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C. THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

1. Charles G. Finney (1792-1875)

An exceptional individual, Finney was born in Connecticut, raised on the shores of Lake

Ontario in western New York, and served an apprenticeship at law. Converted as an adult in
1821, he had a multi-faceted career as pastor, college professor, and president (Oberlin College
in Ohio), and especially as a highly effective traveling evangelist. His national reputation as an
outstanding American revivalist was established through his ministry in revivals of 1825-1831.

Finney became an outstanding orator with extraordinary clarity, tone, ranges of vocal

power and pitch. During his early ministry in western New York, his preaching was vehement,
scolding, dramatic, and highly personal. A unitarian made these observations about Finneys
preaching style:

You raise your voice, lift high your head, bend forward your trunk, fasten your staring
eyes upon the auditors, declare that they know it to be Gods truth that they stand upon
the brink of hells gaping pit of fire and brimstone, and bending your body and bringing
your clenched fist halfway from the pulpit to the broad aisle, denounce instant and
eternal damnation upon them unless they repent forthwith.

Another critic pictured Finneys Hellfire preaching in terms of imagery reminiscent of the Tours
of Hell genre: "Look, look, see the millions of wretches biting and gnawing their tongues as they
lift their scalding heads from the burning lake [of hell] . . . Hear them groan amidst the fiery
billows as they lash and lash and lash their burning shores . . ."

Another description of Finneys preaching style included a response of his captivated

audience:

While depicting the glories or the terrors of the world to come he trod the pulpit like a
giant. He gave his imagination full play. His voice, wide in scope and mellow in pathos,
now rung in tones of warning and expostulation, and anon melted in sympathetic accents
of entreaty and encouragement.. . . As he would stand with his face toward the side
gallery, and then involuntarily wheel around, the audience in that part of the house
towards which he threw his arm would dodge as if he were throwing something at them.
In describing the sliding of a sinner to perdition, he would lift his long finger towards the
ceiling and slowly bring it down till it pointed to the area in front of the pulpit, when half
his hearers in the rear of the house would rise unconsciously to their feet to see him
descend into the pit below.

Finneys traditionalist perspective was a major factor in propelling him into evangelistic

ministry. His vivid imagery of Hell and his dramatic flair in warning people against it were
designed to bring people to repentance and conversion, the only way to avoid the horrors of Hell.
For all his God-given abilities, Finney was well aware of his dependence upon the Holy Spirits
effective operations through him for his successful ministry.