George-Whitefield-Field-Preacher

19° GEORGE WHITEFIELD
fresh triumphs. When Whitefield ended his sermon, McCulloch
took his place, and preached till past one in the morning;
and even then the people were unwilling to leave the spot.
Many walked the fields all night, praying and singing, the
sound of their voices much rejoicing the heart of Whitefield
as he lay awake in the neighbouring manse.
The following Sunday was sacrament day, and he hurried
back to Edinburgh to do some work there, before joining in
the great and solemn ceremony. He says that there was such
a shock in Edinburgh on Thursday night and Friday morning
as he had never felt before. On Friday night he came to
Cambuslang, and on Saturday he preached to more than
twenty thousand people. Sabbath, however, was the day of
days. New converts had looked forward to it as the time
of their first loving confession of their Redeemer, and aged
Christians were assembled with the freshness of their early
devotion upon them. Godly pastors had come from neighbour-
ing and also from distant places to assist in serving the tables,
and to take part in prayer and exhortation. All around the
inner group of believers who were to partake of the sacrament
for a remembrance of our Lord was a mighty host, scarcely
less earnest or less outwardly devout. Two tents were erected
in the glen ; seventeen hundred ' tokens ' were issued to those
who wished to communicate. The tables stood under the
brae, and when Whitefield began to serve one of them the
people so crowded upon him that he was obliged to desist and
go to one of the tents to preach. All through the day, preaching
by one or another never ceased ; and at night, when the last
communicant had partaken, all the companies, still unwearied,
and still ready to hear, met in one congregation, and Whitefield,
at the request of the ministers, preached to them. His sermon
was an hour and a half long, and the twenty thousand were
not tired of hearing it.