Unflinching Courage

"Although the leaders of early Methodism were of differing doctrinal persuasions, in another matter they were alike: they all met physical opposition with unflinching courage. This was true first of Howell Harris. In Wales he was attacked by ruffians, hated by clergy, and brought before magistrates. And in 1741, at the town of Bala, the local clergyman opened a barrel of beer on the main street and used it to entice the mob to attack Harris.

The women were as fiendish as the men, for they besmeared him with mire, while their companions belaboured him with their fists and clubs, inflicting such wounds that his path could be marked in the street by the crimson stains of his blood. The enemy continued to persecute him, striking him with sticks and with staves, until overcome with exhaus­tion he fell to the ground. They still abused him, though prostrate. ...'

In London, even while he was ministering in the Tabernacle, Harris was violently opposed. More than once the mob came beating on the Tabernacle doors during a service, forced their way in, and attacked the people with staves. Amid these dangers Harris was unmoved, and of one such occasion he reported:

Had bullets been shot at me, 1 felt I would not move. Mob raged. Voice lifted up, and though by the power going with the words my head almost went to pieces, such was my zeal that I cried, 'I'll preach Christ till to pieces I fall!'"

A quote from chapter 15 of

George Whitefield
By Arnold Dallimore / Crossway Books & Bibles