History Of Methodist Reform, Volume I - Media Sabda Org

1789-90 were years of unwonted revivals. Except where Whitefield had touched the continent and
souse of the early Princeton College divines had stirred communities, evangelical religion was found
alone among the Methodists and the Baptists, the latter few in numbers. It was the delight of these
young preachers of Methodism to pioneer the country with the Wesleyan doctrines, a recrudescence
of Luther's grand exhumation of Scripture truth, "justification by faith," with an attending
experience, the witness of the spirit, adoption, and holiness. They were broadcast heralds of a present
salvation, and everywhere they sowed, the seed took root, and societies were organized. There was
a net increase of members for the year 1789-90, of eleven thousand whites and twenty-five hundred
blacks, for the minute now made this distinction of color. Asbury continued to be present
everywhere; as much as one personality and the use of two horses could make him. In the revivals
it was expected that some recruits would be found for the itinerancy, and such men called by the
Holy Ghost were not wanting. Snethen used to say that Asbury often repeated at the Conferences that
"he wondered where all these young preachers came from, riding good horses and with watches in
their pockets."
His Journal furnishes some remarkable entries for 1790. In April he is down in North Carolina,
and, after riding twenty-two miles, he "stopped with Colonel Graham, dripping wet with rain. . . .
I was still unwell with a complaint that terminated the life of my grandfather Asbury, whose name
I bear; perhaps, it will also be my end . . . For several days I have been very sick and serious. I have
been compelled to look into eternity with some pleasure. I could give up the church, the college, and
schools; nevertheless, there was one drawback what will my enemies and mistaken friends say?
Why, that he hath offended the Lord, and he hath taken him away." It will be remembered that he
is now wrestling with his preachers and the people over the Council plan. It must have been a fierce
contest. He seems deeply conscious of it, but your autocrat is never in error. Only one drawback to
a happy death: what will his enemies and mistaken friends say? Why he conjectures just about what
he said of Strawbridge, some years now gone. "Why, he hath offended the Lord, and he hath taken
him away." Thus the weak points of his human nature crop out from time to time. Whatcoat was now
traveling with him and doing much of the preaching. They had just come from Charleston and had
held the Conference: "Our business was conducted in great peace and love. The business of the
Council came before us; and it was determined that the concerns of the college and the printing
should be left with the Council to act decisively upon; but that no canons should be made, nor the
old altered, without the consent of the conference, and that whatever was done on this head, should
come in the shape of advice only." He makes a rapid trip into Kentucky, called by an urgent letter
from Poythress, and the hardships of the journey are briefly but graphically depicted. Back again in
Virginia, June 14: "Our Conference began (it was at Petersburg again) all was peace until the
Council was mentioned. The young men appeared to be entirely under the influence of the elders,
and turned it out of doors. I was weary, and felt but little freedom to speak on the subject. This
business is to be explained to every preacher; and then it must be carried through the Conference
twenty-four times, that is, through all the conferences for two years." The Council plan is deeply
settled in his convictions, but the circumlocution of submission of its proceedings to the conferences
and so down among the people wearies him, and to find the dissatisfaction growing greatly taxes his
patience. The action of the Petersburg Conference haunts him. "I felt grieved in mind that there is
a link broken out of twelve that should form a chain of union." His physical health is shattered, and
his mental condition despondent and precarious. The attempt to be everywhere and to touch
everything with his own hands, and to overrule as well as oversee the Church from the people to the