Revival Preceded by Prayer
Acts 2:1-4
And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.…


In the winter of 1875, we were worshipping in the Brooklyn Academy of Music in the interregnum of churches. We had the usual great audiences, but I was oppressed beyond measure by the fact that conversions were not more numerous. One Tuesday I invited to my house five old, consecrated Christian men — all of them gone now, except Father Pearson, and he, in blindness and old age, is waiting for the Master's call to come up higher. These old men came, not knowing why I had invited them. I took them to the top room of my house. I said to them: "I have called you here for special prayer. I am in an agony for a great turning to God of the people. We have vast multitudes in attendance and they are attentive and respectful, but I cannot see that they are saved. Let us kneel down and each one pray, and not leave this room until we are all assured that the blessing will come and has come." It was a most intense crying unto God. I said, "Brethren, let this meeting be a secret," and they said it would be. That Tuesday night special service ended. On the following Friday night occurred the usual prayer-meeting. No one knew of what had occurred on Tuesday night, but the meeting was unusually thronged. Men accustomed to pray in public in great composure broke down under emotion. The people were in tears. There were sobs and silences and solemnities of such unusual power that the worshippers looked into each other's faces as much as to say, "What does all this mean?" And, when the following Sabbath came, although we were in a secular place, over four hundred arose for prayers, and a religious awakening took place that made that winter memorable for time and for eternity. There may be in this building many who were brought to God during that great ingathering, but few of them know that the upper room in my house in Quincy Street, where those five old Christian men poured out their souls before God, was the secret place of thunder.

(T. De Witt Talmage.)



Parallel Verses
KJV: And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.

WEB: Now when the day of Pentecost had come, they were all with one accord in one place.




Pentecost; Or, the First Christian Day
Top of Page
Top of Page