestations of his reviving and converting grace. The daily prayer meeting, which commenced with the week of special prayer, has been kept up ever since, and as yet shows no signs of diminution. The evangelistic and inquirers' meetings, held nightly in the East United Presbyterian Church, continue to be largely attended, as also the children's meeting, which has for several weeks past been held in Knox's Free Church. The work has been till recently confined to the town, but within the last few days it has been extending to the surrounding villages, and we are in great hopes that the circle may widen until the entire country has been brought within its sweep.
Unostentatious in its commencement, the work has continued almost imperceptibly to deepen and extend, silently permeating all classes of the community and infusing fresh life into all the churches in the town. Not only have some of the most notorious sinners been to all appearance reclaimed and a considerable number of careless and irreligious souls been converted, at least so far as man can judge, but many professors have been quickened, awakened, and inspired with new life. To not a few families in this locality, this year has already been a year of grace - an epoch in their history to be held in everlasting remembrance.
A somewhat noticeable feature of the present movement is to be observed in the fact that the larger proportion of those who have been affected by it have been young men, the very parties who, from various causes, are generally considered the most difficult to reach.
"The Revival," 17th May 1866, page 277.
The special services, which commenced in this place during the "Week of Prayer" in January last, having been brought to a close, the present moment may be regarded is not inopportune to take a retrospective glance at the gracious movement with which the locality has been visited. That we have been visited with a gracious movement of a very remarkable kind is a fact which it is impossible to deny, and for which the children of God in this town and neighbourhood are not slow to acknowledge their profoundest gratitude.
SPECIAL PRAYER WITHOUT SPECIAL EFFORT.
As has been already stated, the movement commenced in January last during the week of special prayer. Long previous to the commencement of the present year and more particularly since the year 1859, when the wave of the great American revival reached our shores, the people of God in this neighbourhood had been praying both in public and in private for a revival of the Lord's work, but it was not until the beginning of this year that special effort, as well as special prayer, was made with a view to the immediate attainment of the object sought.-
SPECIAL EFFORT WITH SPECIAL PRAYER.
The special effort consisted in holding a series of evangelistic services, and in keeping them up night after night and week after week without intermission. These services were commenced by Messrs Holt and Geddes, two brethren from England, who came here, at the instance of the Master of Polwarth, to co-operate with Mr Murphy the missionary employed by him to labour in the destitute localities of the town. They were subsequently carried on by Messrs Gilmour, Stuart, and Northrop, and many other dear brethren from a distance, who, having heard of how the Lord was blessing us, came at once to share the revival influence, and to lend themselves as instruments to promote the blessed work.
Several of the local clergy, belonging to different denominations, also came forward and took part in the proceedings, and by and by the converts themselves did good service in assisting to carry on the movement. The meetings were held at first in the Odd Fellows' Hall, but, the accommodation becoming too limited for the increasing numbers who frequented them, they were transferred to the East United Presbyterian Church. Here they continued to be held night after night without intermission till the middle of June, when they were reduced to three in the week. The tide of awakening and converting grace had, by this time, begun to retire, and it deemed expedient to curtail the number of evangelistic meetings, and to devote more attention to the work of teaching and training and edifying those who had professed to give themselves to the Lord. Although we have thus suspended the meetings for a time, it is our intention to resume them again in the course of a few weeks. There are still multitudes who need to be converted, but, instead of settling down to enjoy the fruits of the victories we have already won, we feel encouraged and incited by what God has done for us to resume the campaign against "the enemies of the Lord and his Anointed," and to go forward expecting to achieve still greater victories than any that have yet been won.
Meanwhile, the daily prayer meeting is continued, and the Lord's remembrancers wait at the footstool of his throne and plead his promises, resolved to "give Him no rest till He establish and till He make Jerusalem a praise in the earth."
RESULTS.
With regard to the results of the movement, it is impossible to speak with anything like certainty or exactitude. We know that the gospel has been preached to many who had never been in the habit of attending any place of worship, and who but for the movement would, in all probability, have remained in ignorance of the way of Salvation.
We know that throughout the town and neighbourhood, the number of souls brought under conviction must have amounted to several hundreds and that a considerable proportion of these have professed to embrace the Saviour; of the latter, some, it is to be feared, have fallen back, but the great majority have given evidence that their conversion was real. We know, moreover, that many of the Lord's own people have been greatly quickened and revived. Not a few who were formerly in a doubtful, undecided, and cheerless state of mind, are now rejoicing in the full assurance of their personal interest in Jesus, and are boldly testifying to their friends and neighbours what the Lord has done for their soul. A goodly company of young men, the fruits of the movement, have formed themselves into a sort of evangelistic association, which has for its object partly their own mutual improvement, and partly the evangelisation of the town and surrounding villages. The knowledge of the Scriptures, which some of these converts display, considering the short time they have been students of the Word, is quite remarkable, and nothing could be more refreshing than to hear them pouring our their hearts before the Lord in thanksgivings, supplications, and prayers.
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE MOVEMENT.
Having already occupied so much of your space, I have left myself no room for remarks on the leading characteristics of the gracious movement which I have thus so cursorily described. I would simply observe that it was divine in its origin, and equally so in its direction and government; that it was quiet and orderly in its progress, thoroughly catholic or undenominational alike in its aim and in the instrumentality employed in furthering it; and that while the agency whereby it was carried on was chiefly lay or unclerical, it gave birth to no disorders or heresies. It was truly delightful to behold how, when God is pouring out his spirit and reviving his work, all man-made barriers and middle walls of partition are for the time being, if not demolished, at least lost sight of, and how in the experience of believers the prayer of Jesus seems literally fulfilled, "That they all may be one, as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me."
Asking your readers to thank God for the great things He hath done for us, and to pray to Him that He may do for us still greater things during the approaching winter, I remain, etc.,
J. HENSHELWOOD.
"The Revival," 6th September, 1866, page 131.
The chgurch was close to the place marked.