Episode Details

The Preacher Who Emptied Franklin's Pockets #America250 #Nation250 #Nightlight #RTTBROS

“How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher?"”

— Romans 10:14

THE STORY

Benjamin Franklin did not believe everything George Whitefield preached. He said so himself.

But he admired the man enormously, and the story of their friendship is one of the most charming and revealing in all of American history. Franklin, the great skeptic, became one of Whitefield's closest friends, his American publisher, and on at least one memorable occasion, an unwilling donor.

Franklin attended one of Whitefield's outdoor meetings in Philadelphia with his pockets full of money and a firm resolution not to give any of it. As Whitefield preached, Franklin felt his resolve weaken. By the time Whitefield finished, Franklin had emptied every coin in his pocket, gold included, into the offering basket.

He recorded this story himself, without embarrassment, in his autobiography. He did not claim to have been converted. But he admitted freely that something happened in those crowds that he could not explain by natural means.

THE REFLECTION

What do we do with Benjamin Franklin? He is perhaps the most theologically complex of the Founders, not a Christian in the evangelical sense, and honest enough not to pretend otherwise. And yet here he stands, publishing Whitefield's sermons and admitting the power of the gospel he had not fully received.

Perhaps the lesson is this: the gospel is powerful enough to move even those who resist it. Franklin could not explain what happened in those meetings. He could not reduce it to reason or science. And to his credit, he did not try.

Whitefield preached until the day he died, quite literally. He delivered his last sermon standing on a barrel in a field in Newburyport, Massachusetts, and was dead of an asthma attack the next morning. He emptied himself completely for the gospel. Even Franklin wept at the news.

The Great Awakening reached people Franklin's philosophy never could. It bypassed the mind and went straight to the conscience. That is always how genuine revival works, not by argument alone, but by the Spirit of God bearing witness to something deeper than intellect.

THE PATRIOT’S PRAYER

Lord, we thank You for preachers who gave everything, men who wore out their voices and their bodies in Your service, who believed the gospel was worth any sacrifice. Raise up such men and women in our day. Do in us what Franklin could not explain. Empty our pockets and our pride and our resistance to Your Spirit. We do not want to leave a single meeting unchanged when You have been at work. In Jesus' name, Amen.

PRAY IT FORWARD: Is there an area of your life you have decided in advance not to give to God? Bring it to Him honestly today and ask Him to do what Franklin's philosophy could not.