Sin in the City by Thekla Ellen Joiner

Sin in the City by Thekla Ellen Joiner

Author:Thekla Ellen Joiner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University of Missouri Press


Professionals for Christ

With the Vice Commission now in full investigative mode, the public fury over vice continued into 1910. In October, the Laymen's Evangelistic Council organized for yet another moral assault, the Simultaneous Campaign of J. Wilbur Chapman and Charles Alexander. The Simultaneous concept entailed the organization of multiple revival meetings that met “simultaneously” throughout the city. This method of evangelism required a high level of organization and coordination with churches and the community. Chapman's campaign evidences the increased professionalization and specialization that took place within the Third Awakening. The size and organization of the campaign required numerous evangelists who focused their energies on specific populations. Bible Institute training or apprenticeships with other revivalists usually qualified these professionals for the revival circuit and their unique focus on saloon and jail ministries, outreaches to factories, or brothel evangelism. Although each of these ministries was part of the ongoing urban work in Chicago, a revival highlighted each activity and directed professional expertise toward the redemption of specific portions of the city's population.

As revivalism became a profession, many evangelicals began to reflect on its most current methodologies. The Moody Bible Institute began to publish “The Evangelist's Calendar” in its monthly publication, the Institute Tie. The calendar listed scheduled meetings for a wide network of evangelists organizing revivals throughout the nation. Revivalists themselves began to theorize and advise about revival techniques and the tools for success. Revivalist R. A. Torrey, for example, published such works as “How to Bring Men to Christ” and “How to Conduct a Successful Revival.” Specific equipment was also advertised and sold as a means of increasing revival effectiveness. The Institute Tie promoted folding organs that could be purchased with “Liberal Discounts to Evangelists and Missionaries” and advised its readers that “A Waterproof Tent is a Great Boon to Every Preacher.”48

The leader of the campaign, J. Wilbur Chapman, was a clergyman. Unlike Dwight L. Moody, whose education was probably limited to the fifth grade, Chapman was a seminary-trained and ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church. In 1878, however, under the guidance of Moody, Chapman converted from what he considered a nominal brand of Christianity to a fervent evangelical faith. While pastoring four Presbyterian churches in New York and Pennsylvania between 1882 and 1902, Chapman became increasingly committed to revivalism. In 1893, Chapman preached at the World's Fair Revival and worked in the Interdenominational Association of Evangelists, an organization that unified and standardized Protestant evangelism. Chapman was also influential in establishing the Winona Lake Bible Conference, a meeting and conference ground for evangelists. He also worked for a time as vice-president of the Moody Bible Institute and was appointed the corresponding secretary of the Presbyterian General Assembly's Committee on Evangelism in 1901. In 1903 Chapman resigned his pastoral responsibilities in order to promote the simultaneous evangelistic concept. John H. Converse, a Philadelphia businessman who, in 1905, established a two-hundred-thousand-dollar trust fund to finance Chapman's work in urban revivalism, supported him.49 With Converse's support, Chapman and his evangelistic team traveled nationally and internationally.



Download



Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.