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About the Book
"A Quest for Godliness" by J.I. Packer explores the lives and teachings of the Puritans, a group of Christians known for their commitment to God and pursuit of holiness. The book examines how their example can inspire and guide contemporary Christians in their own spiritual journeys. Packer emphasizes the importance of pursuing a deep relationship with God and living a life that reflects His holiness.
Evan Roberts
Evan Roberts’ childhood
Evan Roberts was born and raised in a Welsh Calvinist Methodist family in Loughor, on the Glamorgan and Carmarthenshire border. As a boy he was unusually serious and very diligent in his Christian life. He memorised verses of the Bible and was a daily attender of Moriah Chapel, a church about a mile from his home.
Even at 13 years of age he began to develop a heart for a visitation from God. He later wrote “I said to myself: I will have the Spirit. And through all weathers and in spite of all difficulties I went to the meetings… for ten or eleven years I have prayed for revival. I could sit up all night to read or talk about revivals. It was the Spirit who moved me to think about revival.”
Bible College and an encounter with the Spirit
After working in the coal mines and then as a smithy, he entered a preparatory college at Newcastle Emlyn, as a candidate for the ministry. It was 1903 and he was 25 years old.
It was at this time that he sought the Lord for more of His Spirit. He believed that he would be baptised in the Holy Spirit and sometimes his bed shook as his prayers were answered. The Lord began to wake him at 1.00 am for divine fellowship, when he would pray for four hours, returning to bed at 5.00 am for another four hours sleep.
He visited a meeting where Seth Joshua was preaching and heard the evangelist pray “Lord, bend us”. The Holy Spirit said to Evan, “That’s what you need”. At the following meeting Evan experienced a powerful filling with the Holy Spirit. “I felt a living power pervading my bosom. It took my breath away and my legs trembled exceedingly. This living power became stronger and stronger as each one prayed, until I felt it would tear me apart.
My whole bosom was a turmoil and if I had not prayed it would have burst…. I fell on my knees with my arms over the seat in front of me. My face was bathed in perspiration, and the tears flowed in streams. I cried out “Bend me, bend me!!” It was God’s commending love which bent me… what a wave of peace flooded my bosom…. I was filled with compassion for those who must bend at the judgement, and I wept.
Following that, the salvation of the human soul was solemnly impressed on me. I felt ablaze with the desire to go through the length and breadth of Wales to tell of the Saviour”.
Two visions
Needless to say, his studies began to take second place! He began praying for a hundred thousand souls and had two visions which encouraged him to believe it would happen. He saw a lighted candle and behind it the rising sun. He felt the interpretation was that the present blessings were only as a lighted candle compared with the blazing glory of the sun. Later all Wales would be flooded with revival glory.
The other vision occurred when Evan saw his close friend Sydney Evans staring at the moon. Evan asked what he was looking at and, to his great surprise, he saw it too! It was an arm that seemed to be outstretched from the moon down to Wales. He was in no doubt that revival was on its way. If you are in the market for clothes, https://www.fakewatch.is/product-category/richard-mille/rm-005/ our platform is your best choice! The largest shopping mall!
The first meetings
He then felt led to return to his home town and conduct meetings with the young people of Loughor. With permission from the minister, he began the meetings, encouraging prayer for the outpouring of the Spirit on Moriah. The meetings slowly increased in numbers and powerful waves of intercession swept over those gathered.
During those meetings the Holy Spirit gave Evan four requirements that were later to be used throughout the coming revival:
1. Confession of all known sin
2. Repentance and restitution
3. Obedience and surrender to the Holy Spirit
4. Public confession of Christ
The Spirit began to be outpoured. There was weeping, shouting, crying out, joy and brokeness. Some would shout out, “No more, Lord Jesus, or I’ll die”. This was the beginning of the Welsh Revival.
Following the Spirit
The meetings then moved to wherever Evan felt led to go. Those travelling with him were predominately female and the young girls would often begin meetings with intense intercession, urging surrender to God and by giving testimony. Evan would often be seen on his knees pleading for God’s mercy, with tears.
The crowds would come and be moved upon by wave after wave of the Spirit’s presence. Spontaneous prayer, confession, testimony and song erupted in all the meetings. Evan, or his helpers , would approach those in spiritual distress and urge them to surrender to Christ. No musical instruments were played and, often, there would be no preaching. Yet the crowds continued to come and thousands professed conversion.
The meetings often went on until the early hours of the morning. Evan and his team would go home, sleep for 2–3 hours and be back at the pit-head by 5 am, urging the miners coming off night duty to come to chapel meetings.
Visitation across Wales
The revival spread like wildfire all over Wales. Other leaders also experienced the presence of God. Hundreds of overseas visitors flocked to Wales to witness the revival and many took revival fire back to their own land. But the intense presence began to take its toll on Evan. He became nervous and would sometimes be abrupt or rude to people in public meetings. He openly rebuked leaders and congregations alike.
Exhaustion and breakdown
Though he was clearly exercising spiritual gifts and was sensitive to the Holy Spirit , he became unsure of the “voices” he was hearing. The he broke down and withdrew from public meetings. Accusation and criticism followed and further physical and emotional breakdown ensued.
Understandably, converts were confused. Was this God? Was Evan Roberts God’s man or was he satanically motivated? He fell into a deep depression and in the spring of 1906 he was invited to convalesce at Jessie Penn-Lewis’ home at Woodlands in Leicester.
It is claimed that Mrs Penn Lewis used Evan’s name to propagate her own ministry and message. She supposedly convinced him he was deceived by evil spirits and, over the next few years co-authorised with Evan “War on the Saints”, which was published in 1913. This book clearly delineates the confusion she had drawn Evan into.
It left its readers totally wary of any spiritual phenomena of any kind or degree. Rather than giving clear guidelines regarding discerning satanic powers, it brought into question anything that may be considered, or that might be described, as Holy Spirit activity. Within a year of its publication, Evan Roberts denounced it, telling friends that it had been a failed weapon which had confused and divided the Lord’s people.
Evan Roberts the intercessor
Evan stayed at the Penn-Lewis’ home for eight years, giving himself to intercession and private group counselling. Around 1920 Evan moved to Brighton and lived alone until he returned to his beloved Wales, when his father fell ill in 1926. He began to visit Wales again and eventually moved there in 1928 when his father died.
Nothing much is known of the years that followed. Evan finally died at the age of 72 and was buried behind Moriah Chapel on Jan 29th 1951.
May his life be both an example and a warning to all those who participate in revival to maintain humility; keep submissive to the Spirit; be accountable to godly men and women; remain true to their calling; use the gifts God has given, but be wise in the stewardship of their body.
Bibliography An Instrument of Revival, Brynmor Pierce-Jones 1995, published by Bridge Publishing (ISBN 0-88270-667-5).
Tony Cauchi
keep him from his knees
My Dear Globdrop, Most regretfully did I receive your last letter. Slumped over at my desk for nearly the entire day, I failed to detect the slightest evidence of rational thought. You coughed and sneezed all over the page and still thought to send it, did you? Next time you desire to unclutter the pockets of your mind, rifle through the lint and half-gnawed bones with one of your peers instead of your superior officer. The only nugget I found (and I admit to having slogged through only half of the small booklet you called a letter) was the bit about your man’s resolves to “give more time to prayer.” I hope, for your sake, that you have not applied standard protocol to such a vile practice. In other pursuits, we consider it sport to let the game run free for a bit. We allow the patients to exercise new levels of self-control, discipline, purity, and the like. The joy they feel when they assume themselves finally free heightens our fun when, to their horror and despair, we recapture them in old habits. And this is not just for entertainment: The last state becomes worse than the first. The merry-go-round of failure weakens their will to fight back, and soon, they won’t attempt to run free even when the door is flung open. Their fresh starts make for more bitter endings. But we do not trifle with prayer, ever . Have you forgotten that one stands on the other side of them, listening ? Keep the Prey from Prayer This ought to be painfully apparent. Would you allow an all-but-conquered army, surrounded and besieged, to send out even one letter pleading for reinforcements? Would you not hunt that messenger down, put arrows in his back, and burn the letter? It is bad enough that our bitter Enemy — I have it on credible report — actually wants  to help them. No, silence toward the Enemy is hell’s only policy. You must silence him as soon as possible. A few pointers. 1. Distract him in his closet. This first step is almost too simple to be devious: show him his surroundings. When he has time to sit and observe — something he otherwise would rarely do — show him everything. The more bothersome, the better. Let him hear that horrid Mr. Snoodle bark at a squirrel down the street. Let him see the mailman walk irreverently across his yard. Let him notice the chipped paint upon the windowsill, the small crack in the ceiling fan, the children’s play toys left disobediently about on the carpet. Once he is divided, end the affair promptly with something he can quickly do — he should clean the dishes or vacuum the carpet. Assure him, of course, that this will only be a temporary detour that will allow for greater focus. Send him away after anything and everything. 2. Remind him of righteous deeds to do. Now, don’t be afraid to use even — and my pen recoils to write it — “righteous distractions.” This, I hope you can finally begin to appreciate, reveals how much we loathe the time he spends upon his knees — that place where all horrid events begin. Get him to say, as one of their generals has said, You wouldn’t believe how many good things keep me from praying — not sin. Sin does not keep me from praying; righteousness keeps me from praying: answering holy emails or just checking out one more piece of relevant news to pray about. . . . It’s not evil that keeps us from praying; it’s good things. So — only in times of deepest desperation, mind you — suggest a million fine deeds he could otherwise be doing: a friend could use an encouraging text message. The elderly man next store could use his driveway shoveled. Perhaps he ought to call and check in with that sister who is struggling. We can destroy those resolves in due time. The act at hand, the speaking directly with the Enemy, stands priority. Without refueling, they can only get only so far. 3. Remind him how little he has prayed. Perhaps you naively assume that this misses the point — why remind a starving man that he has not eaten enough bread? But this squanders an opportunity. If he is set on yelping to the Enemy, prostrating himself on the floor like a spaniel, two courses of action can proceed: either he gets fed and returns to the banquet over and over again — and we lose him  — or we spoil the bread in his mouth by inducing a sense of guilt . Instead of allowing him to begin where he is  — one meal at a time, as it were — suggest all the ways he falls short of where he should be by now . As he finally begins to intercede for his sister, ask, Why have you waited so long?  Should he pray for our humans to follow the Enemy, inquire, Why were you unbothered by their plight till now?  If he begins that wretched way he taught them, “My Father,” let the name turn to guilt before he finishes: Do other sons fail so much at prayer?  Ten minutes of prayer seems like such a weak window for someone who has been a Christian so long. A steady diet of shame turns prayer inward ¬— a gaze into the mirror at imperfections, not a gaze at the Enemy or his alleged perfections. Make prayer a reminder of everything your man is not, rather than a communing with all the Enemy is. Press blame upon him, and he soon may return to his unencumbered, guilt-free starvation. 4. Remind him that he is free  from taking prayer too seriously. Label all prayer habits as legalism. Planning to spend thirty minutes in prayer a day? That is law, not grace. Where — be sure to ask him — does the Bible say he needs  to wake up at 6:30 in the morning? Anyone who tells him he must  spend time communing with the Enemy doesn’t know what freedom  the Enemy affords. Tell them that he is perfectly free  to be prayerless before the Enemy — of course, by this we mean that he is free to stand clueless, weaponless, and defenseless before us. Let him be regular in checking social media, regular in watching his shows, regular in playing Ultimate Frisbee and going to concerts, regular in walking the dog, eating, sleeping, and playing the saxophone — but make the idea that he might be regular in prayer works based . Keep him from prayer, and he shall surely become prey. 5. Remind him of tomorrow. He works hard after all. Working two jobs. Busy with countless Christian activities. What does the Enemy really expect of him? The Enemy’s Son sought to rouse his drowsy disciples to their prayer posts on the night everything changed, but he couldn’t . They were too tired to “watch and pray that they may not enter into temptation.” The spirit may have been willing, but the flesh was weak. We licked our lips as their eyelids drooped. You can always pray tomorrow morning  was our lullaby. A little sleep, a little slumber, a little tapping of the alarm clock, and we shall come upon them like a thief in the night. Lead Them into Temptation The Enemy instructs them to pray that they might not enter into temptation  — I hope you see the seriousness by now. He even commands them to pray daily with the wretched words, “Lead us not into temptation.” Keep them from all of this. Leave them over-busy and exhausted, pushing prayer to the bookends of their days until it is little more than a half-conscious moan or sigh. At all costs, do not let them truly believe that God is and, most of all, that he rewards those who seek him — with himself. Your tried and tempted uncle, Grimgod
