Robert Mary McChane. First of all a word about his times. Robert Mary McChane was born at a time when there were stirrings of new life, the beginnings of revival in the Church of Scotland. Moderatism had prevailed in the National Church for most of the 18th century and that period was described by the great Dr Thomas Chalmers as the dark age of the Church of Scotland. Now you wonder perhaps what the Moderates were. Well, they placed great emphasis on the role of human reason in effecting moral transformation. There was no depth of spirituality, of enthusiasm for the gospel. Generally speaking, Moderates were men of the world. They were more interested, they said, in their gleams, that was the little crofts, the land that surrounded their nuances, than in their people. They were regarded by discerning Christians as wooden ministers. While the moderates were in power, there was no real challenge to the evil of patronage. This was something that came into Scotland in 1712. The passing of the Patronage Act had given the right of the local landowner as a patron of a parish to appoint a minister over the congregation. without the consent of the people. This was a clear threat to the spiritual independence of the Church, which had been a fundamental tenet of the Scottish Reformed Church since the days of John Knox. A typical moderate minister in his early ministry was Thomas Chalmers. He was inducted to Kilmarney in Fife in 1803, and he spent most of the week, while he was minister there, lecturing in mathematics at St. Andrews University. In 1805 he published a pamphlet with a remarkable admission. The author can assert from what is to him the highest of all authority, the authority of his own experience, that after the discharge of all his parish duties, a minister may enjoy five days in a week of uninterrupted leisure for the prosecution of any science in which his taste may dispose him to engage. That was the attitude of Thomas Chalmers and typical of the moderate ministers that he represented at that time. In 1811, two years before Robert Murray M'Chayne was born, Thomas Chalmers experienced an evangelical conversion. Strangely it came through the death of a relation as we will see how much that has an impact upon men like McChain and others and his ministerial emphasis and activity were completely changed. He rejected and moderated them and in time became the acknowledged leader of the Evangelical party within the Church of Scotland. During that early part of the 19th century the Evangelicals grew in number and strength. and by 1832 they were in the majority in the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland and they passed what is known as a Veto Act which gave congregations the right to veto the patron's nominee. And so there was this great conflict between the church and the state and it lasted for ten years from 1833 to 1843. and the state was trying to impose its will upon the church and the church asserted the spiritual independence of the church. And the outcome was the great disruption of 1843 in the Church of Scotland when 470 evangelical ministers came out of the Church of Scotland, left their churches and their mansions, left their stipends were without anywhere to preach, preached in the open air under some most difficult circumstances in all kinds of weathers and would even refuse land to build the new churches on. That was the situation, that was the times in which Robert Murray M'Cheyne was born. Now I will not say much about his family, all I will say that he was born at 14 Dublin on 21st May 1813. His parents were Adam McChane and Lockhart Murray Dixon, and his father was of the legal profession, a member of the Writers to the Signet. His father and mother had come from Dumfriesshire, they both had been born in Dumfriesshire, and they came to Edinburgh to seek to better themselves. They were amongst upper class or upper middle class people in a new town in Edinburgh. They were well-to-do people, it was a closely knit family, and Robert Murray himself, he was the youngest of a family of five belonging to these parents. Three sons and two daughters, one of whom died in infancy. Robert had two brothers, David Thomas and William Oswald Hunter, and his sister was Elizabeth Mary, known throughout her life as Eliza. And so he had this very well-to-do family, and it was a very close-knit family, with a deep concern for one another's well-being. And Robert, the youngest, was a lively member of the family, very active and very athletic, and never without a circle of friends around him. He was blessed with a sweet, docile temper, and had a very melodious voice. Charles Dent Bell, Rector of Cheltenham, reminiscing of his youth, wrote, My recollections of McChane are those of a tall, slender lad with a sweet, pleasant face, bright yet grave, fond of play and of a blameless life. I remember to this day his tartan trousers, which excited my admiration and my envy. The father was very proud that at the age of four, Robert was able to write the Greek alphabet from memory. Some people can't write the English alphabet at that age. He went to the English school, then to the high school and then to Edinburgh University where he studied classics and moral philosophy. He was interested in the art in poetry, in drawing, in literature. He filled notebooks with all kinds of poetry and prose, and sketches and pictures abounded in these notebooks. That was his family. Then we go on to think of his conversion. MacChain was born into a religious family that had been affected by the modernism of the day. He grew up as a model of Christian youth. These are his father's recollections He was always a boy of the most amiable, I may even say noble disposition. I never found him guilty of a lie or any mean or unworthy action. He had a great contempt for such things and others. I hardly recollect one instance of my having to inflict personal chastisement upon him. The first eighteen years of his life were lived in contentment and happiness in the midst of a most loving family. in his poetry when the tears that we shed were the tears of our joy and the pleasures of home were unmixed with alloy. With his many friends he lived and enjoyed a gay social life filled with parties and dances. Among his friends McChane included a number of young ladies whose favour he tried to win in his quest for popularity. From morn till eve, from eve till merry morn, I kissed a rose nor thought about the thorn. My eye, my ear, my taste I lived to please in one unbroken round of idolese. He remained outwardly respectable and religious. Andrew Bonner said of him some would have been apt to regard him as exhibiting many traits of a Christian character. I have heard him say that there was a correctness and propriety in his demeanour at times of devotion and in public worship which some who knew not his heart were ready to put the account of real feeling. Although he became a member of the church in May 1831, as yet his soul was unawakened to a sense of guilt. Then quite suddenly a change came. His tranquil life was invaded by separation and death. William, the second son in the family, went to India. David, the oldest, became sick and died on the 8th of July 1831. He, like others, had been consistently circumspect in his behaviour, but during the last years of his life his mind became deeply impressed with eternal reality. This is how Robert Murray M'Cheyne recalled his brother, I had a kind brother, he's writing to a boy, I had a kind brother as you have, who taught me many things. He gave me a Bible and persuaded me to read it. He tried to train me as a gardener trains the apple tree upon the wall, but all in vain. I thought myself far wiser than he and would always take my own way. And many a time I well remember I've seen him reading his Bible or shutting his closet door to pray when I've been dressing to go to some frolic or some dance of folly. Well, this dear friend and brother died, and though his death made a great impression on me than ever his life had done, still I found the mystery of being friendless. I had no friend who cared for my soul. I had no minister to take me by the hand and say, come with me and we will do thee good. That's an evidence of the state of affairs in the church at that time that he couldn't find anyone who cared for his soul. His father, in commenting on the change wrought in him, said, The holy example and the happy death of his brother David seemed by the blessing of God to have given a new impulse to his mind in the right direction. From that day forward his friends observed the change. A year later in his diary entry on 8th July 1832 he wrote, On this morning last year, came the first overwhelming blow to my worldliness. How blessed to me thou, O God, only knowest who has made it so. Every year he marked the day as one to remember. On what later proved to be the last anniversary date, he wrote a note to one of his flock in which he says, This day, eleven years ago, I lost my loved and loving brother and began to seek a brother who cannot die. Lacking someone to direct him to the Saviour, Robert, like so many others have done, turned to Christian literature to help. He read the Psalm of Saving Knowledge, which is a practical application of the doctrine of the Westminster Confession of Faith, and is included in the Confessions in the Subordinate Standards of the Church of Scotland. He refers to it in a later entry in his diary. The work which I think, first of all, wrought a saving change in me, how gladly would I renew the reading of it, that the change might be carried on to perfection. His conversion experience is given expression in that well-known poem of his, Jehovah said, Kenu, the Lord my righteousness, when free grace awoke me by light from on high, when legal fear shook me, I trembled to die. no refuge, no safety in self could I see. Jehovah said, Cane you, my Saviour must be. That was his testimony and there is a whole poem there and some people use it as a hymn expressing the conversing experience of Robert Murray M'Chayne. And so he came to see that although outwardly respectable it was for the sake of morality that he had. But as he had been content with his own righteousness, he was gradually made aware of his own sinfulness. He became increasingly aware of the need to give up the pleasures of the world. I hope never to play cards again, never visit on a Sunday evening again. Absented myself from the dance, a braiding ill to bear, but I must try to bear the cross. that sorrow gently pulled me by the sleeve, and made me wake, and all my follies leave. That was the conversion of Robert Mary McChane. Then we come to his call to the ministry. It's not known exactly when his conversion took place, but by the end of the year, 1831, his diary entries give evidence that a change has taken place, and a desire to present himself for service grew increasingly through. This was channeled into the work of the ministry by several influences and again it's literature that played this great part in shaping his direction into the ministry. Literature had an important part to play in his call to serve the Lord. He came to read the recently published Lives of Henry Martin and Lee Richmond In reading such biographies, he became acquainted with the principles of consecrated lives. After reading Martin, he wrote in his diary, 12th November 1831, would I could imitate him, giving up father, mother, country, house, wealth, life, all for Christ. And yet, what hinders? Lord, purify me and give me strength to dedicate myself, my all to thee. As he read Richmond, he recorded on 4th December, deep penitence, not an ounce with tears. I never before saw myself so vile, so useless, so poor, and above all so ungrateful. May these tears be the pledges of my self-dedication. And then he reads, authors from this side of the Atlantic, on 20th March 1832, We find his entry in his diary, read part of the life of Jonathan Edwards. How feeble does my spark of Christianity appear beside such a man, but even his was a borrowed light, and the same source is still open to enlighten me. On 27th June of 1832 it was the life of David Brainerd he was commenting on. Most wonderful man, what conflicts, what depressions, desertions, strength, advancement, victories within thy torn bosom. I cannot express what I think when I think of thee, tonight more set upon missionary enterprise than ever. Next day he cries, O for Brainerd's humility and sin-loathing dispositions. These new convictions led MacChain to present himself before the Presbytery of Edinburgh to enter the Divinity Hall of the University. and on 28th September 1831 he was found to be satisfactory, proficient, and permitted to proceed. He entered the Divinity Hall in November 1831, and there he came into close friendship with Alexander Somerville, a man who you come across quite frequently as one who belonged to the McCheyne circle, and then Horatius and Andrew Bonner, the two brothers, who he had such a great friendship with, and they met together in societies and in prayer times and in evangelistic endeavours in the poorer parts of Edinburgh. The Divinity Faculty of Edinburgh University had an impressive number of men. One of them was Alexander Brunton, teaching Hebrew. Alexander Brunton was M'Chayne's old minister where he first worshipped as a child. And he was a man who was his professor of Hebrew. And under him, McCain became a great lover of Hebrew. He loved Brampton's Old Testament classes, especially lectures on language and Eastern customs. New beauty in original every time I read. And he became proficient in Hebrew. And he developed a love for the Jews. And that came out through this teaching by this man Alexander Brunton in the Divinity Faculty of the University. However, the most prominent attraction in the Divinity Hall was the man I mentioned at the beginning of this address, Dr. Thomas Chalmers. He was now the Professor of Theology in the Divinity Faculty of Edinburgh University. To him more than any other person, MacChain found the mould for his theological thought and a pattern for his ministerial life. Even more than his teaching, it was his ability to inspire which had a lasting effect upon his students. It was Chalmers who inspired the students to devote time each week to visit the unchurched and needy in the most neglected districts of Edinburgh. He was the man who could Happily before he was converted he spent five days pursuing his own things and lecturing in mathematics in St. Andrews University. He's teaching in the divinity faculty and he's going out with these students into the needy district of Edinburgh with the gospel. And that group that he had met for prayer in Chalmers Vestry before setting out on their Saturday morning visit. to the poor places of Edinburgh. In that group, as I mentioned already, were young men whose lives were to be moulded in a similar way to that of McChane and they were destined like him to be influential in the revivals of 1839-42 and the subsequent disruption of the Free Church of Scotland. Alexander Somergle, a friend from high school days, was converted about the same time as They were joined by Horatius and Andrew Bonner and were matching each other's society. When the Reverend Alexander Moody, as he was first called, came to Edinburgh, he then took on the name Alexander Moody Stewart, because that was his wife's surname, so he's known as the Reverend Alexander Moody Stewart, and he became minister of St Luke's in Edinburgh. He was commissioned to organise a new congregation there. But Cheney's quoted as saying, After all the ministries he had been under, I have found the man. He found such delight in the ministry of Alexander Moody Stewart, one of the most spiritual men and ministers you could ever come across. Later, MacChain introduced to him Somerville, Alexander Somerville, and the Boners, thus forming the nucleus of what was termed the MacChain Group. They were all of a like mind. and all had similar feelings and desires and so they were recognized as the McChain group. So that was McChain's call to the ministry. I'll briefly go through his various works very quickly. First of all his work in Edinburgh when he was still a Divinity student. He began as I said working under Dr. Thomas Chalmers in Edinburgh. James McCosh recalls these days. Not a few of us were sent out by him as charmers on missionary work in the Cowgate and among the degraded districts of Edinburgh. He sent forth a great body of his students, bent when they become ministers, not merely on preaching the whole gospel on the Sabbath, but especially in visiting among the people during the week. on looking after the non-church growing and the outcast and securing according to Christ's command that the gospel be preached to every creature. This evangelistic enterprise was Machaen's first view of the heathenism of the city that he was brought up in. He was brought up in the very posh district of the city, but now he was seeing what the rest of the city was like. And he assisted in a survey prepared by Chalmers to ascertain the state of the church's facilities and attendance all over Scotland. In that day, it was usual for people to have sittings in a church. In a district for which McChain was responsible, the proportion of sittings to the population was less than one in seven. It was the people who could afford it who could rent these sittings. in a church and they had them, but the poor people were excluded and McChain came to see the need for adjustment and allied himself with Chalmers in the cause of church extension and slum evangelism. Here is this gifted, well-to-do young man and yet the love of Christ is working so in his heart that he is sending him in to these difficult areas to preach the gospel. So that was the beginning, what an example, what an inspiration from Thomas Chalmers. Then he moved on to his assistantship which was quite common then. He became assistant to a minister usually for a year and this assistantship that McChane exercised was in a place called Larbert and it's in central Scotland near Falkirk. After completing his divinity training he was licensed to preach the gospel and on 7th November he became assistant to John Bonner at Larbert where he laboured for 11 months. John Bonner in Larbert was responsible for 700 families in the combined parishes of Larbert and Dunipace and endeavoured to see to all their needs. When what had been a community of 400 people in 1790 had grown to 6,000 people in 1835, this was due to the Curran Ironworks, the largest industrial plant in Scotland at that time, On one occasion, Eliza, Robert's sister who was with him, observed that Bonner had just returned from visiting in 28 homes that day, nearly as good as the Reverend Kenneth A. McRae. McCain threw himself into his labours with this experience he had working with Thomas Chalmers in Edinburgh. It was usual for him to visit 12 to 15 families a day. The combined efforts of the two ministers were such that it was said, there is not a coroner's wife that takes a pain in her head or foot, but she has a minister at her door weekly until she gets well. Some attention. But Jane's visiting was not of a routine nature. He endeavoured to speak to the parishioners about their souls. Death claimed a third of those that were sick. and his diligence is seen that most died within a day of his last call on their homes. And so it was another training ground in evangelism and outreach for Robert Mary McChane. And that prepared him for the great work of his life and that was the call to St. Peter's Church in Dundee, the church that will always be associated with Robert Mary McChane. In the spring of 1836 he was called by the elders to preach as a candidate in a newly formed church extension charge of St. Peter's. It was then in the western outskirts of Dundee. Among the other candidates were Andrew Bonner and Alexander Somerville, my two greatest intimates, being made my rivals, he said. There was a decided preference for McChain, and on 24th November 1836 he was ordained to the ministry and inducted his St. Peter's. Now Dundee at that time was a growing industrial town with a modern harbour. Spinning and weaving were two of the main economic drivers as it were in that city. The steam engine had transformed old mills into new factories where linen, rope and above all jute were manufactured. Many of the factories were unsafe and unhealthy. women and children were employed as well as men. The place was just emerging as a throbbing industrial and shipping centre. Crowds flocked in from all over Scotland and Ireland and the population in 1835 stood at 57, 000. The expansion brought with it some of the evils of the Industrial Revolution. In one parish there were only 11 bread shops as against 108 public houses. A quarter of working class income was spent on liquor. In spite of the increase in population, the number of churches remained constant and the first real effort to remedy this situation was the building of St. Peter's, catering for an area of some 4,000 souls. The building had sittings for 1, 175. So the majority of M'Chayne's parishioners were strangers to the church. In his visitation, M'Chayne adopted a system he first learned from Chalmers in Edinburgh and used in Larbert, the basis of which was to minister to the geographical parish rather than to the members of the congregation. He overlooked no home as the survey through the religious condition of the parish and to converse at least once with as many people as possible. He notified the families the day before he was to visit them. And this is how he says, I girded myself for the combat and commenced. I girded myself for the combat. And that's what we did do. Someone was saying recently, what can colleges and seminaries teach us? They can teach us theology, but they can't really teach us how to do the work. And this was through a muck chain. He had the inspiration of Chalmers in the example, so I guarded myself for the combat and commenced. He expounded some pertinent text of scripture, carefully noting the impression it made upon his hearers as he spoke plainly and urged them hard. Before he left, McChane invited everyone to an evening meeting where it was common for him to speak to nearly two hundred people in a large room or in some back room. That was his system. He went round the homes and he spoke to the people and he left an invitation, come to an evening meeting in a district and he would preach the gospel to them. He made notes of all his pastoral visits and recorded all these things in his visitation notebooks and he has very Interesting entries. Died 8th June at 2pm. It is to be feared as he lived. O Lord, lay not his soul's blood to my charge. Truly I might have seen him oftener, and spoken plainer, and more affectionately, and less stiffly. His hard-hearted wife had reviled our often coming by saying, Are they gain to make him a minister? And that poor man died, but my chain fell. so strongly for him. Then just briefly to mention McChain's mission to the Jews. I spoke about the influence that Brampton had on him in giving out love for the Hebrew and for the Jewish people. And as a result of that love for Hebrew and for the Jewish people, he was appointed on a deputation to go to Palestine. by the Free Church of Scotland to investigate what could be done to bring the Gospel to the Jewish people. And M'Chayne suffered at that time, as he did suffer a lot from illness, and suffered in particular from palpitation of the heart. And he was advised to go and rest in his parents' home in Edinburgh. And it was while there, Dr. Candlish had this idea that M'Chayne should be sent as one of the deputation to Palestine, and because of his great interest in the Hebrew language and his affectionate enthusiasm for the Jews, it seems so appropriate. And we have the account, of course, in the narrative of a mission of inquiry to the Jews, written by Bonner, who went with him, Andrew Bonner, and Mary McChane, and it became one of McChane's great watchwords to the Jew first. And he went round the country proclaiming what was necessary to preach the gospel to the Jew. And that was McChain's mission to the Jews. Now I'm going to speak a little about the revival that took place in Dundee, because that's what I hope to apply to ourselves. From the beginning of his ministry, McChain laid emphasis upon the need for an awakening within the church. Andrew Bonner records in his diary on 30th December 1835, a letter from Robert McChane has made me to resolve to pray for a revival at Larburg and Denepes. On 3rd February 1836, Robert McChane remarked to me in conversation that perhaps one reason why we are not favoured with a revival is that we are not ready for it. The ministers would not be able to direct the people in their alarms. But in his congregation in St. Peter's in Mendee, he says, It has long been a matter of sad and solemn inquiry to me. What is the cause of the little success that attends the preaching of the gospel in our day and particularly in my parish? And he goes on to give reasons and he preached on that text in Isaiah 44. I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground. These are not words in the whole Bible that have been oftener in my heart, and oftener on my tongue, than those since I began my ministry among you. And yet, although God has never from the first day left us without some tokens of his presence, he has never fulfilled his promise. I have taken it up to plead it more anxiously before God. And what did M'Chayne do as he longed for revival? Well, he began reading the accounts of the narratives of revivals that took place under Jonathan Edwards in America and Robe in Plessy. And he preached a sermon which you will find in the Member and Remains entitled, Why is God a Stranger in the Land? And he realized the deadness that there was amongst two Christians and he prayed for times of revival. Now, how did this long for revival come? Well, it came in this way. William Burns was minister at Kilsyth, a naturalist north of Glasgow, in 1821, and he began to study the parochial records in the town to discover the progress of the revival that took place under Roe in 1742. He instituted a series of special lectures and prayer meetings for a revival of religion, and at that time exercised a ministry that was instrumental in preparing for revival. It was William Chalmers Burns, son of the minister, who was asked to supply St. Peter's during McCain's absence in Palestine, and he laboured there from April to July 1839 with no spectacular results. In July, he went to the funeral of his brother-in-law in Paisley, where he was greatly affected. Stopping at Kilsyth on the way home for the communion season, he spoke several times with great effect. On a Tuesday before leaving for Dundee, he was due to address an open air meeting in the marketplace in Kilsyth. Bad weather forced the meeting to be held in the church. which was packed to overflowing with 1,400 people. A singing was announced on Psalm 102, which Burns read and which we sang the other day. Her time for favour which was set, behold, is now come to an end. The word now touched his own heart and encouraged the hope that God's set time was actually at hand. Burns preached from Psalm 110, verse 3, Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power. And in the course of his sermon, he spoke about the work of the Spirit in other days, particularly at Kirk of Shots. Toward the end, as he appealed closely and fervently to the unconverted to close with Christ, God's offer of mercy An overpowering burst of emotion shook the whole congregation and his voice was drowned out by the screams and sobbing of the crowd. It was the beginning of a remarkable awakening that prevented William Chalmers Burns from returning to Dundee for a week or two. There the revival began in Cossack under William Chalmers Burns. He eventually got back to Dundee on 8th August and spoke two days later at the Thursday evening meeting in St. Peter's. He explained about what had detained him and invited those who were seeking a way of peace to remain after the meeting. A hundred stayed, and at the conclusion of a solemn address to their anxious souls, suddenly the power of God seemed to descend, and all were bathed in tears. The scenes at Kossuth were repeated in D and went on for four weeks. Now the news of this movement first reached McChain and Bonner on their way home from Palestine at Hamburg in Germany. The deputies calculated that while at the foot of Lebanon, while McChain was very ill, that the work began. Reaching Dundee on 23rd November, the day of the weekly prayer meeting, McChain spoke to his congregation in a completely filled church. I was almost overpowered by the sight and felt great liberty in preaching. I never before preached to such an audience so many weeping, so many waiting for the words of eternal life. When he came out the whole road was filled with people welcoming him and multitudes followed him to the door of the mans where he had to speak to them again. What M'Cheyne longed for and prayed for became an experience and indeed and what was so marvelous about M'Cheyne that he was free of jealousy The glory belonged to God. God had used another instrument, but he rejoiced in that. Now I want to make an application for our own situation and for our own day. What I want to say is that the minister God uses greatly, he prepares first as a Christian. We have seen that in Archibald Alexander, we have seen it in Professor John Murray. And M'Chayne, first and foremost, had preparation as a Christian. Let your life be the life of your ministry was one of his watchwords. And what happened in M'Chayne's experience? Well, he was awakened to see the vanity of the world. the certainty of death and eternity and the danger of losing one's soul. That came vividly home to him. The uncertainty of life was before his eyes. It was particularly so in those days when people were dying young. And it made him draw back from the world and worldliness. He tasted the pleasures of the world and he saw the emptiness of them and he turned against them. Some of the most vehement things heard from his lips were condemnation of the lovers of the world and lovers of pleasure. Flee the world. Flee bad company. He formed a decided testimony against the world. He recognized the world as the adversary of God and of his church. Love not the world. Now the things that are in the world. How much we need to recover. That is one of the things that we have lost in the church today. How we used to do things. Well it was a separation between the world and the church. And the world was the adversary of the church and the adversary of God. And we need to recapture that today. Now, Chains, secondly, was given a deep conviction of sin. He was led to Christ through deep and ever abiding convictions. He says, What a mass of corruption I've been. Oh, brethren, if God has ever discovered yourself to you, you would wonder that such a lump of hell and sin would have been permitted to live and breathe so long. He saw the root of every known sin within him. And then he saw how It is that when we come to a self-emptying and abasement that we come to Christ and he says clear conviction of sin is the only true origin of dependence on another's righteousness and therefore strange to say of the Christians a peace of mind and cheerfulness. And this led to an absorbing love to the Lord Jesus Christ. This was his ruling passion. This was what dominated his life. He came to see the vanity of the world. He came to a deep conviction of sin. He came to an assurance that all that he has is in Christ. And he had a passion with love for Christ. And that was his Christian experience. And in light of that, he pursued holiness. He gave great study of the way to be Christlike. Study universal holiness of life, he writes to one. Your whole usefulness depends upon this. Cast yourselves at the feet of Christ. Implore the Spirit to make you a holy man. I often pray, Lord, make me as holy as a pardoned sinner can be made. The greatest need of my people is personal holiness. A holy minister is an awful weapon in the hand of God. He pursued holiness. Then secondly, he walked in almost unbroken fellowship with the triune God. Bonner said of McChain, the real secret of his soul's prosperity lay in the daily enlargement of his heart in fellowship with God. How true that was, the daily the daily enlargement of his heart in fellowship with God. And the group to whom a chain belonged were a group who were bound together in prayer. They prayed for one another on a Saturday night. Saturday night was set aside for them. But then I come to the most important thing and the final thing and that is He depended on the Holy Spirit as the source and spring of divine life in his soul. The text with which he began his ministry in Dundee and used on the anniversary of his ordination in Dundee every year are these verses from Isaiah 61. The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me. That was the secret of his ministry. The energy of the Spirit is like a fire. He sheds a broader love of God in the heart. There's a flame of love. It's seen in the preacher as a holy ardor. It was said of John the Baptist, he was a burning and a shining light. M'Chayne had his soul kindled with a heavenly flame, burnt with love to Christ, fervent desires for the advancement of his kingdom and glory, and also with ardent love to the souls of men and desire for their salvation. It has been observed that the evangelists most used of God have all been men for whom love has been the main theme. He had this love. He had this unction of his spirit. His life counted and his very presence had an effect on people. There was no mistaking who he was and whom he served. His very presence was a rebuke. James Hamilton, one of his friends, says, Indolence and levity and unfaithfulness are sins that beset me, and his living presence was a rebuke to all these, for I never knew one so instant in season and out of season, so impressed with invisible realities and so faithful in reproving sin and witnessing for Christ. He preached, his life counted, and his preaching counted. Many ministers today concentrate on expository preaching and aim to instruct the mind. Now Chains' aim was to reach the conscience and the heart of the hearer, to make them aware that God was speaking to them. He sought to get his text on God in a fresh way and aimed to preach as to make things happen. In this he was following Jonathan Edwards in a sermon on 1 Samuel 3.19, McChain says, it is a testimony of an old divine, and he's referring to Edwards, who was indeed a master in Israel, that the main benefit obtained by preaching is by impression made upon the mind at the time, and not by remembering what was delivered. If a rock does not break when a hammer strikes, it is not likely to break afterwards. And that was a characteristic of McChain's preaching. preaching with urgency. Duncan Matheson, the Scottish evangelist, spoke about MacChain. He preached with eternity stamped on his brow. The urgency, his motto was, the night cometh. And he preached with compassion. On one occasion he asked Andrew Bonner for the text he had preached on that Lord's Day. And Bonner said, the wicked shall be turned into hell. were you able to preach it with tenderness? said M'Cheith. He said it's a voice of divine love that is heard among the thunder. Blakey and his Preachers of Scotland speaks of M'Cheith bringing in a new element into preaching and that was winsomeness. He conveyed his love to his heartfelt for the young. He often spoke directly to the children. He wrote a tract Reasons why children should fly free to Christ. That was M'Chayne. He was unique, you might say. But surely what we have to learn from this is that he was a sinner saved by grace. And that same grace is available to us. He was dependent utterly on the Holy Spirit for his life and ministry. And that same Holy Spirit has been given us You have not because you ask not. M'Chayne recalls a rebuke he received from a Mr. Dempster in Denny. This is what the man said. I was highly pleased with your discourse, but in prayer it struck me that you thought God unwilling to give. And M'Chayne had this expectancy. He expected God to work. He expected God to answer prayer. He expected God to bless him. And he experienced these blessings. The Spirit was given at Pentecost. But the Spirit flows down, as it were, through the centuries. And the Spirit's giving is dependent upon Christ ahead. And he poured out his Spirit on these early days of the 19th century in Scotland. and the spirit came down on prepared instruments. In God's sovereignty, William Chalmers Burns was used in Dundee when M'Cheyne was away, that all the glory would be God's. You see, revival is the recovery of what was there before. These men looked back, they read about God's doings, They recounted what God had done in former times, in Kirkpatrick, in Kilsyth, in Cambuslang, and they encouraged people to pray for revival. And revival came, and the blessing seemed to be carried about. We were talking yesterday about how the blessing was carried about in Virginia. Well, the same thing happened in Scotland. The blessing came in Kilsyth, on William Chalmers Burns, he carried that blessing to Dundee and revival came to Dundee. He went on to Perth and the same blessing fell again and in a lesser degree in Kelso, in Collis where Andrew Bonner was, in Jedburgh. And some of these men that we're speaking about were very ordinary men. But when they were filled by the Holy Spirit, they spoke in a new way. That was true of John Milne in Perth. That was true of William Chalmers Burns. And you see, it was the Spirit of God that came upon them. And we have to pray that God will raise up such men. What lack of leadership we have in the United Kingdom, in the church and in the nation. And when God is going to bless a people, he almost always prepares men of God. and he anoints these men of God. There's action upon them, and he works through them, and his blessing comes down, and they are identified with what went before, and it's a recovery of what has happened in the church in days past. We need to call to mind God's mighty deeds. And as we think about these things, you think it's just an historical interest. It's not. It's in order that we may hear of God's words, that we may see them repeated in our day unto the glory of God. That's what M'Cheyne teaches us. We need that anction. We need that power. We need men with anction and power, and we need the blessing of the Holy Spirit to revive this needy church of ours in both our countries, may God grant it for His glory.