10 (1734 at Oxford University where Whitefield and Wesley had become friends and Whit had become a member of the despised 'Methodists", a group of like minded students on campus( ...one day when George went to borrow more books, Charles took down a small volume, The Life of God in the Soul of Man by Henry Scougal, a scot who had written it at an age not much older than "Whitefield's 20 and had died at 28 about half a century ago.back in pembroke Geo began to read: 'My dear Friend, this description doth give me a title to all the endeavours whereby i can serve your interest; and your pious inclinations do so happily conspire with me duty, that i shall not need to step out of my road to gratify you. Geo purred. a few paragraphs further he got a shock. Scougal laments that few who want to be religious understand what ans: 'some placing it in the understanding, in orthodox notions and opinions. others place it in the outward man, in a constant course of external duties and a model of performances; if they live peaceably with their neighbours, keep a temperate diet, observe the returns of worship, frequenting the church or their closet and sometimes extend their hands to the
11 relief of the poor, they think they have sufficiently acquitted themselves.
Geo was astonished: all his ideas were overturned. 'Alas! if this be not true religion, what is? he pushed the book away. 'shall i burn this book? shall i throw it down? or shall i search it? feeling like a debtor who does not dare to look in his ledger for fear of finding himself bankrupt, he drew the book towards him gingerly and stood up. lifting up his eyes he said aloud: 'LORD IF I AM NOT A CHRISTIAN, FOR JESUS CHRIST'S SAKE SHOW ME WHAT CHRISTIANITY IS, THAT I MAY NOT BE DAMNED AT LAST'.
he sat down and read on: 'but certainly Religion is quite another thing...True Religion is a Union of the Soul with God, a real participation of the divine nature, the very image of god drawn upon the soul or in the Apostle's phrase, IT IS CHRIST FORMED WITHIN US'.
Whit blinked. he read it again - and the room seemed ablaze with light. in a second he saw, as plainly as if god had written the message in letters of fire, 'I must be born again a new creature! Christ must be formed within me! I must leave no means unused which will lead me nearer to Jesus Christ.
the more he thought the more obvious it seemed: New Birth was the point of all devotion, he seized a pen, sharpened it, cut some paper and began to write one letter after another, to his brothers and sisters, to his mother and to Gabriel Harris the bookseller. all gloucester must be urged towards attaining this new birth, this union with Jesus Christ. he could hardly write fast enough. ' all our corrupt passions, he wrote, must be subdued and a complex habit of virtues such as meekness, lowliness, faith, hope and love of god and man be implanted in their room before we can have the least title to enter into the Kingdom of god...we must renounce ourselves and take up our cross daily...unless we have the spirit of Christ we are none of His.
he folded all the letters in one cover to save each recipient from paying heavy postage and after returning from the post
12 office set out in good earnest to attain the new birth. first he tried to be more humble. and the more he told himself he was a worm, the more a little voice whispered that on the contrary he was exceedingly holy and must attain the new birth soon.
he resolved to give up tasty dishes. at table in hall he would purse his lips when the fruit came round and wish that college rules permitted him to leave before grace; the very smell of his favourite fruit was torture. next week he stopped powdering his hair. when his college gown caught on a nail he did not have the tear mended, saying to himself it must be more humble to 'go nasty'. soon he fell sick. Charles Wesley visited and surprised him because instead of interest in the new birth he murmured about 'baptismal regeneration'. Wes, as he left, cracked one of the gentle jokes which made him so lovable. Geo laughed, but no sooner was he alone against than he decided that laughter was wrong. he must deny himself laughter if he would attain union with Christ.
when he was well again he walked with downcast eyes and looked for happiness only in the meetings of the Holy Club and in church, yet felt no nearer new birth: there was 'not any who answered', no ray of light at the end of this tunnel. indeed, the devil seemed the only reality and by the start of the new term in October 1734 G Whit scarcely dared go about his servitor's duties for fear of meeting the devil in person on every staircase.
the pages of latin and greek texts blurred before his eyes until he could compose no verses and vowed instead to take up this cross publicly at the next tutorial, trusting that the inevitable rebuke would count towards earning new birth. cowardice, however, kept him away, he paid his fine privately. but next week, trembling yet proud to be a martyr, he stood up in hall and confessed he had been unable to make a theme. his tutor took the fine but looked puzzled and at the end of the class tole Whit to follow him. when they were alone he asked, in a kind voice, whether anything was the matter.
13 Whit burst into tears.
he heard afterwards that the tutor though him mad. he also thought him a most self centered young man.
still no light, no peace and certainly no joy. he would try another way to take the kingdom of God by force. on an early winter evening when bedside prayer bought no relief, he remembered that his master had spent all night on a mountainside. Geo threw his cloak round his shoulders and went at dust into Christ Church Walk. he chose a tree where no one could see him. he knelt down and began to recite prayers silently. after half an hour by the chimes of Great Tom he lay down flat on his face. it began to rain,m the wind rose and Awful Day of Judgement seemed there already, with the tolling of the hour like the tolling of Doom; and still no answer to prayer. shivering and chilled he remained on the ground until warned to return to College by the three quarters chime before midnight.
he cast around for more sacrifices. he could think of just one: 'my religious friends. i must leave them also for Christ's sake!' therefore at the time of the next Holy Club meeting he walked alone into the fields and prayed, only to think of yet another renunciation. he was due to breakfast with Ch Wes next morning and accordingly, at breakfast time, he sat in silent lonely gloom and fought off the surging memories of the warm atmosphere at Wesley's.
Char soon came round to see what was wrong, the Holy Club members had worried already over Whit's excesses; he took matters too far and his meanderings about 'the new birth' puzzled them since all were baptized members of the Church of England. Char realized at once that the case had gone beyond him and urged a consultation with his brother John as the more experienced spiritual director.
John Wesley did not prove too frightening, indeed seemed almost as lovable as his brother, Geo Whit promised not to renounce those means which, said Wes, God Himself
14 had ordained to help men obtain salvation, such as meetings with other christians.
ten days later George was near Magdalen Bridge when he saw a poor woman come half-running, half-stumbling, whom he recognized as the wife of one of his jailbirds. soaked to the skin, shivering, distraught, when collapsed sobbing at his feet and wailed that the cries of her starving children had driven her to drown herself but a gentleman had pulled her out of the icy Thames. such a merciful providence had shown her how wicked she was to try to commit suicide. she wanted to repent and be saved and was on her way to the only man who would understand her woe. she was on her way to mr. Whit.
he gave her money and promised to visit them both in the prison that afternoon. the jailer never refused him entry. he began reading to the poor couple, as often before, only this time he chose the third chapter of St. John's Gospel, about the new birth, the chapter he had puzzled over again and again. he reached the words, 'as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the son of man be lifted up: that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. God so loved the world that -'
'I believe! I believ! cried the woman, 'I shall not perish because I believe in Him NOW! I am born agin, I'm saved!
her husband trembnnled, grasped Whit's hadn and cried out, 'I am on the brink of hell.' next moment the man's whole faced changed. ' I see it too? I'm saved? Oh joy, joy, joy!
Geo Whit was astonished, he had laboured nearly a year yet these two notorious sinners seemed to have been forgiven in a second.
15 Geor returned to Penbroke in a state of shock.
he found awaiting him a family friend who stamped his feet and blew on his fingers in the unheated room, despite the warmth of a travelling cloak. Mr. Hore of Gloucester looked at the empty grate and did not reciprocate young Whit's delighted greetings. Hore said that the Bell Inn and Gabriel Harris had been annoyed by George's letters. they rated him mad. having business in Oxfort Hore had promised to convey their displasure and bed Geo to return to his senses.
Geo lit a fire, ransacked the cupboard for Hoer's refreshment, then tried to show how he could not possibly abandon the search for new birth. as far as Hore could understand, Geo stressed the utmost importance of ridding himself of the guilt of past sins. the price was high, the search long - for him, he admitted, thinking wistfully of the couple in the jail; and he was very far from mastering his passions.
to Hore a parson and a church were primarily means of preserving the Hanoverian Succession and ordering His Majesty's subjects, each in the station of life to which it should please God to call him. he did not argue but left Geo to read the letters which the family had sent. their unhappy tone of rebuke and mystification strengthened pious willingness to lose his mother, brothers and sisters for Christ's sake.
16 Lent 1735 came on. it was now nearly 6 months since Scougal had set him climbling the steep ascent of heaven. Gdo fasted more rigorously, set his mind to be more devout at service, walked out at night lightly clad to pray and tried to ignore the pain when his hands turned blue with cold. over and over he recited Lenten collects. 'Grant we beseech Thee, Al;mighty God, that we, who for our evil deeds do worthily deserve to be punished, by the comfort of Thy grace may mercifully be relieved, through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ'...'Mercifully forgive us our trespasses; receive and comfort us, who are grieved and wearied with the burden of our sins'...'Give us grace to use such abstinence, that, our flesh being subdued to the spirit-' and the most frequent prayer of all, the Ash Wednesday collect, to be said every day in Lent, which summed up in simplicity the plea of "Geo Whit: 'Almighty and everlasting god, who hatest nothing that Thou has mad and dost forgive the sins of all them that are penitent; create and make in us new and contrite hearts...'
early in Passion week, sick and weary, he stumbled at the foot of the staircase leading to his rooms. painfully he dragged himself up, collapsed on the bed, tried to get up an hour later but giddily reeled back. Whit, shamed and defeated, asked the college scout who brought the servitor's evening dole of wood to tell the tutor he was ill.
instead of the kindly tutor the local sugrgeoun-bvarber appered, bustling, exuding good health and in the usual way cupped GTeor to draw off blood to relieve the pressures. the bar ber chattered tactlessly that the news of the illness had spread around the College and the men were laughing, 'what is his fasting come to now?
easter day, early in april 1735, passed unnoticed. for two or three weeks the 21 year old Whit lay almost inert, eating little more than gruels and fish and minced meat on sundays from the college kitchens. he devoted his feeble
17 strength to praying for the removal of his sins and in reaing his Greek New Testament.
another book lay unopened on his desk. he could not remember whether he had bought it or whether Char Wes ..had left it: Contemplations on the New Testament by Joseph Hall, D.D. late Lord Bishop of Norwich. dimly Geo remembered hearing that Hall, 100 years ago, had withstood Archbishop William Laud only to be evicted by Oliver Cromwell. he opened it and at once liked Hall's tone. the book had a calmness, an assurance which contrasted with his own feverishness. Hall seemed to be enjoying his contemplations of each phase of the New Testament. every line had as it were a fatherly smile of a compassion, which suggested a lovable, happy author remarkably unconcerned with his own burdens if, indeed, he had any.
despite the antique language the book grew on Geo. he was stronger now because the days were warmer. blossom coloured the trees, birds sang outside the window; Oxford was on the verge of surrender to Maytime glory. Geo, as he read on, reached the Crucifixion: 'there now O Dear Jesus' wrote Hall in his 17th century english, 'there Thou hangest between heaven and earth; naked, bleeding, forlorn, despicable, the spectacle of miseries, the scorn of men. be abashed, O ye heavens and earth, and all ye creatures wrap up yourselves in horror and confusion, to see the shame and pain and curse of your most Pure and Omnipotent Creator. how could ye subsist, while he thus suffers in whom ye are? O Saviour, dids't Thou take flesh for our redemption, to be thus indignly used, thus mangled, thus tortured...?
Bishop Hall seemed almost in the room, verty patient that his young reader should be painfully slow to get the message.
now Bishop Hall addresses the Penitent Thief. if any sinner might have sins worse than Geo Whit's this was he, yet Hall was saying, 'Thy Saviour speaks of a present possession, THIS DAY...O Saviour, what a precedent is this of Thy free
18 and powerful grace? where Thou wilt give, what unworthiness can bar us from Thy mercy? still George could not get it: 'FREE and powerful grace?...what unworthiness can bar us? he turned another page. Hall addresses the Saviour hanging on His Cross. 'Thou barest our sins: Thy Father saw us in Thee and would punish us in Thee, Thee for us. dimly it began to dawn for George. his mind groped after a fact too amazing to grasp: then 'THOU barest our sins...Thou dids't take flesh for our redemption'. man's puny efforts to redeem himself, whether by praying in a storm in Christ Church Walk or schooling his passions or dispensing charity, were incapable of doing what Jesus Christ had already done.
had already done! Christ had already borne the burden! the new birth was a gift, Hall showed: 'wher Thou wilt give, what unworthiness can bar us from Thy mercy? but to cease struggling and meekly accept that Another had been punished in his place was more than George could stomach. if God had bid him do some great thing, that were easier than to cast himself blindfold and without reserve into God's almighty hands.
the days passed.
one afternoon the pressure on body and mind lay unbearable as ever. George, at his desk, felt thirsty , yet when he drank water his mouth remained dry, he drained the last of his lunchtime ale, to no effect. he was still thirsty when his mind ranged once again to the Crucifixion./ suddenly he recalled that Jesus on the Cross had cried, 'I thirst!' he turned to Bishop Hall, whose words were choice as ever; 'Thou, that not long since proclaimedst in the Temple, 'If any man thirst, let him come to Me and drink: he that believeth in Me, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living waters', now Thyself thirstest'.
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