George Whitefield, a luminary of the First Great Awakening, is the focal point of our discourse, as we explore the profound impact he had on countless souls through his fervent preaching. Born in 1714, Whitefield not only invented a portable pulpit but also captivated audiences of tens of thousands across Britain and colonial America with his impassioned sermons. His voice resonated with an unparalleled power, echoing across vast gatherings, igniting spiritual awakenings and transforming lives. Today, we delve into the essence of his ministry and the theological underpinnings that fueled his relentless pursuit of evangelism. Join us as we reflect on the legacy of this remarkable preacher and the timeless truths he championed, urging us to consider our own engagement with the Gospel in a world that often prioritizes entertainment over substantive spiritual discourse.

Links referenced in this episode:

1. gbcny.org
2. youtube.com/@gbcny
3. soulfishingministries.com

He had a voice that shook a continent.

He sparked the Great Awakening with a firestorm of sermons.

Who is this man that rocks so many with such fiery preaching who was in his own right, a spiritual revolution?

Join us as we take this time to stop and think about it.

Hello?

Hello?

Anybody home?

I think McFly thinks.

I'm thinking.

I'm thinking.

What were you thinking?

I'm trying to think, but nothing happens.

Didn't say anything.

Now just think about it.

You're listening to Stop and Think About It, a podcast for the Christian thinker.

In a day when sound biblical preaching.

Has been replaced by man centered entertainment.

And the church is becoming increasingly anti intellectual, this podcast will encourage believers to think biblically and theologically.

So please join me as we get ready to stop and think about it.

Well, greetings friends and foes, saints and sinners.

Welcome to another episode of the Stop and Think about it podcast.

I am your host, Phil Sessa, AKA the Bronx Expositor.

And I have with me a first time guest and pastor evangelist, Gary George.

Welcome, brotherness.

Hey, good to be on your show, brother Phil.

Just finding out about it and this is exciting to be sharing the good news with you about.

Amen.

Well, one of my favorite things about you, besides your fellow brother, is just the way you say brother, can you give us a nice brother?

Well, that's natural for me.

I'm from the Boston area, so brother, that's what I.

There you go.

I love it.

I love it.

All right, go ahead.

There you go.

All right, so you're from the Boston area, you're a pastor, you're evangelist.

Tell us about yourself, about your ministry.

Yeah, Northeastern Orthodox.

I'm Albanian by nationality.

My parents were immigrants.

I was born here, grew up in Orthodox church, which was a dead church.

I ended up going to a Catholic college on an athletic scholarship called Holy Cross College.

At that time I had an interest in spiritual things that was going on my soul and I started to read the Bible as well as I'm going to a college.

And I started taking religious courses and thinking that this might bring me some peace.

And through the course of my college years, after reading the Bible for three and a half years, I. I engaged with a church that was doing outdoor evangelism.

They were actually inside of a mall and they were spreading the gospel.

And the person that was the one who ministered to me happened to have a middle name called Moody.

His name was Cecil Moody Batstone, his father.

His father named him after Moody because Cecil himself was born just a few months before D.L.

Moody died.

And D.L.

Moody was instrumental in his father's conversion.

So he wanted his son to be modeling DL Moody.

And that's exactly what he was like.

So he was very much outgoing with the gospel.

And I just realized through the Romans three passages that I was definitely on my way to hell.

And then he said, let's turn to Isaiah 53.

5.

And before he even got to it, I turned to it, found it, I read it to myself, and right there, brother, heaven came down and glory filled my soul.

I was a changed man instantly.

And I didn't know what hit me that night.

I had plans to go out as a usual potty person here in the city of Worcester, where I grew up, which is outside of Boston about 37 miles.

And I went to a nightclub that happened to be called the Last Chance Saloon.

Really, I could not find a comfort zone in there at all.

It was a place that was like my second home.

But I knew that I was different that night, and I have been ever since.

So that's my personal history in the actual brother Cecil Mooney Badstone had passed on to me writings of George Whitefield and about him.

So I get introduced to George Whitefield right off the bat in this particular church that I line myself up with.

Were doing outdoor evangelism every Sunday night on a place known as Worcester Common, which happens to be the actual place where George Whitefield preached when he came through the United States and New England parts particularly.

And he passed from Boston, he headed towards Jonathan Edwards place in Northampton.

He had to come west Easterly, or I should say west Westerly.

And he had the pastoral Worcester, and he preached there.

And they said that thousands attended his preaching on the Worcester Common.

So, interestingly, I started my outdoor evangelism in the Worcester Common with that particular church.

And then a few years later, I started my own outdoor evangelism there and have preached there for about 30 years and more and have been preaching right nearby there for numbers of years as well.

The last seven years, I've been doing outdoor evangelism in the city of Worcester.

As well.

Well, anyway, that's a long amen.

And.

And if I'm not mistaken, because you and I go some years back, we had a conference called the New York City Invasion.

You were one of our.

Our speakers at that.

I believe you spoke on evangelism and the power of the Holy Spirit.

So those podcast.

I'm sorry, those videos are up on our Grace Baptist Church of Woodhaven sermon audio page and YouTube.

But I believe that you told me that there was at least one time you dressed up like George Whitefield.

Yes, I actually, there's about 10 miles from my home.

There's a place known as the Whitfield Rock.

He was coming through this area and went to a town called the Brookfields.

And they didn't have a church large enough to fit all the people who would be attending because his popularity had grown so widely that his name, whenever it was broadcasted through newspaper or word of mouth, would draw hundreds and thousands and thousands of people.

So he had to go outdoors to preach.

And there was a place that he preached called the Whitefield Rock.

You can find it on YouTube.

So I decided one time that I would do a little presentation on the Whitefield Rock.

And I spoke 30 minutes with a little bit of a biographical sketch of Whitefield, and then I preached the gospel after that for about 30 minutes with a crowd of people that had been invited to.

To come to that presentation.

Amen.

Did they call you Gary George Whitfield?

Well, the only thing I have in common with George Whitfield is the name George.

All right, well, amen.

Well, you have a few more things in common.

You have the same heavenly Father, the same Savior, and the same power of the Holy Spirit, except his voice carried a little further than probably yours and mine combined.

Absolutely did.

Amen.

And so then you went on to.

And you pastored a church in Worcester as well?

Yeah, in the Worcester.

Worcester county in a town called Southbridge for almost 34 years.

But now I've been doing a lot of quite.

Putting quite a bit of emphasis on outdoor evangelism, working with homeless people, addicts, poor people down and outers.

So each.

Each week I get in one particular.

I go two different places in the city of Worcester.

And in one of the places, there are hundreds of people that are gathered there at a soup kitchen.

And I've had the opportunity to preach inside it and outside with a PA system, with authorization from the police department with a PA system.

So it's just been a real open door here.

That's so exciting.

And I just enjoy Every minute of it.

Amen.

But you've always evangelized.

Like you didn't just start this, you've been evangelizing for over 30 years as a pastor as well.

Yeah.

When I was first saved and shortly married thereafter I had an apartment four blocks from City hall and the downtown Worcester, which people don't know this, but it's the second most populated city in New England with Boston being first, Worcester second.

Then you've got cities like Springfield, Mass, Hartford and Providence.

But Worcester is well over 200,000 people in the city.

So the downtown area was always heavily populated with bus traffic and foot traffic, etc.

So since I lived only four blocks away, I would make frequent trips walking alone downtown, handing out gospel tracts, street preaching, etc.

Etc.

Having Bible studies in my own home and wherever opportunities were open for me.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, I, I find it amazing, surprising and somewhat rare that there is, there are pastors that go out and evangelize.

And the reason I say that is because most of the pastors that I know, and this is not a put down in any way don't go out to the streets.

And matter of fact, a fellow friend that, that we share and my co pastor, or I'm his co pastor anyway, we call back to the church at Grace Baptist in Woodhaven.

Peter Nicotra.

I met him outside of Yankee Stadium when Joe Olsteen was preaching a false gospel on the inside.

I set up an outreach with a friend of mine named Al Yerks who works with Todd Friel of Wretched Radio.

I met my friend Al there for the first time because we did everything on the phone and that day just brought people with me there and Pastor Peter Nacocha was there and when I spoke to him and he told me he was a pastor of a church and I said and you're out here evangelizing and, and that just, I mean, it gripped my heart.

And the church that I was going to at that moment was an assembly of God Pentecostal church.

That pastor did not want me to invite anybody from the church to go and share the gospel because in his words, he thought that Osteen gave the milk, although he didn't really like him.

And then people would hear real good preaching and get the meat.

I told him I thought Osteen didn't give the milk, he gave the poison.

And so I said, out of respect for your office as the pastor, I will not ask anybody from this church to come with me.

But I have committed to go and I need to keep my Word to doing that.

And so he was fine with that.

And that day I didn't realize I was stepping out of that church and going to be stepping into Grace Baptist Church where I've been for the last.

What sick.

Now it's going on 16 years.

So that reminds me of the time when, when Benny Hinn was in Worcester at our auditorium that fits about 16,000 people.

I went down there for evangelistic purposes the two nights that he was there and I held up a sign, me and some other, I guess some other brothers to go.

There were about five of us and one of the signs said don't give a penny to Benny.

And the other sign said, Benny, stop hindering the truth.

And oh, I had a bunch of Pentecostals gather around me.

They were trying to cast demons out of me.

And we were handing out gospel literature that we had written up ourselves with a picture of Benny Hinn on with a, in a white suit saying Benny Hinn the prophet.

Then when you open it up, it.

We had all the examples of the false prophecies of Benny Hinn who tried to expose him and warn people, especially those that were maybe really children of God, to, you know, have ears to hear the truth and, and be aware of the errors that were being taught.

I ended up, you know, going in, I won't go into all the details, but yeah, it was quite interesting.

Two days as I went into, I went in to listen to it and I went right up behind him and, and I observed everything that was taking place just so that I have a bird's eye view of what goes on.

And I really, you know, put my binoculars on so I could see everything carefully.

Amen.

Well, listen brother, I'm just, just warning you, I think I locked you in for two more podcasts.

We're going to do one on orthodoxy with you hopefully, and one on false, another one of false teachers.

So we'll, we'll table those for right now because I'm looking forward to them.

Less.

Less we run in another direction, but to our listeners just real quick.

And I'll mention this again at the end to the tens and tens of people who turning tune into our podcast.

Please check out our videos from the third annual contending conference at the Grace Baptist Church Woodhaven YouTube channel, also at our sermon audio page as well.

And join us June 27th at Union Square 11am to 4pm for the new York City Evangelism Invasion where biblically like minded churches will join hands in sharing the gospel.

All right, so let's get into Our.

Let's get into the meat of our topic today.

So George Whitfield and I. I guess we can't say the name George Whitfield without talking about words like revival or awakening.

If I said, what is a revival or an awakening?

Are they the same thing?

Are they interchangeable words?

That's a good question.

You know, I mean, individual people could be awakened.

Of course, a revival has a broader, I guess you could say a broader intent, wider and more consistent, maybe in the spread of the message that's bringing light to the people that sit in darkness.

So, yeah, I mean, revival and awakening certainly go together.

If you're going to have a true revival, you're going to have to have a true awakening.

And that's something that can't be manufactured.

As hard as we may plan, as marketable as we might make our presentations and all the things that go along with it.

That's not what's going to bring on a weight a revival.

It's going to be the work of the Holy Spirit of God.

And that's where George Whitfield, I think, is a perfect example of a tool in God's hand whose intent was to awaken many people.

And after all of those awakenings, it can rightly be said that a revival broke out.

Amen.

Amen.

Yeah, I mean, I grew up in a tradition where they were advertising revival, and revival was on certain days of the week, there were signs, you know, and correspondence put out, and the church filled up with people from the town, neighboring towns.

Right.

And the pastor held up 600 cards and said, look, we have 600 decisions for Christ.

But, like, when I looked around, the church did not grow by 600 people, but he had 600 people that signed a card, prayed the prayer, walked the aisle, you know, did the repeat after me quote, unquote, sinners prayer.

But I mean, then it.

It went right back to everything.

Like it was because there was something happening in Brownsville, Pennsylvania, and they had this quote, unquote, evangelist and a pastor.

And this pastor that I was going to the church actually did my internship there.

He just tried to duplicate what he thought was going on there.

So it was like he went to Pensacola, Florida, and to the Brownsville Church, and he tried to, like, scoop the water there and pour it out in the area that the town I grew up in.

Well, I mean, as far as where the church was, and just try to duplicate the exact process.

So if the church in Florida blew the shofar, he blew the shofar.

If they played a certain song, he played the certain song and you know, it was like he was trying to get the formula which, I mean the formula that was happening over there wasn't, wasn't a genuine thing either because I went and visited there and I just saw just craziness over there.

Now would you say something like Pentecost was a revival?

Well, I mean, yeah, 3,000 souls.

I would certainly say so.

While Peter, you know, was speaking, of course, conviction sets in the souls of men who are saying, men and brethren, what shall we do?

And obviously, you know, Peter's words repent and to believe the gospel etc results.

And they that gladly received his word were baptized in the same day, were added unto them 3,000 souls.

So that's miraculous.

It is for that kind of grand opening for the age of the New Testament church.

Absolutely.

Have to be considered the greatest probably of all revivals in, at any one time in, in the history of mankind.

Do you think that there's one maybe in the Old Testament that might quote, unquote, top that?

And that would be in Nineveh?

Yeah, I mean Jesus said they repented at the preaching of Jonah and he.

Didn't even want to go there.

Yeah, but a greater than Jonah is here.

But yeah, and he only said eight words that are recorded.

It says yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown.

So there must have been some kind of outpouring of the spirit, you know, for the king to disrobe himself and put on sackcloth and to demonstrate humility and repentance.

I mean, Jesus says that Jonah preached repentance to the Ninevites.

So there was obviously a work of God that went in, in a foreign country, which was really unusual for that to occur when Israel was God's exclusive people.

Yes, yes.

And, and therefore, like you said, it has to be a work of God.

Jonah didn't put posters up or anything like that, you know, revival coming and, and he didn't even want to be there.

But he was obedient to what God told him to do.

And God poured out his spirit.

And I believe that according to like John MacArthur, there could have been up to like 600,000 people that were there.

And that was a huge metropolis of that day.

They were kind of like the modern day ISIS or hamas.

They, they were like the vigilantes of the world, the terrorists of the ancient world.

And God saved them and made them his own.

Yeah, I mean, just like, just like the Corinthians when Paul went there with much fear and trembling and again, you know, the word came in power and the Holy Ghost and much assurance.

And when that happens, look out.

Heaven comes down and glory fills the soul.

Amen.

That's what makes the child of God.

And then the fruits come forth from that new birth, which is something that Whitfield was very much aware of, along with Jonathan Edwards.

As you know, Edwards wrote a book about charity and its fruits.

And he was very concerned about emotionalism becoming sort of a facsimile for what was genuine conversion.

And he wanted to be sure that it was out there, that not everyone that says Lord, Lord with their mouth is necessarily Christ, but the life that's lived, the sanctifying life of a genuine believer will be evident that that person is truly born of the Spirit.

Yeah, because when I was doing my internship at this church and they had the quote, unquote, revival meetings, people were falling down and all of this stuff.

And I started to question and say, like, is this really a move of the Spirit?

And then eventually I went on to study every place in the Bible that someone fell down and the reason, the background.

And.

And I was told by a pastor, you're too much of a word man, not enough of a spirit man.

He said, you're too much.

You're too concerned about the position of the body on the floor than the heart.

And, I mean, he basically said to me, you know, you're trying to make sense of this by reading your Bible, which is what we're supposed to do, test the spirits.

So, needless to say, we don't do ministry together anymore.

Now, when you.

So there's these periods in history.

There was Pentecost, there was Nineveh.

What about this period in history called the Great Awakening, or I guess we would say the First Great Awakening.

Yes, this.

This came probably, we could maybe say the start of it was Jonathan Edwards, who was pastoring in Northampton, which is about one hour or less from where I live now, was preaching the Word, simply preaching the Word faithfully, in converts, out of a clear blue, so to speak, people getting saved, 20 on a Sunday, 200 after week after week, it was growing.

And then later in a few years later, that's when George Whitfield appeared on the scene in the New England area.

He first began in Boston, then he moved his way westerly, like I said.

He came to Worcester, Leicester, Brookfield, and he wound up at Jonathan Edwards Church.

And they said that when he preached that Jonathan Edwards weeped through most of his sermon, and his wife thought his oratory ability was over the top, and that the man spoke with such power and Unction that she was amazed that a man could be so filled with the spirit and preach with such conviction.

And people were getting saved.

Going back to Boston, he preached in the Boston common again.

Word was always spread.

Boston had two newspapers at the time.

Word was passed around by word of mouth and through the newspapers that Whitefield was in town and he shows up at the Boston common.

At that time, Boston's population, which was the biggest city in America at the time, had 17,000 people.

And they said 23,000 people showed up at the Boston common to hear him preach.

The conclusion of it was that 20 different ministers admitted that.

That after Whitefield's visit, in preaching on the new birth, that they attributed their conversions to that preaching into nothing prior to that.

So they were dead men preaching to dead men.

And through the gospel preached by George Witchfield, they became born again, saved people.

A group of newspaper reporters gathered around Whitefield, about four or five of them.

And one of the newspaper reporters said to him, Mr. Whitfield, Reverend Whitfield, why do you keep preaching that people must be born again?

And he put his finger out and he pointed it in the direction of every one of those reporters and said, the reason why a preacher must be born again?

And he's looking and turning his body with his finger pointing in their fingers and saying, because ye must be born again.

Primary preaching, it was about the necessity of the new birth.

Except he be converted and become like little children.

You shall not enter into the kingdom of God.

He was emphatic about that.

Yeah, yeah.

And.

And we must be.

Matter of fact, I was working upstate yesterday, about an hour north, and there was a Christian festival next door to where I was working.

I went over to it.

It was pentecostal in nature.

I spoke to some of the people over there, and I was emphasizing regeneration, you know, preceding repentance and faith.

It seemed like they never heard of such a thing.

Oh, I know.

It's being missed.

It's being missed.

Yes.

And I saw.

I show him.

I said, well, why.

Why in John 3 does.

Does the new birth precede you?

John 3:16.

I mean, it's.

There is.

There's an order here for a reason.

How can a dead man repent?

How could Lazarus have called himself out of the tomb?

He couldn't have.

And then they try to go to the prodigal.

And I said, well, let's read the first two verses of Luke 15 about the prodigal.

And then, you know, I said.

And it was great because the wind, a huge gust of wind came at this moment.

And so.

And I said, you see this verse where it says the wind blows where it pleases?

I said, the wind that just blew.

Did you.

Did you make that happen?

But you felt it, right?

It was just.

It was.

It was blown upon you.

That's what the new birth is.

It blows upon you.

The thieves on the cross, they mock Jesus.

All of a sudden, the wind blew upon one and not the other.

He realized Jesus was a king.

And he said, remember me when you come into your kingdom.

And Jesus said, today you'll be with me in paradise.

So I. I was emphasizing the new birth.

As I went through this, one of the ladies admitted, well, she called God Yehuda.

And then of.

As I went down the line, I was speaking about Jesus as God.

She goes, jesus isn't God.

And so the pastor of her church didn't even realize that she didn't believe Jesus was God.

Therefore she was an unsaved woman.

And here I am, I'm coming in from the city, and.

And he, like.

Like he didn't know.

Shame on him.

So, yeah, it was.

It was something.

Now, when you think about what an evangelist is, I know that Ephesians is one of the passages that tells us that he gave some to be.

And then it lists apostles, prophets, evangelists, and then shepherds and teachers, or hence teaching shepherds.

And then it says to equip the saints for the work of the ministry and build up the body of Christ.

So I know pastors are to preach and equip the saints for the building of Christ, a building up of the body, and.

And to.

To have the saints do the work of the ministry.

How does that relate to the evangelist as well?

Because I think that some people think, well, the evangelist is.

Is only the one in the church who's kind of, you know, a little bit of an oddball.

And they go out and nobody goes out with them, and they go out and preach the gospel.

But this connection to equipping the saints for the work of the ministry, couldn't you speak to that for us?

Yeah, well, you know, Paul writes to Timothy, Timid Timothy, yes.

And he tells them that we have not received the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of sign mind.

And he goes on to say to Timothy, do the work of an evangelist.

Now, certainly certain people are gifted with the gift of evangelism as well as pastors and teachers.

Like, it's been said that the evangelist has the hook, the pastor has the crook, and the teacher has the book.

So you need all the Hook the crook in the book to really equip the saints so that they in turn can go out and do the work themselves.

And when you read the book of Acts carefully, it's not Peter and John and Paul that are doing the evangelizing, only you'll see the multitudes.

They go out everywhere proclaiming the gospel.

As a matter of fact, after Stephen's stoning, it says many were scattered except the.

What?

Apostles.

And they were the ones who were told, you'll receive power after the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you'll be witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria.

And to the end, they didn't even leave Jerusalem until they heard that the Samaritans, you know, were receiving the Word.

And then they had to go up and inspect it and discover that, yes, even the Gentiles, God is reaching in the Holy Spirit is an evidence to us that these are truly children of God.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, I. I know that you know this name, Ray Comfort, all right?

And he likens the evangelist.

He.

He speaks about a flock of sheep, and he says, you see that man?

That's the shepherd.

And he said, you see the sheepdog?

That's the evangelist.

So we got the hook, the book and the crook, and now the sheepdog.

All right, so who's George Whitfield?

You.

You touched a little bit about why you became interested in his.

In his life and ministry.

Yeah.

Well, Whitfield was born in Gloucester, England, and his parents owned an inn called the Bells Inn, and he worked there.

His father died when he was 2, but his mother maintained the hotel and a lot of the guests that they had happened to be persons who were actors in the theater.

And George Whitefield at a young age was very infatuated with actors and the way in which they would present themselves, their oratory presentations, their animations, et cetera.

And he would even try to imitate them on his own.

He would go to the theater, sometimes sneak in so he could watch them.

He was very impressed with them.

Well, anyway, his family wanted him to get an education, so they send him to Pembroke, which was a college within the college, I believe, of Oxford University that we know now.

And that's where he was introduced to Charles Wesley, who invited him to go to breakfast with him one day.

And he saw how serious George Whitefield was as a young man about religion.

And Whitefield at that time was extremely disciplined.

He was very emaciated from fasting long periods of time.

Historians actually think that he damaged his own physical body internally because he starved Himself so much he didn't allow his body to have the nutrients and he had to live with pain, internal stomach type pains for the rest of his life.

Well, anyway, Wesley, Charles that is, invited him to come along and attend the meetings that were held by the Holy Club.

Yes, as the Methodist.

And during that course of time, Charles Wesley had handed to George Whitefield the book by Henry Scoogle called the Life of God and the Soul of Man.

And that was medicine to his soul because he read it and there he says that light dawned into his heart and he understood the Gospel at that point and onwards.

And as a matter of fact, you could say that he became saved even before the Wesleys were saved.

I've heard that they're evangelizing him, but he's the one that got saved first.

And then in due time, of course, the Lord works in both Charles and John Wesley, who are amazing ministers of the Gospel themselves through song, preaching, etc.

So you could say that of all of them, you know, this is a chosen vessel unto me, who the Lord.

You know, hand picked and used them mightily in their era and of course even to current times as we read his histories about the Wesleys and George Whitefield, etc.

So George Whitefield at that time, he was of course, which was very popular for anyone to be a part of the church which would have been the Church of England.

And when he had the opportunity to give his first message preaching, it says that he drove that 15 people, the languages went crazy over his preaching.

I mean that they, they, they, they never heard any preaching like that.

And then rumors started to spread about the kind of preaching that this Whitefield preached that was very uncommon, not only uncommon, unheard of basically among the church clergy, which were very stiff, they were very boring, they were dry.

There was no life in their preaching.

They were just simply doing a service for the people.

But Whitefield preached from his soul, inspired by the Holy Spirit.

And God used him in powerful ways from the outset.

He was ousted from the mainline churches.

They didn't want him in the buildings.

He decided he was going to go out in the fields and preach in the outdoors, praise the Lord.

Because that opened a whole arena for the future evangelistic movement that I think is even in our current time because of George Whitefield and how God sent him out, if you will, into the highways and byways.

And he would preach anywhere we could get on a rock, stand on a scaffold.

He had his own mobile Pulpit that he brought with him.

He preached to the poor, to the weak, to the miners, wherever there were people populated.

He managed to find those spots.

And he preached boldly the gospel and he paid a price for it.

He was beaten up.

He had rotten tomatoes, rotten eggs thrown at him, body parts of animals that were cut up and thrown at him, feces, you name it.

I could go on and on, and how badly he was treated.

They hired bands sometimes to play music right next to his evangelistic campaign night to try to drown out his preaching.

So it wasn't.

It wasn't like everybody was like, oh, George Whitfield, he's our hero.

Some of them hated his guts and they wanted to murder him, so to speak.

But God preserved his life in many different ways.

Yeah, yeah, I heard that.

Yeah.

Some people, they.

He's.

I think he said, and I quote, I was honored today by having a.

Through a few dead cats thrown at me.

And one preacher said, the problem with preachers today is nobody wants to kill them.

Right, right, right.

Because, I mean there.

Many are not actually making much of an impact.

Well, you know, there was a comment that was made by one of.

I believe it was one of the actors who said this about Whitfield.

He said, you know, actors speak imaginary things like they are true, but ministers speak things that are true as if they are imaginary.

And then like Benjamin Franklin said, there's no man alive on earth, he said, that can awaken people like Benjamin Franklin did.

His exact quote was, he said, there is hardly another minister of the gospel alive who can bring to life the truth and relevancy of the scriptures.

And then he goes on to say about himself almost, he persuadeth me to be a Christian.

Wow.

Quote from Benjamin Franklin.

They were friends.

They became.

They became very affectionate friends for many years.

Although Benjamin Franklin still maintained the Bible wasn't inspired and Jesus wasn't risen from the dead.

So he.

He never threw his lot in with the gospel.

He loved the oratory gifting that Whitefield had, but he never could bow the knee to the gospel in his heart, unfortunately.

But there was an impact though from Whitefield preaching upon Benjamin in a way that produce some effect on his political outlook on America.

That had been very profitable down the line.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, it just goes to show you, sort of like Judas, Judas walked closely to the greatest preacher in the world, heard the sermon, saw the miracles and was never converted.

And Benjamin Franklin walked close to, if you will, the greatest preacher at the time in, in George Whitfield even befriended him and ultimately Never bowed his knee to the savior that his friend preached about.

And so it's not as preachers, we don't just want to get through our sermons.

We want our sermons to get through people.

So now, now, now, Whitfield, he made this portable pulpit.

He rode by horseback primarily or walked or took ferries.

He would travel hundreds and hundreds of miles on the east coast.

He made seven visits to the United States from England, as well as going to Scotland and other countries too.

And he would even utilize the people on the boat as candidates for hearing the gospel.

So he would preach on the ships as well, which at that time took two to three weeks and oftentimes was a dangerous endeavor to cross the seas from there to here.

So when he would arrive, of course, you know, there was not the kind of transportation we have today, but the ones that were available to him.

And as a matter of fact, he didn't go empty handed either.

You know, I often wondered, like, what did he read?

And I've discovered in my readings that he carried everywhere he went, Matthew Henry's Commentaries with him wherever we met.

So Matthew Henry had a big impact on him devotionally.

And that's why Whitefield was not just a fire and brimstone preacher when he preached.

Much of the time of his preaching was in tears.

He said, I weep for you because you don't weep for yourselves.

I mean, we don't have preachers like that today, brother.

Something's wrong with us.

I haven't embraced the realities of hell enough.

And I confess that to the Lord.

If I did, I think I would be shedding tears as well for people.

When we read stories like Jesus tells us of the rich man in hell, was pleading with Abraham to go to his five brothers and witness to them, testify to them, lest they come to this place of torment.

So we can't ignore the realities of the afterlife in our preaching.

And certainly Whitfield had a great grasp of the error beyond the graves.

Yeah.

Amen.

Amen.

And, and he, he, he sort of.

There was like marketing that went out about when he was coming into town, right?

Was, did he, did he spearhead that?

Did others spearhead that?

That was one of the reasons why he wanted to meet Benjamin Franklin, because Franklin had a very.

It was new, but it was a prosperous and widely read newspaper.

And he acquainted himself with Whitfield, I mean, with, with Franklin, so that he could introduce to him, you know, his purposes of coming to America and what his intentions were.

And he won over Franklin's favor and he began to publicize his sermons and his writing and also his travels and other newspapers picked up on that as well.

So that when Whitfield went to certain places that were basically small, populated places as well.

But then when they heard through the writings of newspapers that Whitfield's arrival was expected on such and such a day, they would come from even 40, 50 miles, either on horseback.

Some of them walked for tens of miles to get to where Whitefield was so that they could hear him.

He broke down the barriers.

This is very important for us to understand.

He broke down the barriers of sectarianism.

So it wasn't like the Presbyterians, you know, would go just to the Presbyterian Church or the Baptist to the Baptist or the congregation or the Church of England people, to the Anglican Church or whatever.

This was a gospel for all.

And all people began to realize the oneness that the gospel brought to the lives of people that united them to the Lord, number one, and to one another.

And church membership was not.

Not that it is insignificant is important.

But in the bottom line, the vitality of the gospel is to bring life into the soul of people.

That allows them now a union with fellow believers, and they become one family of God upon earth.

And that was why so many attended without hesitance, because of the way in which the gospel was preached so freely and without any roadblocks to sectarian doctrinal standards.

He didn't get into that.

That wasn't his.

His angle, though.

He was very strong on his doctrinal positions, but his primary goal was evangelizing.

Right?

Right.

And, I mean, he was Calvinistic, I believe, because I think Wesley came after him with that.

And he said, wesley, like.

Like, leave this issue alone.

You're gonna.

You're gonna.

You're gonna tear.

What's going on?

Well, they exchanged, you know, various communications.

I want to say that Whitfield's responses are always respectful and kind.

He's been a wonderful example to me, brother, about how I need to tame my temper, my tongue and my words, either in writing or in voice.

And he respected him.

He was an older man.

He was about.

I believe he was a left.

John Wesley was 11 years older than George Whitefield, and he highly respected him.

He disagreed with him to the T, no question about it.

But he nevertheless spoke kind words but faithful words to Wesley.

Wesley, as you know, ended up doing his funeral and spoke with the highest accolades, imaginary, about any person that could have been said.

And so they became friendly, you could say.

And, of course, they each had their own ministries and God was using them Equally in many ways.

I would never want to put down the effects of John Wesley's ministry.

As a matter of fact, John Wesley's preaching back then would be like soft Calvinist today maybe in some ways.

Right.

He preached righteousness, temperance and judgment to come.

He was not, you could say the typical modern day Arminian of our days.

Not even close.

He preached repentance just like Whitefield would preach repentance and powerfully as well.

But there was just differences on.

So I don't really think the gospel was affected.

Like Whitefield never said, well I don't know if I can preach to you because I'm not sure you're an elect.

He never looked at people in some hindering way as if, well maybe the Lord hasn't predestined you.

Not at all.

He preached to all men everywhere freely without any kind of pre, pre determined expectation of who was who.

The gospel went unto all and it was upon all who ever believed.

Yeah, Amen.

Well, I mean that is definitely a practice, you know, because obviously you know, we have some differences with other believers and things like that, but keeping the main thing, the main thing and even where we disagree we don't have to hammer the other person.

And again you mentioned that his, his, the, his, his thrust was preaching the new birth.

And, and as you mentioned with the reporters I researched, a lady came and said, Mr. Whitfield, why do you keep telling us we must be born again?

And you know, in character he did the same thing.

He said woman, because you must be born again.

And you know, do you think today many preachers are preaching the new birth?

No, unfortunately not.

I mean I can't say that I know everything about every preacher that's preaching out there.

Sure.

I think we are losing the realities of what a gospel presentation should contain.

If we're not preaching righteousness and a judgment to come, like Paul when he spoke to Felix of righteousness and self control and judgment to come, then I think we are shortchanging the gospel.

We are misleading people and we've got to be more faithful to what is the gospel.

I don't think people quote enough of God's word.

I'm talking about preachers now.

Yes.

The word of God is what is life giving and powerful and sharper than any two edged sword.

It says, while Peter yet spake these words.

What words?

The next Verse says, while Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Spirit fell on them which heard the word.

So it's the word that contains the power.

So Paul preached the word.

He says to Thessalonians, when you receive the word of God which you heard of us, you received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth the word of God which affliction effectually worketh in you also that believe first.

Thessalonians 2:13.

So I want to, as a preacher, believe that God's word contains the dunamis, the dynamite.

The Gospel of Christ is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes.

So when we're not emphasizing the importance of the written word that we're preaching and utilizing it in our presentations faithfully to hearers that don't know their Bible, they don't understand the gospel.

If we're softening and we're just talking about, oh, take Jesus into your heart, that's all you have to do is just say this prayer.

I've seen it over and over.

I work with about 30 different people that join me, and they come from different denominations.

I think they're learning.

I think they're observing things in my preaching, in my presentations, and the way in which I evangelize people, I'm hoping at least, and others too, with me, that are coming from a reformed perspective, that we.

That they see that we're not trying to soft pedal the gospel.

We're not trying to make.

We're not trying to add bodies to the.

To the body of Christ by just giving them a.

Well, an abc.

You just do this, this, and this.

Bingo.

When you're saved.

Not a formula.

I don't want like DL Moody, sword.

A drunk come out of a bar room, and he was walking towards DL Moody.

He recognized Moody and he said, hey, Mr. Moody, I'm one of your converts.

Mr. Moody says, you must be because you're not one of the lords, you know.

So we don't want to make converts after our own makings, you know, we've got to be faithful to the written word.

And I, for instance, have put together what I think are the top 26 most important evangelistic verses that every Christian should know, especially if they want to evangelize.

And when I.

Whenever I have told fellow believers about it, thankfully they're saying, brother Gary, could you send them to me?

I'd love to get them.

So I always want to encourage my brothers and sisters as well, to spread the gospel by the knowledge of the word that you know, and then you pass it on to people as truth in hopes that God will use the Word and in an electrifying way, if I can use that term, to awaken the souls of sinners.

Amen.

So to our listeners, what we're going to do is we're going to put those 26 verses in one link on our Soul Fishing Ministries website.

It will be under our tackle box, so you'll be able to access that as well.

You can go do that as soon as you pull your car over, or if you're at home, you can go and click on that and get that list and commit those verses to memory.

Amen.

Thank you for that resource, brother.

Now, I know that many people, they have this perspective that when we go out to evangelize, that we need to share our testimony.

Because in Revelation it says they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony.

And they think that that.

That speaks about their story.

Let me tell you about my story.

But that's not the word of the testimony that is being spoken here in Revelation.

Is.

Is our story going to save people?

Well, the only way it will is when it reflects the word of God.

Right.

Genuine it to be a conversion.

Like when Jesus said that the demoniac in Mark 5:19, go home to thy friends and tell them the great things the Lord has done for you.

Just like the Thessalonians.

They went everywhere and Paul said, I don't have to speak on your behalf.

You are witnesses yourself of the grace of God.

And the word about you has spread abroad to Macedonia and other places.

So our testimony is really the work of Christ in us.

Such were some of you, but now you wash.

But it's not about how powerful my testimony is.

It's how powerful Christ can work in the heart of a sinner like me.

I'm an example.

Can be the same for you if you're willing to sit and listen and say, speak, Lord.

And that's what we want to do.

We want to minister the Word in a way that every person is a candidate for conversion.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, his story is.

Is crucial.

And if we're not telling his story, the personal work of Christ, we're not giving.

We're not really giving a testimony.

Paul says we preach, not ourselves.

Yes.

Jesus the Lord, that's what we want to preach.

It's not about us, it's about him.

If I be lifted up, and I like to use that verse away, that's what we want to do, Lord.

We want to lift you up and we pray that the Holy Spirit will draw people to Calvary's cross and they'll behold the Lamb of God and believe in their heart that died.

He for me, for me.

For me who was dead in trespasses and sins.

He made me alive.

He shed his blood to wash me clean so I can become a child of a living God.

What a privilege.

We've got the best news that ears could hear on earth.

Well, that's right.

So one morning I was leaving the parking lot, going into the building, and one of my colleagues said, you know, how do you have so much energy in the morning?

And like, you know, you're zipping along already first thing in the morning.

She said, do you take pills in the morning?

I said to her, I said, I take one pill every morning.

It's called the Gospel.

Amen.

And it drives me all day long.

Yeah, I mean, this is me at 8 o' clock in the morning.

And now I want to just talk about here, Whitfield and his voice.

I mean, there was something unique about his voice.

And he had to have a providential voice.

And, and of course, Jonah would have had to have a voice that lifted through the streets of Nineveh.

Jesus would have to have a voice as he preached to the, you know, all of those.

The multitudes gathered to hear him.

Sometimes he.

He went out on a boat and he used it as a natural amphitheater.

He was up on a.

On a hillside as well.

What about George Whitfield's voice?

I mean, no amplification, right.

You know, later preachers use what was called a sounding board that they would erect behind them, and somehow the echo of their voice would project a louder sound for the hearers.

But Whitfield didn't have such a thing.

One, one commentator said that he had a lion like voice, quote, unquote, lion like voice.

I mean, when he spoke, it was a boomer.

I mean, he could have been a great, you know, football coach on the sidelines calling the place.

I mean, that's all I can say.

And keep in mind too, I mean, there were no airplanes flying overhead.

There were no buses driving by or vehicles that would, you know, douse out the sound or something like that.

So that was a benefit.

But still.

And they didn't.

You didn't have the concrete like we do today.

That helps also the volume of our voice.

I've preached many, many, many times without a PA system.

Before I can get a hold of one, like, please, I stick that microphone right down my throat almost so that the volume can, you know, be loud enough for everybody to be able to hear it.

So it was just simply a gift that the Lord had given to him for what was ahead in his lifetime.

Open air preaching, that was unheard of in those days.

Yeah, it was frowned upon by, by the clergy.

They looked at him as a renegade and they spoke evilly of him because he thought, they thought that he was desacralizing the church and Christianity and, and having psalms read and quotations, you know, from the confessional book, etc, they thought that was degrading.

Not at all.

You know, what did Jesus mean when he says go into all the world?

Whitfield is a proof of the realities of doing something like that.

Yeah.

So Benjamin Franklin actually did an experiment to see how far Whitfield's voice would carry and concluded that he was heard by over 30,000 people at one, at one time, because he was, you know, he was somewhat of a scientist, an inventor, Benjamin Franklin.

And so practically speaking, this 8th century preacher managed this kind of vocal power without modern amplification.

And if you're hearing this, we're actually going to be putting in for a permit for amplification with the NYPD for our New York City invasion outreach program.

Pray that that comes to pass.

If God would have that.

But now in, in today's day and age, do you think that many, even pastors, they almost devalue still to this day, open air preaching?

Well, I, I think they're too probably either embarrassed or feel incompetent to be able to preach the gospel to people that are not gathered to hear the gospel.

And I think it's probably insulting to people and it's coming across too rudely or roughly.

And I think in some cases, I think some open air preachers could use some lessons on how to present the gospel in a way that is not.

Is.

How could I use not so abrasive.

And I'm not saying that the gospel isn't offensive.

It is offensive, no doubt about it.

And we can't curtail the reality of that.

But I think we can present the word in a way that we can show to these people.

I get to preach to hundreds of people every week in open air.

It's amazing.

And I want them to know that I love them.

So I even want the tone of my voice to be such that it comes across in their ears not in a crass, harsh way, but something like a parent who's trying to guide their children in the right path.

And it's not because I'm not raising my Voice, I am speaking with volume, but I want to make it a volume that blended with a tone that people can sense that there's genuinity with this man.

He's not just preaching at us, he's preaching for us.

And that this man is on our side, he cares for us, he, he wants what's best for us.

So that's how I want to come across.

It sounds kind of idealistic.

We, you know, you can come across that way and yet be as bold as a lion at the same time.

But I think there is a balance there that I would like to see more often with open air preachers than what I have seen.

I've seen.

I saw an open air preacher who was preaching about maybe 25 yards away from me.

The police had warned them two different times, you're blocking traffic right here.

It was a busy street in front of a business.

And I went up to him and I said, hey brother, praise the Lord, you're preaching the gospel.

But like the police said, just move across the street, they can still hear you.

He says, no, God wants me to be right here.

He kept preaching loud and he was very, I think he was very over the top, so to speak.

Finally the priest came, they arrested him, put handcuffs, and then he started making a, almost like a big scene.

See everybody, I'm being persecuted.

Was like he was boasting that he was arrested in his church.

Denomination was making him out to be a big hero.

And I felt like saying, you were a fool, brother.

That's all you had to do was go across the street.

The police weren't against you, they were just warning you.

And the warning was that you can't do what you do.

Well, anyway, that just kind of, kind of a warning that I would say open air preachers need to have.

Yeah.

And you, you could imagine the amount of open air preachers we have in here in New York City.

Some people can do it, some people shouldn't do it, do it.

Like you said, some people are great abrasive.

I forgot who said it.

If they don't hear, if they don't see tears in your eyes, let them hear tears in your voice.

And so, yeah, I, I think that it is very easy to come across abrasive because you want to speak righteousness and stand for righteousness, but at the same time, I mean, Jesus wept over Jerusalem.

He saw them as sheep without a sheep, shepherd.

And so I guess the illustration, and I think I probably heard this from John Piper.

We have to be like steel wrapped in velvet.

And so There has to be this, this boldness that I'm, I'm gonna give it to you straight, but like I'm, I'm trying to like, wrap my arms around you because like I'm trying to embrace you with the gospel, not beat you to death with it.

And so I think the way that we come across as winsome, not compromising, not, not sloppy, agape, we're not compromising, but we certainly want a love because that is supposed, that is to propel us.

Love is to propel us.

Because I mean, I mean, again, Jonah went and he didn't even want to be there.

I, I don't, I don't know what amount of love was, was spewing from him.

I, I know he loved the Lord because he did obey the Lord, but at the end of the day, it didn't seem like he loved the people and did not see the Ninevites became his brothers and sisters in Christ.

He, he, he rejected that idea.

And I think that many open air preachers today, they, they're, they're well meaning.

And perhaps some pastors see open air preachers like the, like the embarrassing uncle that makes, you know, gas sounds with his armpit at the family reunion, they kind of see the open air preacher is the embarrassment.

And I heard somebody say, you know, the, the evangelist.

Because a lot of people that I meet that call themselves evangelists, they're, they're disconnected from a local church.

And so I think the evangelist needs the local church and the.

No.

And the local church needs the evangelist and, and they ought to work together because sometimes evangelists on the streets, they have no church and they have just terrible theology because there's no accountability in their life, no theological discipleship going on.

Yeah, one verse I just want to throw in Phil, at the end of what we're talking about at the moment.

And that's in Acts chapter 14 when Paul preached in Iconium, it says they so spoke, or they spoke in such a way that multitudes believe both of Jews and of the Greeks.

So what does that mean?

They so spoke that the King James or EFC spoke in such a way.

What is that in such a way?

And I think that's what we, we open air preachers need to learn what it means to speak in such a way.

Yeah.

Acts x 17.

Paul used the tomb of the unknown God as a springboard to preach the gospel.

Philip ran after the Ethiopian eunuch and he heard him reading from the scroll of Isaiah.

And he, and he sat down with him, him and, and he.

And he opened his mouth and he began to preach Jesus to him.

And so, I mean the man was going, he was going to the temple to worship God, but he didn't know that God he was going to worship per se.

And so Philip came alongside of him and, and, and of course, the greatest preacher of all was Jesus Christ.

And we see the way he interacted with people and we have to realize sometimes people will walk away from us just like they walked away from Jesus.

Jesus.

And he even called Judas's friend.

Amen.

Good point, brother.

He called Judas's friend and the rich young ruler, it said, you know, he, he walked away saddened for he had great wealth.

And the picture there is he walked out be as he was standing before Jesus.

He walked out from a sunny day into a storm, into dark storm clouds.

And I, I, Yeah, I mean First Corinthians 13 can, can certainly be something that we can read as we go out and, and evangelize.

Sure.

Let me ask you just a few wrap up questions.

All right, here's one sort of projecting.

If Whitfield was alive today in the 21st century, how do you think that his message would be received and what do you think would be happening on like social media, podcasts, YouTube?

Yeah, well, I think if a serious Christian who has a real ear for the gospel would appreciate the kind of, not just a voice, not the way he pronounced words, but also it's something we didn't mention was his animation, his body spoke.

If you had time to listen to what he said, you'd have an easier time to watch the way he moved because his body spoke words to people.

And I think that's something too, that would be important for us today if we really believe what we're preaching.

I mean, I get it.

I know there's Jonathan Edwards out there that stand like mannequins at the pulpit and it's the word, no matter how it's presented, soft tone, loud tone, extemporaneously, manuscript wise, whatever.

It's the word, it's the accent always will be sharp and it will accomplish its end.

But I think it's wise for us to understand and try to answer your question as well understand the difference between Whitfield's era and our era.

You know, I think if Whitfield came today, yeah, he would, I don't want, he would never shortchange the gospel.

He would never compromise all the facts and truths and the hard truths of the gospel, but he would present it in a way that would be appropriate for modern day listeners.

That they could relate to.

He would speak in Koine English, so to speak the language of the people.

So I made the mistake, and this is kind of a confession when I.

And I got absorbed in Whitefield right off the bat by my brother, Cecil Moody Patstone, who put these books in front of me, and I loved them.

And I tried to preach like Whitfield, but people were turned off because I was using the V's and the dolls and some of his quotations that would have been very appropriate and relevant for his audience, but they wouldn't be for the drunkards downtown and the dope addicts and the poor street people and the shoppers and whatnot.

They need to hear.

They need to hear the word in their own lingo, you know, so that they can connect.

So I think George Whitefield would make the appropriate adjustment to be able to be as powerful today as he was back then, with only God's help being the real source of the energy.

Amen.

Now, you saw the movie A Great Awakening.

You recommend it?

Highly, Highly, highly.

Of all the movies that have been out there in movie theaters, this, I would say, is at the very top.

It's not perfect, but there's enough of the gospel.

There's enough truth about, really, the new birth and what it meant.

The way they handled Benjamin Franklin, who was sort of a central character, maybe in some ways more so than Whitfield.

I didn't expect that twist, but I think that from a Hollywood's perspective, that that was probably a right way to go to get more viewers.

And I do think that Whitfield did have an impact on him other than just the gospel that he utilized in the political arena.

But, boy, I mean, there were some moving scenes.

I was in tears myself watching some of those things, and I was so excited.

I'm like, praise the Lord.

I wish this movie could be seen by 340 million people in America, you know, because it was.

It was bringing the Bible right into the living room, you know, and this is how it was.

And sometimes people who hear the gospel the first time, they're like, I never heard anything like that.

We have a lady coming to our church right now.

Her name's Diane.

And I preached a few weeks ago with a heavy emphasis on the gospel.

And afterwards she said, you know, I never heard anything like this.

She said, I was brought up as a Catholic.

I never heard this thing about being born again and being saved.

And I said, honey, keep reading the gospel.

Keep reading the Gospel of John.

Keep coming to church.

And she came again Today she's come like nine out of the last ten Sundays.

So that's.

That's my example.

Amen.

Amen.

Get.

Get to the wit.

Get to that movie.

Matter of fact, I was talking to a sister this morning in church.

You brought up.

I said I had the same idea.

Once that movie comes out in a DVD or whatever, however, we can broadcast it in our church building, put it up on a big screen and invite everybody under the.

Summon some.

It's out.

It's out.

You can.

Yeah, it's out on itunes.

It's out on Prime Video.

I don't know if they have the DVD yet, but it's out.

We're gonna do a movie night with it.

We haven't planned that yet, but that's.

That's in the works for.

Yeah, for sure.

You know, my favorite scene in the movie was when he was in the church building.

He took the wig off.

I don't know what's up with those wigs.

I mean, that's not my style English.

That's England for you, but go ahead.

Yeah, it's England for you, right?

He.

He.

He takes the wigs off and he basically says, if you want to sit here listening to dead sermons by dead men, stay here.

But if you want to hear the truth of the gospel, I'm going, and I'm bringing it out.

You must be born again.

And he just belted it out.

And that was like.

I mean, that scene, it was like that catapulted him out and then from there, he never looked back.

That.

That.

We need men like.

That we need men that are.

Just say, I'm going.

If no one goes with me, I'm going alone.

And.

And I mean, I just love that.

That.

That was like my.

My favorite scene.

I don't know if you had a favorite scene, but that was.

There were so many of them.

I love the one that you just referenced.

So I'm good to go with that one, brother.

That was awesome scene, too.

Yeah.

And I actually.

I actually looked up on like an AI thing.

How do you.

How do you build a portable pulpit like George Whitfield?

And it gave me instructions on how to.

How to make the same.

Yeah, that was a cool pulpit that he made.

I've seen a matter of fact, if I'm not mistaken, you're a New York City boy.

That pulpit is in Manhattan somewhere.

Is it?

Yeah, I try.

I wish I could tell you.

If it's in a museum, you'd have to look it up and say, where is George Whitfield's?

Pulpit.

Portable pulpit.

I'm gonna look that up.

I have the whole summer off.

If I go there, I'm sending you a picture with me right next to it.

Or stand on it and hold your hand up like that's it.

I'm not wearing the wig though, unless they have it there.

Massachusetts.

And see where he was buried, that's another place you can stand in the pulpit where he preached.

Is that an invitation to visit you this summer, brother?

Yeah.

Come and do some open air preaching with us for sure.

All right.

I think I might be able to do that.

I have the whole summer off.

Right.

I got eight weeks off and I'm only going to vacation for one of them.

So I think you might be seeing me this summer.

I would love and be honored to go out open air preaching with you.

Amen.

Amen.

And do you think.

Let me just ask this one question.

If.

Is there any misconceptions about Whitfield that you would just erase from the history books?

Because I mean, he even had utilized slaves.

Right?

He utilized slaves for a time, you.

Know, and I'm not an expert in this cat in this category at all.

But sometimes you have to look at people through the lens of the days.

That they live, the times that they lived in.

Yeah.

Whitfield was very compassionate to the black people who were told sometimes by white people that they didn't even have souls.

But Whitefield emphasized that we are the same people.

You like us, we have souls.

You have a soul that he treated them with reverence.

He hired them, he utilized them.

I think he prospered them.

I don't think he looked down on them in any kind of racist way as we would think.

Hey, so I think that's a bad rap that he got on that end.

I think because he also tried to raise money for.

For the orphanage that he started that although the Wesley's tried to get one going, but he ended up really being the one that planted that orphanage, which I believe it's.

It's still there in Savannah, Georgia.

But he would travel in his travels.

He would.

What we would do today, take like love offerings.

But the offer goes strictly for that.

That would be one thing.

And he also, by the way we didn't mention is he was instrumental in the starting of the University of Pennsylvania College and Princeton University.

He had Jonathan.

Jonathan Edwards was one of the.

He was the.

An early president after Aaron, which was his brother in law.

Unfortunately, he died from a vaccine for smallpox that he died from.

But yeah, so George Whitfield was An educator as well.

I mean he was well rounded but man, he gave his life to the gospel.

He would preach somewhere between four and six hours each day and sometimes he would preach four hours non stop.

I mean I think I've done two, maybe a little over two in open air sometimes I can, I can.

But four hours, wow.

He preached the day that his son's funeral was who died at the age of 4 months old.

It was just, just, just an infant.

He died in infancy.

And as a matter of fact Whitfield was preaching in the open air when the, when the church bell went off for the funeral to start.

So we went from the open air into the church and he preached at his son's funeral and says the Lord cut my flower down was the way he describes the loss of his childhearted.

Tenderhearted.

Yeah.

Amen.

Amen.

Now do you have a website or anything like that that people can go.

To or I mean of course if they wanted to hear any of my sermons they could go to our church website.

I don't record any of my open air preaching.

What's the name of your church?

It's, the address would be Sovereign Grace Matt.

Org and I'm not currently the lead pastor.

I'm not the pastor so to speak of the church.

I'm a pastor emeritus.

You could emeritus.

Continuing to do many of the same things that I did before.

And of course like you said, you don't find many pastors that are evangelists.

When I was first hired in the church, one of the lead men there said brother, you can't be doing all this evangelizing and pastoring at the same time.

Well then I said you're going to have to find another pastor because I'm not giving up evangelizing, you know.

Right, right.

I, I, I, I see that they're complimentary, you know.

Yes.

But I have the hook and then someone's got to have the book.

So, and the, so I, I tried to have all of them, you know, hook them in and then teach them and lead them with the book and the crook.

I like that there, there might, there might be a T shirt coming out now, brother.

I mean, yeah, like you said before, Paul told Pastor Timothy, do the work of an evangelist.

And so if pastors weren't to, to evangelize then I, I guess Paul had a misstep there.

But I would be excited if your listeners, Brother Phil would, would take the hot these top 26 evangelistic verses to memorize whatever translation is their preferred translation.

I'm not pushing anyone necessarily over another.

We have many great translations, but whatever that person chooses, they choose stick with it.

And I put them on index cards.

I have hundreds and thousands of memory verses that I have committed to memory, which I don't expect anybody to be doing that necessarily.

But if you want to be an effective minister of the Word, either as an evangelist, a teacher, preacher, etc.

The more you can utilize God's Word and your messages, you can be sure the more effective they're going to be to your listeners.

Memorize the Word Listeners.

Memorize.

Memorize the Word.

If you say I can't memorize, think about your phone number, your birthday, your spouse's birthday.

There's nothing wrong with your memory.

You can memorize things.

It's the heart we, we commit to memory when, when it's important to us.

So as a school teacher, I know the day that some summer break starts, I've memorized it and, and look forward to it.

I know all of our breaks, my wife's birthday, my children, and so on and so forth.

Commit God's Word to memory and then use God's word that you've committed to memory thy word to have a hidden my heart that it might not sin against you.

So commit it to memory.

To the tens and tens of people who tune into our podcast, please check out the videos from our third annual contending conference at the Grace Baptist Church Woodhaven YouTube channel.

Also, early in the summer, on July 11, we are looking to have the New York City Invasion.

It's an evangelism outreach at Union Square where biblically like minded churches will invade this area with the Gospel of Jesus Christ through open air preaching, street witnessing, prayer and handing out gospel literature.

You can check out GB1CLS Co NYCI until the nets are filled.

Thank you for taking this time to stop and think about it.