His gifts for oratory were so strong that people are said to have wept just hearing him pronounce the word “Mesopotamia.” For among his contemporaries, no one came even close to being as good in the pulpit as he did, with one pastor calling him “the prince of preachers and the least imperfect character I ever knew.”
Likewise, despite the fact that most will customarily think of John Wesley as the founder of our church, the first real Prime Minister of England, Robert Walpole, considered another figure instead to be the actual “Patriarch of the Methodists.” Even Mr. Wesley himself accorded him pre-eminence when it came to winning others to Christ, asking,“Have we read or heard of any person who called so many thousands, so many myriads of sinners to repentance?”
What’s more, when he made his second trip to America in 1740, he began a series of revivals along the Eastern Seaboard that came to be known as The Great Awakening in this country, too. It was in Philadelphia, in fact, that he first met Benjamin Franklin who was intrigued by his ability to speak to enormous crowds all at once and still be understood. Franklin went so far as to scientifically calculate the area around which his voice could carry, determining that he could actually be heard by over 30,000 persons in the open air at once–all without the benefit (or distraction) of audio-visual volunteers.
The famous Founding Father was so struck by the power of the man’s preaching, however, that he soon learned to leave his wallet at home whenever he went to hear him. For inevitably his sermons wove their way into his otherwise thrifty disposition, resulting in the inexplicable emptying of all of his pockets, followed by Franklin even asking friends nearby to loan him some funds so that he could give more.
It’s no real wonder, thus, that the figure who could preach such sermons became one of the first celebrities in this country, despite his small stature and cross-eyed appearance. For in addition to delivering some 18,000 messages on both sides of the Atlantic–which he crossed 13 times, by the way–George Whitefield also founded an orphanage in Bethesda, Georgia, which is even today the oldest extant charity on the continent.
To be sure, when it came to certain theological positions, Whitefield differed from his long-time friends from Oxford, John and Charles Wesley, preferring Calvinism over the Arminian views of his former “Holy Club” colleagues. Likewise, though Whitefield was the stronger preacher, it was John Wesley’s methodical organizational skills that made the Methodist movement so enduring and clearly made it into a force to “spread scriptural holiness all across the land.”
It’s worth noting, however, that when Whitefield died in America and his will was opened in London, the last item in it was a ring which he left to his dear friends the Wesleys in token of “the indissoluble union with them in heart and Christian affection, notwithstanding our difference in judgment about some particular points of doctrine.” Unsurprisingly thus, when a memorial service for Whitefield was held in London in 1770, by his own request, it was John Wesley who preached it.
And in a day of depressingly disputatious discourse and “winner-take-all” wrestling matches within the church and the culture over its polity and policies, there is perhaps a lesson worth learning from the relationship that the leaders of different ends of the early Methodist movement were able to maintain.
We even have Whitefield to thank for changing the opening words of a hymn that Charles Wesley wrote in1739, one you will no doubt hear in the days ahead, “Hark, How All the Welkin Rings” to the more familiar imagery, “Hark! the Herald Angels Sing.” For clearly that spiritual grandfather of all evangelists knew how to speak so that people could understand what he was saying.
The calendar has changed since then, but George Whitefield was born 300 years ago this week. Though few will probably remember his birthday, however, maybe we can at least remember the message that he fervently offered at the end of many of his sermons: “Come, poor, lost, undone sinner–come just as you are to Christ.”
No wonder all the welkin went wild.

300 years after his birth, Whitefield has staying power with evangelicals

The Reverend Mr. George Whitefield.
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George Whitefield, hailed by scholars as the best-known evangelist of the 18th century.Public domain photo courtesy of Yale University Art Gallery
 This image is available for Web publication. For questions, contact Sally Morrow.
(RNS) If YouTube had existed in the 1700s, George Whitefield, hailed by scholars as the best-known evangelist of that century, would have been all over it.
Whitefield (pronounced WIT-field), who was born in England 300 years ago on Dec. 16, 1714, is regarded as a catalyst for the First Great Awakening. Here are five reasons why he remains a potent influence and a cautionary tale for U.S. evangelicals:
1. He was the master of mass media.
“A major part of his success is that he mastered the new media of his day,” said Thomas S. Kidd, author of the new book “George Whitefield: America’s Spiritual Founding Father.” Whitefield’s sermons and theological thoughts were spread broadly through newspapers, journals and prolific letter-writing.
Unlike many journal-writing Puritans who came before him, Whitefield chose to share his journals publicly.
“It’s like celebrities using Facebook,” said Michael A.G. Haykin, director of the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.
Future evangelists — most notably Billy Graham — followed a pattern set by Whitefield of making the most of the media available in their time.
2. He had his critics.
Media coverage of Whitefield wasn’t all favorable, but it expanded his fame beyond the thousands who sometimes heard him preach in churches in England and in fields in New England.
“Between 1739 and 1742 total output of colonial presses doubles and the whole new half is all Whitefield: It’s all Whitefield or anti-Whitefield,” said Kidd, a history professor at Baylor University, which held a symposium on the itinerant evangelist in November.
Actors felt threatened when Whitefield, an actor-turned-evangelist, decided to build a church called the Tabernacle in London just down the street from the theaters.
“He’s lampooned in really popular plays, the most famous being the ‘Dr. Squintum’ play, which is just a total sensation in Britain,” said Kidd of Whitefield, who was cross-eyed after a childhood ailment.
He had rotten eggs, turnips and stones thrown at him and once was saved from a stoning by his beaver hat, wrote Kidd.
Portrait of George Whitefield, attributed to Joseph Badger, circa 1750s.
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Portrait of George Whitefield, attributed to Joseph Badger, circa 1750s.Photo courtesy of Joseph Badger [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
 This image is available for Web publication. For questions, contact Sally Morrow.
3. He supported slavery.
In his early visits to the U.S., Whitefield condemned the beating of slaves by their masters and encouraged evangelizing slaves. But he later became a slave owner.
“I think he probably shares in some respect the sort of failure … of evangelicals as well as the larger culture to understand the horrors of slavery,” said Haykin, whose seminary held a conference on Whitefield in October. “He was the man directly responsible for the introduction of slavery into Georgia.”
Some scholars wonder what difference Whitefield could have made if he had condemned slavery — as fellow evangelistJohn Wesley did after Whitefield’s death in 1770.
“No one was more influential than Whitefield at the time. What if he had crusaded against slavery instead of advocating for it?” wrote blogger Alan Cross, author of “When Heaven and Earth Collide: Racism, Southern Evangelicals, and the Better Way of Jesus,” in SBC Voices. “Would the United States have begun differently 30, 40 years later?”
4. He fostered friendships with influencers.
Just as Graham became an adviser to presidents and made connections with sports figures and Hollywood’s elite, Whitefield surrounded himself with influential people in the secular world — including Benjamin Franklin in the 1730s.
“He was far more famous than Franklin when they first met,” said Kidd of the mutually beneficial relationship that lasted for decades. “Franklin kind of hitches his wagon to Whitefield’s star.”
Across the Atlantic, the evangelist befriended members of the British aristocracy.
“Whitefield had connections even within the royal family in Britain,” said Kidd. “At one point, Whitefield was getting death threats and got an order from the king to investigate the situation.”
5. He disagreed with other evangelicals.
The battles that continue between Calvinists and non-Calvinists erupted between Whitefield and Charles and John Wesley, who like Whitefield were Church of England ministers who started the Methodist movement.
“His most famous falling out is with John Wesley and it’s over theology,” with Whitefield in the predestination camp and Wesley believing in free will, said Kidd. “He just was constantly falling out with other evangelical leaders and in some ways creating a pattern that persists through today.”
In the end it was Wesley and Jonathan Edwards, another key leader of the Great Awakening, who became better known through the ages: Wesley had the legacy of the Methodist denomination, while Edwards’ theological writings remain influential.
“His brilliance was in that moment,” Kidd said of Whitefield.