by Chris L. Williams
The church board had made its decision! Dwight’s speech was too poor; he would not be allowed to speak in the church again. So he began searching for Christian activities in and around town. After many inquiries and no luck, the young man went to the Wells Street Mission and asked if he would be able to help them with anything. The aspiring minister told the man in charge that he couldn’t teach or preach, the man said in a discounting way, “Why don’t you go out into the alleys and streets to see what boys you can bring in?”
With the fresh marching orders, the young Dwight set out to see what boys he could find, rounding up eighteen ragged, barefoot boys on his first trip through the rough side of town. Later in life Dwight let it be known that this was his best and most joyful Sunday ever! After searching for two years to find out what his work was before he succeeded, the zealous novice minister discovered his mission.
Like everything he was involved in, he threw himself head first into the new adventure of finding kids. Or what he called “drumming up scholars”. One afternoon this, would be preacher realized the boys didn’t much care for the formality and hard learning of the Wells Street Mission. He could hardly blame them; he never cared much for it either.
The idea struck with a forcible blow, it changed the evangelical movement for good. After rounding up several boys, the novice pastor asked them, “How’d you boys like to help us build a mission Sunday school?” The first Sunday the freshly painted rail car that was used to house the boys almost burst at the seams. Before too, long a one and a half story house was purchased for them, it was once a saloon. Numbers increased weekly due to the voracious outreach campaigns.
A well-known businessman once popped in to see the thirty or so lot of sorry little munchkins, but to the aspiring minister these children were precious jewels, and they made up the mission to which God had called him. This young man was so devoted to the little ones entrusted to him, that after cleaning the mission on Saturdays he spent the rest of the afternoon and evening drumming up boys and girls and if he needed to, he would reason with the children’s parents to allow them to come and if need be he would even wash and dress the youngsters.
What a tremendous heart young Dwight had for the children of Chicago! He was blessed by God to touch the world because he first ministered to children. The children’s pastor who changed the world for Christ? You know him as Dwight Lyman Moody, D.L. Moody, the great American evangelist.
