EVANGELISM IN BRITAIN

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27395, 7 July 1954, Page 15

EVANGELISM IN BRITAIN

“Sense Of Hope Arid Expectancy”

(NJZ. Press Association—Copyright) (Rec. 8 pin.) LONDON, July 5. The Rev. W. Russell Shearer, the president, told Methodists in conference in London today that one of the most encouraging signs of the present time had been the “phenomenal” London campaign in which Mr Billy Graham, the American evangelist, had “spoken to the whole of England.” Another had been the astonishing crowds attending the indoor and outdoor meetings of Dr. Donald Soper, the former Methodist president. No-one would dare claim that the country was on the eve of a revival, but there was “a sense of hope and expectancy throughout the whole of the Christian Church in Britain.” he said.

Mr Shearer said that on the debit side were “the raucous noises of contemporary life.” He added: “But there is a sound we scarcely permit ourselves to hear—the feeble cry of millions of refugees and displaced persons, many of them ageing, and without home or hope, a sinister undertone that has almost despaired of mercy.” Mr H. Guy Chester, the vice-presi-derit, said the Methodist Book of Hymns, nearly half of which were written by Charles Wesley, “too often express a theology which many people find difficult to understand and, at times, are unwilling to accept.” There were also thousands of people who took Communion “who have no idea what it is all about—and I am not at all convinced that the service as set out in our Book of Offices, is what Jesus meant it to be.”