Kentish Town Congregational Chapel (1860)



" No more earnest worker among the London ministers of that epoch could have been found than Rev. James Fleming of the Congregational Church, Kentish Town, who had visited Ireland, and had brought back with him much of the revival fire. For some months a manifest work of grace had been going on in the congregation. Early in Mr Radcliffe's sojourn in London he was invited to speak in Mr Fleming's church. Quite a number of times his earnest, pleading voice was heard there." I rather think it was Mr Fleming himself who wrote: — "The Congregational Church, Kentish Town, has been the scene of no ordinary spiritual movement during the past few days. Many have been awakened, and not a few have found peace. Mr Radcliffe occupied the pulpit on the evening of Wednesday, 25th March, i860, and addressed one of the largest and most attentive audiences that ever assembled in the building. The impression produced on the minds both of believers and unbelievers, by the earnest, pointed, and loving words of the speaker, was as apparent as it was profound. The probability is, that from sixty to a hundred were savingly awakened; while from twenty to thirty of those personally spoken to at the close of the service left the church professing to have found the Saviour, and to enjoy peace.

" Mr Radcliffe addressed an equally large and attentive audience on the following Sabbath morning. Many were deeply affected, and several declared that they had there and then found salvation. On the same afternoon, Mr Fleming, the pastor, himself met fourteen young persons connected with the Sabbath-schools, who had found peace; and from seventy to a hundred anxious inquirers, many of whom were in the greatest distress of mind."

Again, " One from the country has reason to bless God, that during a visit to friends in Kentish Town she has been privileged to hear Mr Fleming and Mr Radcliffe preach. She has been a member of a Christian church more than ten years, fancying herself a believer, yet far from peace; longing for it, yet full of fears, doubts, and backslidings. On Wednesday evening she heard Mr Radcliffe preach, and felt she was, what he described many Christian professors to be, ' a mere church door,' but far from being as harmless. Mr Radcliffe's sermon on Sunday morning showed her that ' the wrath of God ' was still 'abiding on her.' Her distress, even agony of mind, was intense ; but through the power of the Spirit, the earnest pleadings of Mr Radcliffe tO' come to Jesus were the means of bringing peace to her troubled soul ; and on listening to Mr Fleming's stirring discourse in the evening, she felt she was rejoicing in Jesus as her own Saviour."

From 'Recollections of Reginald Radcliffe', by his wife, page 102/3