New Connection Methodist Chapel, Sheffield - William Booth (1855)
Certainly, William Booth had never preached with greater effect. This mission in Sheffield was perhaps his first whirlwind triumph. The chapels were so full that the stairs of the pulpits were crowded and hundreds stood at the doors. Conversions occurred among people of all classes.
'We had a wonderful day at the chapel yesterday, a tremendous crowd jammed together like sheep in a pen, and one of the mightiest sermons at night I ever listened to, from "Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed Me!"... I believe that if God spares him, and he is faithful to his trust, his usefulness will be untold, and beyond our capacity to estimate. He is becoming more and more effective every day, and God seems to be preparing him in his own soul for greater things yet. We do indeed (she writes) find our earthly heaven in each other. ... I never knew him in a more spiritual and devotional condition of mind. His character daily rises in my esteem and admiration. . . . He often tells me he could not have believed he should ever have loved a being as he loves me.'
From 'The Life of William Booth', by Harold Begbie, Volume I, page 292 and from a letter from Catherine Booth.
Additional Information
Now flats.