Why We Still Need Moody
The man who invented modern evangelicalism.
by Timothy George | posted 12/06/1999 12:00AM
One hundred years ago today, on December 22, 1899, Dwight Lyman Moody died in Northfield, Massachusetts, the same small town in which he had been born. Years before, Moody had anticipated this moment: "Someday you will read in the papers that D. L. Moody of East Northfield is dead. Don't you believe a word of it! At that moment I shall be more alive than I am now. … I was born of the flesh in 1837. I was born of the Spirit in 1856. That which is born of the flesh may die. That which is born of the Spirit will live forever."
Moody has been called the Billy Graham of the nineteenth century, but it would be more accurate to say that Graham is the D. L. Moody of the twentieth. Both are evangelical icons in the revivalist tradition. Like Graham, Moody modeled the virtues of integrity, sincerity, and single-mindedness, avoiding the taint of scandal in personal and financial matters. In their respective eras, both preachers also served as magnanimous leaders around whom others could rally.
More specifically, Moody embodied three principles that are highly relevant for what we face today. First, he modeled an evangelical unity focused on the gospel. Some have predicted the inevitable fragmentation and dissipation of evangelicalism in the post-Graham era, a replay of the fratricidal fights following Moody's death. But history need not repeat itself. Evangelical unity is not a matter of patching together new coalitions, nor of devising a new superstructure. Jesus Christ is our unity, and his gospel is our message. Second, Moody showed love and generosity toward all, including those with whom he differed. This same note was sounded by the late Francis Schaeffer, who reminded us that love is the irreducible mark of the Christian: "We must not forget that the final end is not what we are against, but what we are for."
Finally, both Moody and Graham nurtured a worldwide fellowship of faithful believers. Moody and Graham were Great Commission Christians and they proclaimed the many-colored grace of God unto the ends of the earth.
Moody was led to faith at age 19 (and membership into the Congregational church) through his participation in a Sunday-school class taught by Edward Kimball. That same year, 1856, Moody left New England for Chicago, where he came under the influence of the lay-led prayer revival that swept through the urban centers of America on the eve of the Civil War. "Mother" Phillips, a formidable woman of faith, taught Moody to study the Bible and to reach out in love to the unwanted street children of the city. Moody started his own Sunday school, which eventually attracted more than 1,000 students. From this work emerged the Illinois Street Church, "an all-age rescue shop within a yard of hell," as one historian described it.
Not everyone approved of Moody's work with the castaways and ragamuffins. He was dubbed "Crazy Moody" and criticized for enticing the children to Sunday school with the promise of pony rides and "missionary sugar." Others asked whether a mere layman should usurp the role of the ordained clergy. But Moody's compassion and obvious success could not be gainsaid.
The 1860s were a frenetic blur in Moody's life: he married Emma Revell, a fellow Sunday-school worker; he served as a chaplain in the Civil War, making several trips to the front; he intensified his work as a city missionary in Chicago, where he became president of the YMCA; he devoted time to fundraising and building projects; he made his first tour of Great Britain.
December 6 1999, Vol. 43, No. 14
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