Although the Prayer Revival of 1857 had a less than overwhelming start, Jeremiah Lanphier and the six men who prayed with him at lunchtime in downtown New York City decided to meet again the following Wednesday, Sept. 30.
Second of two articles
Although the Prayer Revival of 1857 had a less than overwhelming start, Jeremiah Lanphier and the six men who prayed with him at lunchtime in downtown New York City decided to meet again the following Wednesday, Sept. 30.
This time 20 men showed up to pray, the following week 30 or 40 filled the third floor. During that third meeting, the group determined a daily prayer time was in order rather than a weekly meeting.
The gathering began to increase in numbers so fast that by the end of the second month three large rooms were filled. Many unsaved people came and fell under conviction of sin. Within six months, 50,000 people were gathering in prayer meetings all over New York City.
The Prayer Revival couldn’t have come at a better time, because a national crisis loomed on the horizon. The time of great economic prosperity was about to succumb to the grip of panic. In his work,
When Heaven Touched Earth, Roy Fish wrote, “The immediate era of expansionism and prosperity had occasioned a spirit of carelessness and wildcat speculation in the nation’s economy. This, coupled with financial conditions in England and on the Continent, brought about a major financial panic in October, and plunged the nation into a period of severe economic depression.”
Some have mistakenly attributed the economic panic as the cause for the revival. However, the crisis did fan the flames of the call to prayer and spiritual awakening that had already begun.
The period of depression led people to realize their need to bow their knee to something different from the god of materialism. Even the editors of a secular business publication,
The Journal of Commerce, recognized the spiritual need when they wrote: “Steal away for awhile from Wall Street and from every worldly care, and spend an hour around mid-day in humble and hopeful prayer.”
The prayer meetings were spilling over to other parts of the city. Burton’s Theater, with a capacity of 3,000, had men standing on the streets outside to participate when the theater was completely full. The secular press could not resist writing about the movement.
The New York Times, on March 20, 1858, wrote the following:
“In this City, we have beheld a sight which not the most enthusiastic fanatic for church observances could ever have hoped to look upon. We have seen in a business quarter of the City, in the busiest hours, assemblies of merchants, clerks and working men, to the number of 5,000 gathered day after day for simple and solemn worship. Similar assemblies we find in other portions of the City; a theatre is turned into a chapel; churches of all sects are opened and crowded by day and night.”
In the first three months of 1858, records quoted by
The Tennessee Baptist indicate 25,000 people were converted in New York. By May, the number had doubled to about 50,000.
Great revivals occurred around the nation. In Philadelphia, as news of the New York revival spread, prayer meetings sprang to life. After outgrowing a local meeting hall, the community erected a tent. More than 150,000 people attended the gathering over a four-month period. Estimates were that 10,000 people converted to Christianity during this one event.
In 1858, revivals extended to New England, the Mid-West and the South. Talmot Chambers recorded that in a Michigan prayer meeting a woman submitted an anonymous request for prayer for her unconverted husband. Suddenly a burly man stood and said, “I am that man.” Before the meeting adjourned, six other men were saved, believing the note was from their wives as well.
Story after story of bars closing, crime decreasing, interdenominational relationships built, and people called into the ministry were but a few of the significant effects of the 1857-1858 Layman’s Prayer Revival.
This year, marks the 150th anniversary of this great movement of God. It all began with one man, committed to God, led to begin a season of prayer. Could it happen again? Who will be the next Jeremiah Lanphier to lead a nation to bend its knee in prayer and seek God’s face?
Resources for this article and further study: Roy Fish,
When Heaven Touched Earth; Kathryn Teresa Long, The Revival of 1857-58; Malcom McDow & Alvin L. Reid, Firefall.