"Billy" Sunday, the Man and His Message: With his own words which have won thousands for ChristEllis, William T. (William Thomas)
Religion
"Billy" Sunday, the Man and His Message: With his own words which have won thousands for Christ
Ellis, William T. (William Thomas)
Baseball players -- United States -- Biography; Evangelists -- United States -- Biography; Sunday, Billy, 1862-1935
Withal, the evangelist, like every other man pre-eminent in his
calling, suffers a great loneliness; he has few intimates who can
lead his mind apart from his work. What says Kipling, in his "Song of
Diego Valdez," the lord high admiral of Spain, who pined in vain for
the comradeship of his old companions, but who, in the aloneness of
eminence, mourned his solitary state?
"They sold Diego Valdez
To bondage of great deeds."
The computable aggregate of Sunday's work is almost unbelievable.
His associates say that his converts number more than a quarter of a
million persons. That is a greater total than the whole membership of
the entire Christian Church, decades after the resurrection of our
Lord. Imagine a city of a quarter of a million inhabitants, every one
of whom was a zealous disciple of Jesus Christ. What a procession these
"trail-hitters" would make could they all be gathered into one great
campaign parade!
Of course these converts are not all trophies of Billy Sunday's
preaching power. He has not won them alone. He has merely stood in the
forefront, as the agent of the Church, with vast co-operative forces
behind him. Nevertheless, he has been the occasion and the instrument
for this huge accomplishment in the Church's conquest.
When it comes to counting up the aggregate size of Sunday's audiences,
one is tempted not to believe his own figures, for the total runs up
into the millions, and even the tens of millions. Probably no living
man has spoken to so great numbers of human beings as Billy Sunday.
More eloquent than any comment upon the magnitude and number of his
meetings is the following summary of his campaigns gathered from
various sources. Sunday himself does not keep records of his work. His
motto seems to be, "Forgetting those things which are behind."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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