For the past two weeks, one of our teams has been planted in the exact community where God moved in dramatic fashion 130 years ago. What God did during that year was truly amazing . . . a superb account of what He longs to do again!  The following edited version of the account tells the story:

Sunday meetings were held and a thousand people were in attendance. On Tuesday forenoon the wheels of the scale factory were stopped, and men crowded into the machine shop where the voice of prayer and song superseded the hum of machinery. In the evening there were 1200 people at the South Church, and 140 rose to say that they had begun the Christian life. The interest continued, union meetings were held thrice a week in the different churches, usually conducted by laymen, almost everyone present taking some brief part.  Half-hour noon meetings were begun, which continued several years.  On the 27th of March, large assemblies met at the Avenue House Hall, at North and South Churches; also next day at the Universalist Church, which was filled, deep interest being manifest.  In the evening of Monday, March 28, there were 1400 people crowding the Academy Hall and passage-ways and 300 more in room No. 10; more than 100 rose for prayers.  During the next six weeks there was a steady, quiet continuance of the revival spirit, which received a fresh impulse by the return once more, when urgently invited, of the Massachusetts brethren.  This was on Sunday, the 8^th of May.  Neither North nor South Churches could contain the crowds that flocked to the evening meeting, and Academy Hall was again the place of assembly.  On Monday, another gospel meeting was held at the Scale factory, and in the evening some 1500 people were together again at the Academy, where, as so often before, large numbers gave expression to their interest or their purpose to live a Christian life.

These and similar scenes during the year following will be forever memorable in the history of our town.  The whole atmosphere of the place seemed charged with religious feeling; no one questioned the immense reality of spiritual forces that were so distinctly transforming men’s lives and lifting the standards of thought and conduct in the community.  The religious life stood out as a manly thing to be manfully followed; the dominant note was not so much the old solemnity, as the joy of opportunity, the cheer of the good news to every man.  Everybody was singing . . . and repeating cheer-inspiring verses from the Bible.  Gospel meetings, so called, with a lay brother in the chair, were a popular attraction; there was no distinction of church or creed; all, as in apostolic times, were “continuing daily with one accord in fellowship together and in prayers, with gladness and singleness of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people.”  Like the friends from Massachusetts who had left their business to bring messages to us, laymen of this town went out in bands of two to five, holding gospel meetings not only in the school districts but in near or distant towns; the influence of the religious uplift here was extended for a hundred miles around, and left its permanent mark on this community.

Though a community-wide awakening did not occur these past two weeks while God’s people gathered to seek the Lord, seeds were planted to spark another great move of His Spirit. As is often the case, God’s people seemed to especially respond to the Spirit’s work in the following areas:

• Deep bitterness and the need to be set free
• Wives admitting a total lack of respect for their husbands
• Men admitting a complete lack of spiritual leadership in their homes
• Men confessing addiction to pornography, but now being willing to become accountable to other Christian men in order to overcome this gross sin. One man said this addiction started so early that he can’t remember living without it.

Many men in the church said they were beginning to rebuild their family by establishing a regular family devotional time. A wife gave notice to her job that she would be resigning, because her husband really wanted her to be at home with their family in order to be the spiritual influence in their home that he needed her to be.

When God gets ready to move broadly, He always begins in our closest relationships, and that means at home. God did an amazing work in many marriages and families in this community. Now, as these seeds have been planted, pray for the spiritual leaders as they continue to stir these “lights of hope” until this area of Vermont experiences another extraordinary move of God. Lord, do it again!