Evan Roberts and

the Welsh revival of 1904

Part One

Preparing for Blessing

In one of his daily readings on the text "The night also is Thine" (Psalm 74 v16), C. H. Spurgeon reminds believers that "Gloomy seasons of religious indifference and social sin are not exempted from the divine purpose. When the altars of truth are defiled, and the ways of God forsaken, the Lord's servants weep with bitter sorrow, but they may not despair, for the darkest eras are governed by the Lord, and shall come to their end at His bidding. What may seem defeat to us may be victory to Him."

During times of declension in the history of the church, the best consolation and encouragement for Christians is the sure knowledge which inspired John Morison to write the verse:

"Long hath the night of sorrow reigned,
The dawn shall bring us light:
God shall appear, and we shall rise
With gladness in His sight."

It is such confidence in God's unchanging faithfulness and power which drives His people to pray more earnestly and to strive more obediently to serve Him until He is pleased to grant another gracious outpouring of His Spirit.

When God in His sovereign providence moves in reviving power, as He did in Wales in 1904, secular observers tend to look for rational explanations, but those who experience the mighty workings of the Holy Spirit have no doubt that a divinely supernatural intervention is taking place. Similarly while contemporary accounts of the revival often regard its dramatic suddenness as inexplicable, those who had longed and yearned and prayed for the return of God' s favour have the spiritual discernment to see the events of 1904 as His astounding answer to their pleadings.

Looking to God

This was indeed the experience of Christians in Wales at the end of the 19th century who had witnessed the rapid spread of worldliness and humanist ideologies, despite the progress made in some areas by agencies such as the Forward Movement. In the religious literature of the period before 1904 there were frequent expressions of concern over the deadness affecting the churches. Amongst the examples quoted by Dr. Eifion Evans In his book "The Welsh Revival o f 1904", the following are typical: "a spirit of error fills the air, so that a silent subconscious influence on the minds of men attracts them away from the living God," (Evan Phillips, Welsh Presbyterian Moderator 1900); "while the church sleeps the enemy busily sows tares among the wheat, and nothing short of an outpouring of the Spirit from on high will uproot them, and save our land from becoming a prey to atheism and ungodliness," (Y Drysorfa, Nov.1902). "The authority of the Bible and the fundamental truths of Christianity are being weighed in the balance of reason and criticism as though they were nothing more than human opinions," ("Y Cyfaill Eglwysig", Dec. 1902).

The recognition that God alone could provide the answer to this sad state was admitted by some church leaders of the day and it was gradually reflected in the increased fervency of their prayers both in private devotions and in public worship at churches in Carmarthen, Neath, Bridgend, Dowlais and the Garw, Llynfi and Rhondda valleys. The other characteristic features of their prayers were the greater sense of burden for the unconverted multitudes and the deeper longing for the Holy Spirit to descend upon them. A small number of ministers including W.S. Jones, W.W. Lewis and Keri Evans (all of Carmarthen), O.M. Owen (Penydarren), David Evans (Bridgend), Cynog Williams (Aberdare), W.N. Williams (Ammanford) and R.B. Jones (Rhondda) had independently experienced God' s power transforming their preaching in the years immediately preceding 1904 and it was through the ministries of such men that Joseph Jenkins of New Quay and John Thickens of Aberaeron were challenged over the spiritual needs of their congregations.

Listening To God

Jenkins, conscious of his own inadequacy and poverty of spirit, pleaded for the anointing of the Holy Spirit upon his life and God granted him such boldness and power that his ministry began to enjoy much blessing. Together with Thickens, he arranged a series of "conferences" in various churches in the area which started in January 1904 and which were led by some of the preachers already being used by God. In the following months an intense longing for the baptism of the Holy Spirit was felt by many attending the meetings so that when Seth Joshua, the itinerant evangelist of the Forward Movement, arrived in New Quay in September, he recorded in his diary, "I have never seen the power of the Holy Spirit so powerfully manifested among the people as at this place just now."

In the following week Joshua had engagements to conduct services at Newcastle Emlyn, before attending the next "conference" at Blaenannerch, and it was during the meetings at the former place that he again experienced the first "mercy-drops" of blessing. Several years earlier Joshua had felt "it laid upon his heart to pray to God to go and take a lad from the coal-mine or from the field, even as He took Elisha from the plough, to revive His work." That prayer was to be answered by God in the next few days at Newcastle Emlyn and Blaenannerch in such a remarkable way that the lives of thousands were to be transformed as a new and glorious awakening swept through Wales.