Kibble Palace, Glasgow - D L Moody (1874)



The final meeting was held in the Botanical Gardens on the following Sunday. Mr Sankey found his way into the building and began the service with six or seven thousand, who were crushed together there; but so great was the crowd outside, estimated at twenty to thirty thousand people, that Mr Moody himself could not get inside. Standing on the coachman’s box of the carriage in which he was driven, he asked the members of the choir to sing. They found a place for themselves on the roof of a low shed near the building, and after they had sung Mr Moody preached for an hour on “ Immediate Salvation.” So distinct was his voice that the great crowd could hear him without difficulty. The evening was beautiful, the air calm, the sun near its setting; the deep green foliage of the trees that enclosed the grounds framed the scene. Writing of this, a witness said: “We thought of the days of Whitefield, of such a scene as that mentioned in his life, when, in 1753 at Glasgow, twenty thousand souls hung on his lips as he bade them farewell. Here there were thirty thousand eager hearers, for by this time the thousands within the Crystal Palace had come out, though their numbers quietly melting into the main body did not make a very perceptible addition to the crowd; and many onlookers who knew something of such gather-ings were inclined to estimate the number much higher.” After the sermon, Mr Moody asked all those who wished to attend the inquiry meeting to enter the Palace. Those who could remain were requested to gather in the neighbouring church, Kelvinside, for prayer. In a few minutes the Crystal Palace was filled, and when Mr Moody asked for those who were unsaved and yet anxious to be saved, two thousand people rose to their feet. ‘‘It was a strange and solemn sight, so many unsaved and yet seeking salvation,” said a spectator. “It made the heart yearn in an intense desire for them, and assuredly it was of the Lord that these two thousand should thus appeal to the Lord’s people for help at the very moment when these special meetings were brought to a close. It was a sight that summoned the Lord’s people to continue every effort in their behalf, hastening with sharpened sickles to the fields ready for the harvest.”

"The Life of Dwight L Moody," by W R Moody, page 179-80

 


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