In the summer of 1871, Rev. Robert W. McAll and his wife,
visiting Paris at the close of the war with Germany, and led by
a deep desire to reach workingmen with the gospel, were giving
away tracts in the hotels and on the public streets, when a
workingman said: “If any one will come among us and teach us
not a gospel of priestcraft and superstition, but of truth and
liberty, many of us are ready to hear.”
Mr. McAll returned home, but above the murmur of the waves and
the hum of busy life he heard that voice, “If any one will come
and teach us ... we are ready to hear.” He said to himself,
“Is this God’s call? Shall I go?” Friends said, “No!” But a
voice within said, “Yes.” And he left his English parish and
went back, and in a district worse to work in than St. Giles in
London he began to tell the old story of Jesus. Soon the little
place was crowded, and a larger room became a necessity; and
sixteen years later that one gospel hall has become 112, in
which, in one year, have been held 14,000 religious meetings,
with a million hearers, and 4,000 services for children,
with 200,000 attendants.--PIERSON, “The Miracles of
Missions.”
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