REV. L B. FLETCHER

Evening Post, Volume CXIV, Issue 123, 21 November 1932, Page 8

REV. L B. FLETCHER

WELCOME IN LONDON

PREPARING FOR REVIVAL

(From "The Post's" Representative.) LONDON, 7th October.

The- Rev. Lionel B. Fletcher received a warm welcome at the Jtfildmay Conference Hall *when he, appeared in. his new capacity as. "Empire Evangelist" under the scheme prepared by the Trust for Woria Evangelisation. A large number of people were unable to obtain admission, and it was arranged to have a further meeting on the following night. ■ &

The 2800 people in the audience were for the most part under thirty. Hundreds were converts of Mr. Fletcher's London campaign of 1930-1931. Dr. Thomas Cochrane, experienced missionary, founder of one of China's greatest hospitals, and now editor of "World Dominion," presided. He-out-lined . briefly the situation throughout the world from an evangelical viewpoint, and insisted, on the immediate need for a religious revival: "Eva.ngelise—or Perish." Introducing Mr Fletcher and his- wife, Dr. Cochrane emphasised the fact that the challenge that would be thrown down by the Trust and by Mr; Fletcher was a call to rdaring sacrifice, a call to the youth of Great Britain to face difficulties for the sake of the Gospel as great as any put before those who had died in the past for a great ideal.

Mr. Fletcher's message was a renewal of the call to. young men. and women to take part in a revival movement which, he said, had already begun. He told.of great events in Sydney and in New Zealand pointing to the coming of a.long-overdue religious awakening. Ho promised his hearers no easy task, and mentioned tha opposition which some of the most outstanding converts in recent campaigns had met from office-bearers in respectable churches. '

The two dangers against which he warned'them were: A tendency to religious snobbery; a fear lest jthey should do anything which. "just wasn't done." And, on the other hand, that devastating and ' weakening spirit, parading as the guardian of orthodoxy, which was in reality of the devil—the spirit of the heresy hunter.

Mr. Fletehe-r begins work at Leith, Ist to 7th October, with periods at Bcrmoudsey, 22nd October to 7th No-' vcmber; Belfast, 29th October to 20th. November; Hampstead, 2Gth November to 12th December; followed by meetings at Tottenham, East Ham, Plumstoad, Milclniay, Edmonton, and Harrow, in the New Year.