Nor was it a mere sight-seeing crowd. I found myself surrounded by
people who were manifestly there for higher ends, and who listened with
as fixed an attention as any preacher could desire. But the most
remarkable part of the service was the Holy Communion, with which it
closed. At the end of the Prayer for the Church Militant there was a
pause, in order that those who did not intend to remain for the Lord’s
Supper might retire; but of the great crowd near the rail very few went
away. At first it seemed a doubtful question whether they understood
that the time was come for them to go; but it soon became evident that
they perfectly understood what they were doing, and that they were
remaining to partake of the Lord’s Supper. The bread and wine originally
prepared was quite insufficient for such a number of communicants, and it
was necessary to send out for an additional supply. When once the
service began everything was done that could be done for the comfort of
all that were present; but as the whole space in front of the rail was
filled with seats, all of which were occupied, and there was only one
narrow passage by which the communicants could both approach and retire,
and as there were eight persons administering, it was impossible to
secure that solemn stillness which we sometimes enjoy in our parochial
churches. But nothing could possibly be more interesting. There I saw
not only ladies and gentlemen, but many who appeared to me to be
mechanics, and, scattered through the crowd, numbers of young men.
When I looked on that mixed body of communicants, and observed the
earnestness, the seriousness, and the apparently deep devotion with which
they gathered round the Table of their Lord; and when after the service
was over I saw them pressing round their beloved Vicar, and many of them
reaching out their rough hands once more to grasp his with a true,
hearty, loving grasp, and heard them wishing him a blessing, I could not
help giving thanks to the God of all grace who gave that day such a
testimony to the faithful reaching of His Gospel. For what were the
means employed for the attainment of such a result? Not music, not form,
not the claim to priestly power, but the plain, simple, loving ministry
of the Gospel of the grace of God. Between three and four years my dear
friend had been preaching the great doctrines of Scripture—such as
conversion to God, justification by faith, free forgiveness through the
finished atonement, and, new life by the power of the Holy Ghost—and God
had blessed that ministry to the ingathering of a people to His name.
This was the work of which we that day witnessed the fruit, and I trust
the effects on all of us who witnessed it may be that we may work on in
our various spheres of labour more than ever resolved, by God’s help, to
stick fast to great principles, and more than ever encouraged to trust
His promises, and look out for great results.