During the first year of his labors in Lëyn, he was united in marriage to
Miss Catherine Jones, a pious young lady of his own church, and a very
suitable companion. After this event, his duties were increasingly
arduous. He frequently preached five times during the Sabbath, and
walked twenty miles. His heart was full of love, and he spoke with the
ardor of a seraph. Constant labor and intense excitement soon wore upon
his health. He became feeble, and his friends were apprehensive of
consumption. Through the mercy of God, however, he was spared; gradually
recovered his strength; and performed, through the remainder of a long
life, an incredible amount of ministerial labor.
VISIT TO SOUTH WALES.
Mr. Evans naturally felt a strong desire to see his friends in South
Wales. During his second year at Lëyn, thinking it might benefit his
enfeebled health, as well as refresh his spirit, he determined to make
them a visit. He was unable to procure a horse for the journey, and the
small societies to which he preached were too poor to provide him one.
So he set forth on foot, preaching in every town and village through
which he passed. His talents were now developed, and he had received “an
unction from the Holy One.” All who heard him were astonished at his
power. His old acquaintances regarded him as a new man. A great
awakening followed him wherever he went. Hear his own language:—
“I now felt a power in the word, like a hammer breaking the rock, and not
like a rush. I had a very powerful time at Kilvowyr, and also pleasant
meetings in the neighborhood of Cardigan. The work of conversion was
progressing so rapidly and with so much energy in those parts, that the
ordinance of baptism was administered every month for a year or more, at
Kilvowyr, Cardigan, Blaenywaun, Blaenffôs, and Ebenezer, to from ten to
twenty persons each month. The chapels and adjoining burying-grounds
were crowded with hearers of a week-day, even in the middle of harvest.
I frequently preached in the open air in the evenings, and the rejoicing,
singing, and praising would continue until broad light the next morning.
The hearers appeared melted down in tenderness at the different meetings,
so that they wept streams of tears, and cried out, in such a manner that
one might suppose the whole congregation, male and female, was thoroughly
dissolved by the gospel. ‘The word of God’ was now become as ‘a sharp
two-edged sword, dividing asunder the joints and marrow,’ and revealing
unto the people the secret corruptions of their hearts. Preaching was
now unto me a pleasure, and the success of the ministry in all places was
very great. The same people attended fifteen or twenty different
meetings, many miles apart, in the counties of Cardigan, Pembroke,
Caermarthen, Glamorgan, Monmouth, and Brecknock. This revival,
especially in the vicinity of Cardigan, and in Pembrokeshire, subdued the
whole country, and induced people everywhere to think well of religion.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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