Articles

Revival historian J. Edwin Orr marks the Second Great Awakening in America as beginning with Isaac Backus’ call to the churches for prayer for revival in 1794.[1] Thereafter, a period of almost continuous revival existed in the United States until 1842 except for the decade beginning with the War of 1812. The early years of revival occurred in the colleges and churches in the east and in the churches and camp meetings of the west. The early years of revival produced many young leaders, but there was no dominant personality that led the revivals. Orr dated the later years of the Second Great Awakening as beginning in 1822 and lasting until 1842. Unlike the early years, this era produced one dominant figure in evangelicalism during […]

Religious Revivals amid political turmoil and war To properly understand revivals that occurred during the later years of The Great Awakening, it is important to have knowledge of the contemporary events that impacted those revivals and religious life in general from the 1760s through the end of the Revolutionary War. During the 1750s the British had awakened to the importance to the British Empire of the few American colonies that clung to the eastern edge of a vast wilderness thousands of miles across the Atlantic. This new found interest was kindled by the French and Indian War being fought on the American continent (1754-1763). Britain’s interest and involvement in the affairs of the American colonists significantly increased following the war and ended decades of salutary […]

The beginnings of revivalism in New England occurred during the late 1600s to about 1720. The early years of The Great Awakening are generally considered to encompass the years from about 1720 to 1740. During both of these periods the characteristics and practices of religious revivals and revivalism grew in importance and frequency and gave birth to evangelicalism with its dramatic and powerful style of preaching, emphasis on personal conversion called the “new birth” often accompanied by outward physical manifestations, personal devotion and holiness, and justification by faith alone (individual access to God) which de-emphasized the importance and authority of church government and its leaders. In many ways the characteristics of the newly-born evangelicalism can be said to mirror many elements found in the early […]

The dates of the beginning of the Great Awakening in America and its conclusion are a matter of supposition. If the long view is taken and includes the revivals in the early 1720s and concludes with the waning of the Awakening’s long-term effects on society, then The Great Awakening can be said to span from about 1720 to the conclusion of the American Revolution in 1783.[1] Other historians date the Awakening as beginning with the 1735 revival in Northampton, Massachusetts, under the ministry of Jonathan Edwards and ending with the conclusion of the powerful and unprecedented season of revivals that occurred during 1740-1743.[2] A third view dates the Awakening as occurring between 1735 and 1760 which is considered by many to be the period of […]

What occurred among the New England Puritans between 1620 and 1660 is a remarkable story that began with a rag-tag band of beleaguered separatist Puritans (Pilgrims) that landed on the shores of a vast wilderness in 1620. By the end of that decade many of the prosperous, well-educated members of the Church of England also began immigrating to New England. Unlike the Pilgrims, they still considered themselves to be members of the Church of England, although separated from their corrupt brethren that remained in their homeland. Known as Puritans, they formed the great migration to the Massachusetts Bay Colony which by 1640 had grown to a population of twenty-six thousand. For these Protestant Puritans who strongly followed the teachings of John Calvin, religion was the […]

Conditions in England 1688-1739 As discussed in Chapter 3, the Catholic Church and the various branches of the Protestant Church were in great turmoil from the beginning of the Reformation in 1517 until 1648 when the peace agreement at Westphalia substantially ended the Catholic-Protestant wars on the continent of Europe. However, the conflict would not end in Great Britain until the Glorious Revolution of 1688 and the triumph of Protestantism under William III. All wars invariably lead to post-war periods in which the Christian faith is neglected which leads to a general decay of national morality. This was the condition in which the British people found themselves at the end of the seventeenth century. Not only had the opposing camps of Christianity fought among themselves, […]